Political Forgiveness

In covering the confession by Newt Gingrich concerning his affair of the late 90’s, CNN speculates that critics will call the religious right hypocrites if they forgive him for the affair when they are/were so critical of the infidelity displayed by Bill Clinton and Rudy Giuliani. I think there would be an element of hypocrisy to that scenario. On the other hand, forgiving him and voting for him are not the same thing. Some may forgive him and still not vote for him. Others may vote for him without forgiving his hypocrisy.

I know he claims that it isn’t hypocritical, but his logic is the same as the logic used to say that the Civil War was not fought over slavery. Certainly states rights was an issue in the war, just as perjury was an issue in the Clinton impeachment. That being said – common sense says that states rights would not have been an issue worthy of war without the slavery issue, just as perjury would not have been a problem for Clinton without the infidelity.

So if this admission is an attempt to clear the way for a presidential run I hope that Gingrich does not try to cast himself as a clean candidate just because he has paraded his skeletons in public already.