Newt Gingrich: The Hypocrite We All Knew He Was

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The Clinton impeachment trial stands out in the minds of many who remember it as one of the most ridiculous political fiascos in decades. From his own Puritanical impulses the independent counsel felt the need to investigate the private sex life of a sitting president and turn what should be a nonpartisan position into arguably the most partisan government activity in the history of the federal government. The president told the country a pathetic and irrelevant lie while under oath. And a Republican controlled Congress squealed with glee as they proceeded to begin impeachment proceedings over a lie that had nothing at all to do with any part of the president's job, only his ability to keep his hands off of an intern.

Leading the charge was none other than the aptly named Newt Gingrich, Speaker of the House at the time, a reptile of a man who sat on his high moral horse looking down on the sins of Bill Clinton and deciding that was enough to remove a sitting president from office. Well apparently, Clinton wasn't the only one having an affair at the time.

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich was having an extramarital affair even as he led the charge against President Clinton over the Monica Lewinsky affair, he acknowledged in an interview with a conservative Christian group.

"The honest answer is yes," Gingrich, a potential 2008 Republican presidential candidate, said in an interview with Focus on the Family founder James Dobson to be aired Friday, according to a transcript provided to The Associated Press.

"There are times that I have fallen short of my own standards. There's certainly times when I've fallen short of God's standards."
So even though this was clearly sufficient to vilify Clinton and make a mockery of the constitution, we're supposed to find it in our hearts to forgive Gingrich? Of course! Because now, in the Gingrich revisionist history of the impeachment proceedings, it was never about Lewinsky at all, but rather a legal technicality.

Gingrich argued in the interview, however, that he should not be viewed as a hypocrite for pursuing Clinton's infidelity.

"The president of the United States got in trouble for committing a felony in front of a sitting federal judge," the former Georgia congressman said of Clinton's 1998 House impeachment on perjury and obstruction of justice charges.

"I drew a line in my mind that said, 'Even though I run the risk of being deeply embarrassed, and even though at a purely personal level I am not rendering judgment on another human being, as a leader of the government trying to uphold the rule of law, I have no choice except to move forward and say that you cannot accept ... perjury in your highest officials."
Admittedly, Clinton's decision to perjure himself was not a good one. But the moralizing that Democrats were subjected to by holier-than-thou Republicans, with Gingrich leading them, is a bit ridiculous in retrospect considering how many of them have left office in disgrace, or like Gingrich, were doing what just what they were demonizing at the same time.

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