Ten years after leading the “Republican revolution” that won control of Congress, former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich is back as an arbiter of public morality.
Gingrich’s new book, Winning The Future: A 21st Century Contract with America, criticizes President Bush’s policy in Iraq, while accusing liberals of driving God from public life.
In a Jan. 14 interview with TV preacher Pat Robertson, Gingrich criticized a federal appeals court for removing “God” from the Pledge of Allegiance and blamed four judges in Massachusetts with “trying to destroy traditional marriage and redefine marriage.”
Earlier he wrote an opinion piece analyzing the 2004 election titled, “Values and the Bush Victory.”
“The Massachusetts Supreme Court decided to allow gay marriages and subsequent officials in states began illegally redefining marriage by marrying same-sex couples,” he wrote. “Americans who believe in traditional marriage felt that the courts had gone too far. In response, 11 states put a ban on gay marriage on their ballot. The bans, which were viewed as a defense of marriage and not as an attack on homosexuals, passed in all 11 states. The closest margin of victory was not close–57 percent in Oregon.”
“My hunch is if you were to put traditional marriage on the ballot in Massachusetts where four lawyers overturned it, the–the voters of Massachusetts would almost certainly reinstate it and rebuke those four lawyers,” Gingrich said Nov. 9 on “The Today Show.”
Gingrich has not ruled out the possibility that he will run for president in 2008.
When Gingrich, a Southern Baptist, came to power in the 1990s under a moral values banner, his enemies seized upon contradictions within his own personal life.
He divorced his wife of 19 years in 1981 after she was diagnosed with a recurrence of cancer.
Within months, Gingrich married Marianne Ginther, a former county planner from Ohio. They separated periodically over the years, before the marriage ended in 1999 amid reports that Gingrich was having an affair with a congressional aide 23 years his junior.
The woman, Callista Bisek, became the third and current Mrs. Gingrich in 2000.
During the investigation and impeachment of President Clinton, Gingrich generally refrained from criticizing the president’s personal behavior. But during his term as speaker, House Republicans voted to impeach a president for the first time in 130 years.
Bob Allen is managing editor of EthicsDaily.com.
Managing editor at EthicsDaily.com from 2003-2009, Allen wrote more than 1,500 news stories during his tenure.
