In Newt Gingrich’s World Rules Do not Apply to Him
By Victoria Toensing
TheDailyBeast.com
It’s not about the sex. Marianne Gingrich’s interview with ABC revealing former husband and presidential candidate Newt Gingrich’s request for an open marriage was not about a wife rejected. Rather, it was an insight into the persona of Newt: When he gets power he believes the rules do not apply to him.
Nothing is more telling of this trait than Newt’s response to Marianne when she asked how he could reconcile asking for a divorce because of an affair with another woman and speaking days later about family values to a Republican women’s group. His answer? “People want to hear what I have to say. It doesn’t matter what I do.”
I am reminded of a trip when I was a Justice
Department official to a Muslim country that
outlawed drinking alcohol. But there I was at
the American Embassy with the country’s elite
imbibing. “I thought the law and your religion
forbid you to drink,” I commented to one. “Oh,
that’s for the common people,” he replied.
In the Newtonian world, people only care
about what he says; the rules are to be followed
by the rest of us.
This distorted vision of the world also
applies to whether Newt is allowed to ignore the
facts. He does so with such conviction that,
unless one knows the truth, his delivery
mandates believability. Newt takes on a foe with
such ferocity that Republicans, hungry for a
fighting candidate, have not sought to challenge
the veracity of his words. Consider his debate
exchange with
CNN moderator John King, who opened with a
question about Marianne’s revelation.
In claiming as false Marianne’s statement
that he asked for an open marriage, Newt
asserted,” Every personal friend I have who knew
us in that time period said the story was
false.”
How could that be? Marianne has said the
discussion occurred during a private
conversation when they were in counseling. How
would any friend know what Newt said only to his
then wife?
Moreover, Newt had been having this affair
with
Callista for six years—in Marianne’s bed and
when talking on the phone to Marianne in
Callista’s presence, ending always with “I love
you.” Newt had been in an open marriage for six
years; only Marianne had not been told of it.
Newt next claimed to CNN that “we offered
several of [these friends] to ABC to prove
[Marianne’s statement] was false. They weren’t
interested because they would like to attack any
Republican.” Only it was Newt’s statement that
was false. ABC immediately refuted his
assertion. ABC Senior News Vice President
Jeffrey Schneider stated: “That’s just not true.
His daughters were interviewed for our
Nightline story last
night and we sought interviews with Gingrich or
surrogates very aggressively starting Tuesday
morning. We would have been happy to interview
anyone they put forward.”
In fact, according to ABC, the campaign said
it was “going to provide somebody who would
answer point by point everything” Marianne said,
but “it had not done so as of” the morning of
the broadcast. Has any reporter asked the
campaign for the names of the people Newt
claimed ABC refused to air?
Newt also claimed his
two daughters wrote ABC asking that the
interview with Marianne be “pulled.” Not a word
in that letter (found
here) requests it be pulled.
“People want to hear what I have to say. It doesn’t matter what I do.”
Significantly, Newt’s excuse for having an
extramarital affair—in his own words—is that he
did “inappropriate” things because he was under
stress from working “far too hard” as speaker.
What misconduct will he excuse when he discovers
the Presidency comes with hard work and stress?
Newt asked Marianne to accept an open marriage while preaching family values to the rest of us. Such request is not a disqualifier for a man to be an effective president, as John Kennedy’s and Bill Clinton’s tenures will attest. But Newt’s grandiose mindset, that the rules we all live by—including telling the truth—do not apply to him, is a different matter. His duplicity should be a disqualifier.