John King of CNN, and Callista and Newt Gingrich. Image from last fall, a college appearance in South Carolina. From cisternyard.com at College of Charleston, their photo credit was: (Colin Johnson/GSO)
As a journalism professor, I’m more than a bit conflicted.
John King, CNN’s debate moderator, opened last Thursday’s debate with a question based on an ABC news interview of Newt Gingrich’s second wife, in which she alleges he asked for an open marriage.
Ewwwww.
King’ s question was really rather mild. He could have asked: “Why have you repeatedly claimed the Republican Party is the party of ‘traditional marriage’ while you ended both of your first two marriages with affairs while your wives were ill?” Or: “If your first or second wife can’t trust you, how can America trust you?”
No, what King asked, after a setup briefly describing the ABC intervew, was: “Would you like to take some time to respond to that?”
And Newt went all Newtron Bomb on him. To the raucous cheers of the GOP crowd, Newt sealed his fate as the winner in South Carolina with a spirited and forceful defense.
In which, by the way, I think he lied at least twice. Once, when he claimed his campaign had repeatedly contacted ABC News with Friends of Newt whom they should interview (the ABC Nightline host has since said that only the two daughters were offered, and yes, I trust the host of Nightline more than I trust Newt Gingrich). The second time wasn’t necessarily a lie, but if it wasn’t a lie it was both creepy and odd. In his bombastic tirade against the low taste level and “despicable” behavior of the American media, Newt said that many of his friends from that time period could have told ABC News that the second wife was lying.
Wow.
Call me old fashioned, but if I decided to ask Audrey if it would be OK if I slept with, oh, I don’t know, Pink or someone, I can’t imagine any of my friends being able to confirm or deny her version of the conversation. Certain spouse-with-spouse conversations are usually not open to anybody, including friends. Or kids, for that matter—Newt using his daughters as his surrogates to defend his martial record also seemed, well, a bit odd to me.
Newt lecturing anybody on proper manners or what ought to be discussed is a bit rich.
But, on the other hand, I’m oddly finding myself in some agreement with The Gingrich. He made a valid point.
Should the marital issue be a factor in the campaign? Should ABC be interviewing ex-wives of candidates? Should it be the lead question in a debate?
John King says he was just doing his job. But a criticism of the media, a valid one in my book, is that in an election it focuses too much of its attention on two things: 1) The horse race (who is ahead and why) and 2) The personal characteristics and lives of the candidates.
Both are easy to focus on, because they let the press duck the harder job of tackling dull policy matters.
Newt, the press is not protecting Barack Obama. The press is questioning your ex-wives because it can and it makes for good TV. But should it?
Then again (there are more than two hands in this debate), Newt, along with most Republican candidates, makes a lot of noise about protecting the traditional family and traditional marriage. And frankly he has poor standing to do so. Yes, I’m a Christian and I believe in redemption too, but come on. Two divorces to wives who had just fallen ill when you deliver the news? As Jon Stewart said, “first, I’m going to be sick. And then Newt will leave me.” This is Mr. Protect American Family?
The whole thing depresses me. I feel the same way about Bill Clinton, by the way. The playboy Prez lost a lot of standing in my eyes during the Lewinsky scandal, and I’m not able to just “move on.”
And yet ….
How many past presidents, even great ones, were known for marital fidelity? Kennedy? Eisenhower? Roosevelt? Reagan had been divorced. Granted, not all presidents have been randy, but randiness doesn’t seem to be associated with incompetence in government. And to the extent that it doesn’t interfere with a President’s performance of his or her public duties, whose business is the whole question of presidential sexuality anyway?
And another thing: This whole event was staged theater. When he’s not quoting “The New York Times” as his source for any fact, Gingrich is consistently trashing the “liberal” media for favoring Obama. It’s part of the Republican shtick. I don’t think the “media elites” live on a different planet, and I don’t think they are as clearly biased as Gingrich would claim, but railing against the media is red meat to a GOP audience. I think it’s mostly blaming the messenger because conservatives don’t like many aspects of society that are presented and reflected in the media.
Would I have asked the question? Not in that form, I don’t think. Was it a fit question? In context, it was almost inevitable, and Newt was clearly ready to respond—quite effectively. I think he’s a pompous, egotistical, dangerous gasbag, but he’s right that he’d be a good debater against Barack Obama. Of course, we need to elect a President, not a Debater-In-Chief, but that’s another topic.
Whatever you can say about Newt, and frankly, the attack ads were right, he’s got more baggage than KLM, he is a fighter. And he had a point. What a strange question to open a presidential debate on.
Life musings ... My name is Joe Sheller and I'm an Associate Professor at Mount Mercy University in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. This blog is personal opinion and does not reflect the opinion of the college, it's administration, staff or board. I love to garden and often find my mind wandering when I'm pondering weeds or flowers. This blog is a pretty random mix of those thoughts, some on gardening, many on life in general.
Well this is what happens when you let CNN run a debate. John King by the way should have at least had the guts to stand by the question and not try and say that it came from some other news outlets. That just made things worse. I do agree however that it was an awful question to open a debate with, and I wonder what was going through John King’s mind when he said it.
The only reason Newt having divorced his previous wives is an issue in the campaign is because its part of the “Character” issue, but its also due to the fact that him and other GOP candidates keep speaking about “Defending Traditional Family Values.” Its kind of hard for someone to keep saying he stands up for that when he tried to have an “open marriage,” and he’s on his third wife. Newt is by and large, a hypocrite.