Confess Infidelity, Win Votes

Posted by Jeffrey Feldman at 11:49 AM on March 9, 2007.

If you are a Republican Presidential candidate who once (or even twice) cheated on your wife, that personal shortcoming is more likely to help than harm your political chances in 2008.

While it may seem counterintuitive to many progressives, a past bout with marital infidelity is actually an opportunity for the right-winger and not the albatross that many believe it to be.As the scramble for the 2008 Republican nomination unfolds, one strategy emerging involves confessions of being unfaithful to woo Evangelical voters.

Cynical? Absolutely. But smart, too.

To see the logic in this newest right-wing game, we need only look as far as ...

... Focus on the Family--one of the largest right-wing Evangelical groups in the country.For this group, marital infidelity is not a hanging offense, but a point of entry into the fold--a moment of joining rather than a rupture leading to expulsion.Showing up on Dobson's doorstep with a teary confession of adultery is not a slap in the face, but a validation of the group's very reason for being.


Newt Gingrich has figured this out, and it is just a matter of time (days or weeks) before Rudy Giuliani figures it out, too.In fact, it would not be surprising if March 2007 becomes one of the smuttiest months in recent American history as Americans are treated to revelation after revelation about how unfaithful their Republican candidates have been to their wives.All of these staged performances, of course, will be followed by equally staged moments of accepting the advice and guidance of the Evangelical leadership--as clever a tactic for gaining Republican votes as any.


In fact, the question is not "if" other Republicans will follow Gingrich's lead, but "how long" will it take before every single Republican candidate finds something to confess and what those confessions will be.Focus on the Family: Submit
As much as it pains an progressive pundit to admit this, James Dobson's Focus on the Family website actually has a a great many quite helpful resources on marriage infidelity.Expecting to find fire and brimstone about extramarital affairs being the devils work, what I found were a series of rather level-headed discussions about strategies for maintaining a strong marriage.

Then I remembered, of course, that the Protestant Church was born out of an act of marital infidelity--at which point all of this started to make sense.

One page lists a series of essays on "Affairs/Marital Infidelity," including such selections as:

• Danger Signs of an Affair



• Restoration: Four Hurdles You Must Face



• Rebuilding Trust in the Aftermath of an Affair



• Next Steps / Related Information

It is all very level-headed stuff, but there is an overarching theme that reveals how adultery can be leveraged into political opportunity for an enterprising Republican candidate.

Consider this quote, for example, from an "Overview" essay written by Jeff Hooten and Brad Lewis:

Maybe it's happened to you. You're fed up with your spouse, so you start chatting with that attractive person of the opposite sex in the next cubicle. You've known him for years, and it's so easy to talk. He just listens. Pretty soon you're sharing intimate problems, and now the co-worker is telling you how hard you have it. Maybe you should just leave your spouse … and maybe the two of you should go out to lunch to talk more about it all. With this person, you're finding what you need and want: a sympathetic ear, someone who understands you and all you're going through, maybe even the first meaningful physical touch you've had for months.

Obviously, while not all office relationships lead to affairs, and not all affairs start at work, this scene demonstrates in an overly simplified and time-compressed way how some people start down the path of cheating on their spouse.

Maybe it is oversimplified, maybe it is not.But the logic it reveals right away is the key to how Focus on the Family views this issue.

Cheating on your spouse, in their view, begins with "wrong thinking," not with an act of sexuality.Infidelity is a product of a lack of discipline in the workplace or in one's personal time that leads "down a path" to physical betrayal.

The way to prevent infidelity, subsequently, is pretty much the same as the way to restore a marriage after infidelity has occurred:by clamping down tight controls on personal interactions through a deeper commitment to God and the church.

For Republicans seeking to gain the support of Focus on the Family, the formula could not be simpler:Confess and commit.Once that happens, all Dobson needs to do is offer a highly-publicized acceptance of that commitment, and the wedded bliss of Republican and Evangelical returns.

Ain't love grand.

"Confess and commit" is exactly what Gingrich will do, today, in an interview with Dobson when he talks about an affair he was having with Congressional aide Callista Bisek during the Lewinsky scandal. At the time, Gingrich was married to his second wife Marianne.

And judging by the way Dobson has been promoting Gingrich on his website, it seems that the "confess and commit" tactic is a winner all around.

Whether other candidates go to Dobson or other Evangelical leaders for their "confess and commit" sessions remains to be seen.But there is no doubt that this kind of open airing of marital dirty laundry will be a hallmark of the Republican primary season as a tight field seeks to cash in on their infidelity for support of a key voting block.

Tagged as: republicans, religious right, election08, focus on the family

Jeffrey Feldman is Editor-in-Chief of Frameshop.