Wiki on Newt

[Bucky]

In 1962, Gingrich married Jackie Battley, his former high school geometry teacher, when he was 19 years old; she was seven years his senior at 26 years old. Jackie raised their two daughters, worked to put Newt through graduate school and was a loyal political wife. Gingrich and Battley divorced in 1980. Battley has charged that Gingrich discussed the terms of their divorce settlement while she was in the hospital recovering from cancer surgery. According to L.H. Carter, his campaign treasurer, Newt said of Battley: "She's not young enough or pretty enough to be the wife of the President. And besides, she has cancer." Newt has vigorously denied saying anything like this and his staff has stated that L. H. Carter was a disgruntled employee left behind in Georgia.

He refused to pay alimony or child support. His hometown First Baptist Church had to take up a collection to support the family. Newt's younger daughter, Jackie Gingrich Zyla, refuted much of the above by saying, "My dad has always stood behind and supported me and my sister in everything we have done," she said. "We care about our father, and he cares about us."

During his marriage to Battley in 1977, Newt had an affair with a Washington, D.C. woman named Ann Manning. "We had oral sex," says Manning. "He prefers that modus operandi because then he can say, 'I never slept with her.'" Newt also threatened, "If you ever tell anybody about this, I'll say you're lying."

Gingrich married Marianne Ginther in late 1981. Marianne was quoted in a 1995 article in Vanity Fair as saying: "I don't want him to be president and I don't think he should be." Marianne added, "Right now, the presidency is not a single person. It's not so much what he'd be doing. It's what I'd be doing." by which she meant not that Newt would not be a good President but that she did not particularly look forward to being first lady. They divorced in 1999, the same year Gingrich had an affair with a then 33-year old member Congressional staffer, Callista Bisek, whom he married the next year. Gingrich's affair was taking place at the same time that he was condemning President Bill Clinton for lying (under oath) about his own affair with staffer Monica Lewinsky. Newt Gingrich did not discuss his own affair until March, 2007.
While Gingrich admits his behavior was not to his moral standards, he differentiates http://kcweb.bcpl.lib.md.us:2000/kcweb-icons/xtra_additions/pinocchio.gif his experiences from Clinton's by noting that Clinton was being impeached not for his sexual behavior, but for lying under oath. According to several newspaper editorials, the electability of Gingrich for president is questionable on a Republican party ticket — with a party that emphasizes family values and Christianity as some of their strongest assets. However, recently Newt Gingrich has been quoted saying "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." He also said the following:

"There were times when I was praying and when I felt I was doing things that were wrong. But I was still doing them... I look back on those as periods of weakness and periods that I'm... not proud of."

Reverend Jerry Falwell, a leader among Christian Conservatives, believes that Gingrich has "genuinely {sought} forgiveness"
In August 2000, Gingrich married Bisek. Gingrich resides in Virginia with Bisek, who appears with him on the back cover of his book "Winning the Future". The Gingrich family includes 2 daughters, 3 sons-in-law, and two grandchildren.

"She's not young enough or pretty enough to be the wife of the President. And besides, she has cancer."