How badly will Marianne Gingrich’s interviews hurt Newt? Go back to October 2004 and the third George W. Bush-John Kerry presidential debate — and the last question from moderator Bob Schieffer:
“All three of us are surrounded by very strong women. We’re all married to strong women. Each of us have two daughters that make us very proud. I’d like to ask each of you, what is the most important thing you’ve learned from these strong women?”
In answer, Bush gushed over Laura, said it was love at first sight, spoke of how much he loved his daughters — and was self-deprecating.
Kerry answered, “Well, I guess the president and you and I are three examples of lucky people who married up. And some would say maybe me more so than others.” What was supposed to be a joke about his wealthy wife fell completely flat. He then turned to talking about his mother, with only a passing mention of his wife toward the end.
To jaded types on both coasts this was a barely noticeable gaffe, owing more to Kerry’s stiffness than anything else. But in at least one small-town Bush campaign office, the phone started ringing in the morning with new volunteers noting that Kerry hadn’t said he loved his wife.
If there was a game-changer in the 2004 race, that was it. Kerry had failed the most basic test — show us your happy marriage.
Yes, marriage rates in America are declining. A Pew poll from 2010 found that four out of 10 people believe the institution is becoming obsolete. Yet our favorite TV shows and big fat Hollywood films (even “The Office” and “Sex and the City”) still correlate happy endings with marrying your mate and living happily ever after.
Gay marriage is a hot-button issue precisely because we value marriage so much. As a country, we might have an over-developed snark about romance but we still like seeing happy pairs in the Oval Office.
Pundits dissected the casual Barack-Michelle Obama fist-bump during one of the 2008 debates, but it played much better with the general public than the still-cringe-inducing Al and Tipper Gore kiss of 2000.
In this election, the Republican primary seems to be coming down to two men:
* Mitt Romney, who met his wife in elementary school and started “going steady” (his words) while in high school.
* And Gingrich, who also met his (first) wife, Jackie, in high school — she was his geometry teacher, seven years his senior.He cheated on her with his second wife, Marianne, and then cheated on Marianne with his third, and current, wife Callista.
To keep the story straight, Jackie was the one Newt allegedly asked for a divorce from while she was recovering from uterine cancer in the hospital. Marianne is the one who says Newt called her while laying in bed with Callista and asked her to tolerate his affair.
Newt Gingrich has to count on this being the election where Americans won’t care about the marriage of their president. But Americans love the love story.
The Clintons may have never had the perfect marriage, but it’s been a partnership.The Bushes glowed in each other’s presence. The Obamas have the natural ease of a life enjoyed together. Can a candidate on a third marriage, with romantic destruction left in his wake, be elected?
Karol Markowicz blogs at alarmingnews.com.
Twitter: @KarolNYC