By: Don Martin
Re: Sex/Bombs and Gingrich

    Newt Gingrich is not behindhand at attributing to the Democrats
causal impact on individual instances of evil: he is on record as
blaming Susan Smith's drowning of her two children as an effect of
"a direct nexus" between the "acceptance of brutality" and "the
counterculture and Lyndon Johnson's Great Society." When it was
suggested that the bombing of the building in Oklahoma City might
also be part of a "direct nexus" between a politics that identifies
the government as "the enemy" and the actions of nutters like
McVeigh, he found the idea "grotesque." So "grotesque" did he find
it that he repeated that word several times, apparently on the
principal we see frequently around here that if nonsense is repeated
often enough, sombody might actually believe it.

    In this context, here is an item from The New Republic of May
15, 1995, p 11:

    The Company You Keep: Newt Gingrich's connection between Susan
    Smith, the woman who drowned her two young sons, and
    Democratic-inspired American decadence is now folklore. But
    here's a connnection Gingrich hasn't made yet. _The Post and
    Courier_ of Charleston, South Carolina, reported April 12 that
    one of the possible contributing factors to Smith's behavior was
    early sexual abuse. Her stepfather allegedly abused her
    repeatedly when she was a teenager. "She detailed one incident
    at about 5 a.m. one March morning when she woke up to find
    Russell (her stepfather) standing over her. Russell, a Christian
    Coalition member, had been out putting up campaign posters for
    presidential candidate Pat Robertson, the televangelist who
    founded the Christian Coalition, Smith said. He kissed her and
    then took her hand, thinking [she] was asleep and put her hand
    on his genitals and kissed her again." So what's the link
    between child abuse and Pat Robertson? None, of course. But
    we're waiting for Gingrich to comment.

    Personally, I find it interesting that at least one Pat
Robertson supporter waxed so enthusiastic about his candidate that
after spending the night putting up signs (for such candidates as
that, a deed of darkness) he gets a hardon. I think all of us
suspected that Mrs. Snith was the product of such a good, Christian
upbringing, and surely her connection with Lyndon Johnson is no more
compelling than that with Pat Robertson.

    I, too, await the comment of Mr. Gingrich. And while he is at
it, he migh explain why any such connection between himself as
promoter of the celebrated "Contract on America" and Timothy McVeigh
must be considered any more "grotesque" than those between either
Johnson or Robertson and Mrs. Smith.