Family Values FAIL

Mark Sanford.  Newt Gingrich.  Larry Craig.  John Ensign.  Rudy Giuliani.  David Vitter.

By now you've probably figured out the connection among all of those individuals: prominent GOP members who belong to a party that regularly touts family values and an opposition to same-sex marriage, while they cheat on their spouses and engage in out-of-wedlock sexual behavior.  Hypocrisy?  You bet.

It's not that Republicans have a solid grip on adultery.  John Edwards, Bill Clinton, Eliot Spitzer...Lord knows the Dems have their fair share of issues with the subject, as well.  But there's something about Sanford, Gingrich, Ensign, Vitter, Giuliani and Craig (God, that sounds like the law firm of the damned!) that rings extra hypocritical.  And it has to do with the fact that these individuals were crusaders for what they call "family values," where the primary focus is on denying gays and lesbians the right to marry, railing against non-discrimination policies, and attacking hate crimes legislation.

But as these leaders show, they can't even handle "family values" within their own homes, let alone in politics.  Here's a list of what each of these characters has said about LGBT rights under the guise of "family values," while they were treating their own marriages as if they were disposable.

Mark Sanford: Sanford voted against allowing gay adoptions in Washington, D.C. when he was a Congressperson, and supported South Carolina's marriage amendment that banned same-sex marriage.

Newt Gingrich: Gingrich cheated on his wife during the height of the Monica Lewinsky scandal (when he was one of the leaders assailing Clinton for immorality), and has said that gay marriage proponents are like fascists trying to take over the country.

Larry Craig: Craig voted for a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage, voted against inclusive hate crimes laws, and said about Idaho's marriage amendment..."the appropriate definition of marriage is a union between one man and one woman."

John Ensign: Ensign was one of the biggest champions for a federal constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage, and in 2004 (five years before admitting to an affair of his own) he offered this definition of marriage on the Senate floor, "It is not right to mold marriage to fit the desires of a few, against the wishes of so many, and to ignore the important role of marriage."

Rudy Giuliani: Serial groom Giuliani went so far as to accept the endorsement of Pat Robertson during his campaign for President in 2008, and told Fox News that "Marriage should be between a man and a woman. It should remain that way."

David Vitter: Vitter not only compared gay marriage to Hurricane Katrina, he's opposed to gay adoption as well, and once said, "that saving sex until marriage and remaining faithful afterwards is the best choice for health and happiness."

It's not to kick these guys while they're down.  But it is to say that politicians who have an obsession with gay marriage and taking away the rights of gays and lesbians to enter into legal unions, ought to focus on their own marriage and their own household long before going after others.