Posted on 09/12/2007 3:49:22 AM PDT by blogsforthompson.com
Oh! You caught us red-handed. In fact, all Mitt Romney supporters on Free Republic were in on the anti-Fred website and we know firsthand that Romney approved it directly. We never dreamed that we'd ever get caught. Wow! You're a genius! You hit the target but good, making us yelp or something like that. < /sarcasm >
Oh! You caught us red-handed. In fact, all Mitt Romney supporters on Free Republic were in on the anti-Fred website and we know firsthand that Romney approved it directly. We never dreamed that we'd ever get caught. Wow! You're a genius! You hit the target but good, making us yelp or something like that. < /sarcasm >
Loving the law means something keeping the commandments is impossible. Look at a woman with lust for even a second and you have committed adultery!
We’re talking about whether Fred’s past — and his wife’s — will hurt him with the electorate.
Really I thought we were talking about if a man who cheated to be trusted to keep his promises? I guess if were going to pull the 'will it hurt with the electorate' Mitts Mormonism is back on the table no?
But we shouldn’t bury our heads in the sand, and act as if he’s the Second Coming.
Never thought such a thing but in terms of issues he is the one of the only players who is not either to the left (Rudy) or a major flip flopper (Mitt)..
He could have been saying a lot of things.
He could have been saying that Thompson has been active with women after his first marriage. After all, he used the present tense. He could have been saying that there was infidelity, but that it was not the cause of the marital break-up, as you implied. He could have been saying that Fred Thompson was seen in the company of other women, and this was a cause of marital friction, without implying he was unfaithful with those women.
What he pointedly did not say to the question of whether or not Fred Thompson was unfaithful was "yes". In fact, what you have here is a man who seems to be very careful to not say "yes". And yet, you take that as a definitive "yes".
That, to me, is a pretty thin thread to be making an accusation, as you have.
Now, I am not saying that Fred Thompson was faithful in his first marriage. I have no way of knowing whether or not that is true. But to leave that question behind, and blithely move on to the debate over whether or not his supposed infidelity in his first marriage is relevant to the current political campaign seems to me to be making a pretty big leap.
“keeping the commandments is impossible.”
Are you saying that, therefore, we can do anything we want, and it doesn’t really matter, if there is “deathbed repentance”?
“Really I thought we were talking about if a man who cheated to be trusted to keep his promises? I guess if were going to pull the ‘will it hurt with the electorate’ Mitts Mormonism is back on the table no?”
We are talking about basic integrity, which I think is an issue with more people than just me. Maybe I’m wrong.
Maybe Mitt’s Mormonism will turn off more people than Fred’s, and Mrs. Fred’s, amorality. I don’t know the answer to that question. Interesting turn of events, if true, for a number of reasons.
I have refrained from supporting Mitt because I was watching him in the early 90’s, and didn’t like his positions. But, you have to admit that regardless of his political positions, he has lived the most “conservative” life of any of the front runners.
Fred’s first wife’s family are rock-ribbed, influential Republicans. They got Fred his political appointments, and helped him in his political career. They probably like his politics, as does his first wife. She wouldn’t be the first wronged wife to keep silent for political reasons.
I think the brother’s answer was pretty clear, viewed in context. I could be wrong, I admit, but I think the chances are small.
I’m really surprised, though, that so many people who consider themselves religious think that promiscuity is okay, though, just because a man is single.
(LUKE 18) "{10} Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. {11} The Pharisee stood up and prayed about himself: 'God, I thank you that I am not like other men--robbers, evildoers, adulterers--or even like this tax collector. {12} I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.' {13} "But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, 'God, have mercy on me, a sinner.' {14} "I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted."
What I am saying is before God all of our good works are like filthy rags, and its even worse when we hang our hat on them. I don't know if Fred will or has fallen before God and confessed himself a sinner but I do know I see Mitt and his supporters playing the Pharisee here. Oh Thank goodness Mitt is not like Fred he is a great husband!
We are talking about basic integrity
You mean the integrity of flip flopping on every issue he needs in order to get elected?
But, you have to admit that regardless of his political positions, he has lived the most “conservative” life of any of the front runners.
Sure you can be a nice person and a flip flopper at the same time..
“What I am saying is before God all of our good works are like filthy rags, and its even worse when we hang our hat on them. I don’t know if Fred will or has fallen before God and confessed himself a sinner but I do know I see Mitt and his supporters playing the Pharisee here. Oh Thank goodness Mitt is not like Fred he is a great husband!”
Hmmm. But Fred is the one who has publicly declared himself “Right with God,” not Mitt.
I think you are right to say that his first wife’s family supports him politically, and for that reason they have refused to discuss whether or not Fred Thompson was unfaithful in his first marriage. But we should not take their silence as a confirmation of infidelity.
If I am convicted of robbing a the First National Bank, I could go to jail for a long time, so I have a strong reason to say that I did not rob the bank. But if the police ask me if I robbed the bank and I say “no”, my interest in saying “no” should not be used as evidence to indicate that I actually did rob the bank.
As to the matter of Fred Thompson’s activities while he was not married, to me there is a difference between marital infidelilty and sexual promiscuity outside of marriage. The factual question of marital infidelity is still up in the air, as far as I can tell, and we are all just speculating on that point.
If you wish to change the discussion to sexual promiscuity outside of marriage, though, I think we are on pretty safe ground there. I don’t think anybody will go to the mat saying Fred Thompson led a monk’s life between his two marriages.
Saying you’re right with God is, to me, the same as saying it is well with my soul. Its not saying look at me and how great my family is (which, I believe, Mitt has alluded to when he points out his stainless divorce record)
Ill say this clearly to you: My two choices right now are Hucakabee and Thompson. I could vote for Hunter or some of the others were they the nominee but I cant vote for Mitt or Rudy, I wont be caught up in the ‘anyone but the democrats’ crap that costs us in 06.
“You mean the integrity of flip flopping on every issue he needs in order to get elected?”
I’ve already told you that I am not a Mitt supporter — I have turned down requests for support from people I know and respect who are Mitt supporters — because of his previous positions on some issues. I haven’t taken the time to sift through his previous positions and his current positions to see if they are really inconsistent. I know that anti-Mitt people have embellished the flip-flopping charge.
I can see where a man who is fundamentally conservative, running in a liberal state, would avoid the conservative positions, and try to emphasize points of agreement, without sacrificing integrity. You have to be somewhat pragmatic. But my memory of Mitt’s previous positions is that he went further than that in the 90’s and it bothers me.
Maybe he did “convert” on issues like anti-abortion laws, but I haven’t accepted that. I know otherwise good men who have taken a kind of “hands off” position on the law, but I don’t agree with them. There is no question that Mitt has been pro-life in his own life, and when he has counseled LDS woman as a church official. You can be personally pro-life, yet refrain from wanting to impose that on others by law. Just like I don’t smoke on moral and religious grounds, but I oppose most anti-smoking laws, because it infringes on the freedom of others.
What bothers me more, I think, is his supposed previous embrace of gay “pride,” and a lack of clarity as to how far he believes that gay “rights” extend. Although I think those who are trying to blame him for what the judges did on gay marriage are up in the night. There’s no question that he has always opposed that.
Having said all that, I don’t think there’s any question that Fred has also changed his positions on some issues. All the candidates have.
Mitt is proud of his family, and rightfully so. He is a handsome, smart, successful, rich man, who undoubtedly has had numerous opportunities to stray. It says something about him that he hasn’t, and that he and his wife and children are close. I admire him for that, just like I admire President Bush for being faithful to his wife.
Yup thats called a lack of integrity.
You have to be somewhat pragmatic
Thats called clintonesq
You can be personally pro-life, yet refrain from wanting to impose that on others by law.
Thats spineless, either you are for protecting the unborn from murder or youre not..
but I oppose most anti-smoking laws, because it infringes on the freedom of others.
Not the same..
Having said all that, I don’t think there’s any question that Fred has also changed his positions on some issues. All the candidates have.
Its not the shift in Mitts beliefs that bother me so much as the *timing* He ran and won as governor as a center left (center center *at best*) but between that election and announcing his race for the presidency he became a convert on Gay issues, abortion, and gun control.
“I think you are right to say that his first wife’s family supports him politically, and for that reason they have refused to discuss whether or not Fred Thompson was unfaithful in his first marriage. But we should not take their silence as a confirmation of infidelity.”
The problem is, the brother wasn’t “silent.” He pretty much confirmed that it was infidelity, and nor mental or physical cruelty.
“As to the matter of Fred Thompson’s activities while he was not married, to me there is a difference between marital infidelilty and sexual promiscuity outside of marriage.”
There certainly is a difference, because you are not cheating on a spouse. My observation was that I was surprised at how many seemingly religious people see nothing wrong with promiscuity if you are single. It bothers me. Just as his wife’s shack up relationship — and we know about one. Maybe others will surface — bothers me. I’ve never believed in a double standard. His behavior, to me, is as bad a hers.
But, as I said before, maybe it’s just me. I think it will be an issue.
“Thats spineless, either you are for protecting the unborn from murder or youre not..”
You’re partially right. That’s why I disagree with that position, because I think the unborn child deserves protection, and legal abortion completely devalues the developing child.
I say “partially” because I don’t think it equates with spinelessness, just a failure to think the issue through. While I and my firm were fighting the ACLU on the abortion issue, one of my male partners, who would never have encouraged abortion for any woman he personally associated with, couldn’t understand why people were so exercised about the law. I think it’s because he had never been pregnant, and didn’t really appreciate the humanity of the unborn child.
Pathetic! Paul was stoned, shipwrecked, and scourged for the sake of his beliefs and he held strong. Even in that it was *Christ* who allowed him to do it and *Christ* to whom he gave the credit!
Ive never strayed from my wife, so what Its not to my credit. Lord knows I have had moments of lust so I can not stand and say look at how faithful I am, even if I had never lusted it is still only through Christ I am faithful.
Given the way we love our lovable rogues, I think that Fred Thompson’s life between his marriages will work more for him than against him. I am not defending it, but it would be silly to deny it.
As for the statement of his former brother in law, you are reading into it more than I do. I do not agree with your assertion that that statement pretty much confirms marital infidelity. An implication, perhaps, but not a confirmation.
Do you *really* think Hillary will want to go down that road with fred? I mean it opens up a whole an of worms for her family and history... Heck if Fred avoids condemning her marriage and she goes after him he gets to hold the all precious hypocrite card
And there you have it. Politics I hate but we have to know what the little sickos are doing with our country!
By next week, everyone will have forgotten about this story; it's only effect will have been to give political junkies something hem and haw about.
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