Saturday, October 8, 2016

Is Rudy Giuliani Right That ‘Everybody’ Cheats?

On Sunday’s “Meet The Press,” Chuck Todd questioned whether Rudy Giuliani could critique Hillary Clinton’s practice of defaming her husband’s mistresses because “you have your own infidelities, sir.” Regardless of whether the logic of Todd’s questioning holds, Giuliani’s response alarmed many Trump critics. He said, “Well, everybody does. And I’m a Roman Catholic, and I confess those things to my priest.”
I was somewhat surprised by how much this comment upset people. Russell Moore said the remark was “Defining deviancy down.” The Daily Mail thought it worthy of a news story (“Rudy Giuliani – married THREE times, just like Trump – says ‘everybody’ is unfaithful (but it’s OK for him, he’s a Catholic who’s been to confession)”). Most bizarrely, The New York Times thought it worthy of a news story (“Rudy Giuliani, Continuing Rebuke of Hillary Clinton, Says ‘Everybody’ Commits Infidelity“)!
Giuliani’s repeated adultery is offensive, but I’m not sure that his comments in this interview were. Christians do believe that everybody is unfaithful. Jesus once said, “You have heard that it was said, ‘You shall not commit adultery.’ But I say to you that everyone who looks at a woman with lustful intent has already committed adultery with her in his heart.” Assuming that no human has ever managed to keep this standard, we’re all guilty. And Giuliani wasn’t talking about Bill Clinton’s infidelity but, rather, Hillary Clinton’s involvement with the practice of gaslighting and destroying women whom Bill had slept with. That’s related to infidelity, but a separate and distinct issue.
The outrage-du-jour here reminded me of Jimmy Carter’s interview with Playboy, where he said, “I’ve looked on a lot of women with lust. I’ve committed adultery in my heart many times.” Oh that we could all be so honest about our failures to be faithful. So in this sense, Giuliani is right to confess his sins of adultery.
But there are still a few problems with his statement. ...
Read the rest of this op-ed from The Federalist HERE.

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