If there is one thing I cannot stand, it's self-righteous hypocrites.

You know the type: Holier-than-thou, sanctimonious blowhards who insist they're better than everyone else, despite the fact that they're just as bad as (or worse than) the people they're condemning.

The evangelical pastor Jerry Falwell, a notorious sexist bigot who famously claimed that gays, lesbians and feminists "helped" cause the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, is a prime example. Other examples of this crass, smug attitude can be found in most members of the Christian Coalition and the rest of the "Religious Right."

But easily, my favorite of all self-righteous hypocrites is one of the biggest: Newt Gingrich, former speaker of the House and one of the main Republicans behind Bill Clinton's impeachment. Back then, he railed against Clinton for what he considered immoral behavior and fashioned himself as a stalwart champion of "family values."

As it turns out, that was a load of crap.

Gingrich recently confessed to conservative (and — lo and behold — evangelical) talk-radio host James Dobson that all throughout the impeachment trial of Clinton, he was — wait for it — cheating on his wife! Gingrich claims he headed up the Clinton witch hunt purely because Clinton perjured himself, but if you were conscious and anywhere near a television during the long, drawn-out impeachment process, "perjury" was practically an afterthought to the Republicans. It was all sex scandal, all the time, and the guy leading the charge for the "moral majority" was diddling some broad behind his wife's back. Classy.

Not, of course, that this news comes as much of a surprise. Gingrich divorced his second wife in 2000 after his attorneys admitted he was sleeping with his current wife while he was still married, and he divorced his first wife while she was in the hospital recovering from cancer surgery.

But it does shed light on the insincerity and duplicity of the "moral" movement that has been the keystone of the Republican Party since the mid-'80s. The current President Bush got elected partly due to his folksy, Lennie-from-"Of Mice and Men" persona, to be sure, but he also got elected because he campaigned as a moral candidate. He mentioned his born-again Christian faith so often in interviews that you'd think Jesus was paying him for product placement.

Now, I'm not knocking faith (faith, like drinking, is good in moderation), but there seems to be an increasing movement among conservative politicians to place themselves on the ideological high ground by using religion or some skewed sense of morality to justify attacking people, when, in reality, the attacker is worse than the victim. If patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel, then pious morality has to be running a close second place.

What's worse is that as the hypocrisy is revealed, time and again, the American voting public doesn't seem to care. Republicans still command strong support among Christian voters, and it would appear that their own brand of hollow moralizing speaks to a certain constituency, regardless of whether those doing the moralizing have a leg to stand on. The claim they stand for "family values" and "morality" seems to be more important than actually following through.

It appears that Gingrich has publicly confessed to his actions as the first step in a potential bid for the White House; cutting off his enemies before they have the chance to — excuse the pun — make a federal case out of it. I sincerely hope the Republicans throw their support behind Gingrich, and he makes it to the 2008 election, if only for the chance to see him placed on the same chopping block he put Clinton on back in the '90s.

Maybe, when one of the conservative right's champions is held up to the light and scrutinized (oh, yeah, he also resigned from Congress after the House ethics committee called him out on using tax-exempt funding to support his politics), voters will realize what a sham the moral majority image is that the Republicans have been projecting.

Maybe, finally, people will wake up and realize that the people pandering to the faithful aren't doing it out of any religious drive, but rather to court and manipulate a segment of the population that's easy to congregate and mobilize to serve their own ends.

Maybe Gingrich's candidacy will help to dismantle the "Religious Right" and bring some rationality back to American politics. But probably not.

All he'd have to do is find God, and all past transgressions would be forgiven.

Neat trick.

Pete Nichols is the State News opinion writer. Reach him at nicho261@msu.edu.