We can become able masters of the human heart, but only if we allow ourselves to be tutored in the school of “heart-felt” personal experience.

Kings have their troubles; the peasant has his cares; the wayfarer has many hardships; the Captain has his difficulties, and there were times when the dark valleys were too much for me, but thank God, “The Lord was my Shepherd!”

I was also tried in my friends and my counselors; they forsook me! They that ate my bread lifted up their heels against me, but my worst foes were that of my own household; my blood family; but especially my children, they were my greatest affliction.

The temptations of poverty and wealth, of honor and reproach, of health and sickness, all took a toll on me. The trials from without disturbed my peace, and from within, marred my joy. No sooner I escaped from one trial I fell into another; emerging from one season of despondency and alarm, I was again brought into the lowest depths, whilst simultaneously the waves of billows were rolling over me.

At the time, whatever my frame of mind, whatever ecstasy of depression, was the result of emotions propelled by incomprehensible deep hurt. Having been instructed in life’s personal experience, I have matured with God’s grace through the years, and with my Lord’s inexhaustible mercy, He placed me in “Green Pastures.” My soul, let my Lord’s grace continue to cheer and counsel thee,” this day!

Sheriff G Ali

© Sheriff G Ali 2010-2011

http://sheriffali.blogspot.com/2011/11/my-greatest-affliction.html

This is from the movie BAGBAN which translates “care-taker.” The Parents four children had taken, and taken and taken from their parents and they ended up treating their parents like dirt, never ever remembering that their parents gave them “all” that they had!

This video is where the children had separated their parents who never spent one night apart in the forty years they were married. The parents had given their four children all that they had, and the father ended up having to stay with one son and the children’s mom had to stay by another son, solely because their sons thought that it was a burden having both parents in the same house was too much for them. The father asked his son to use the phone to call his wife (the boy’s mother) because it was the first night they were being apart after 40 years. When he asked his son to use the phone, the boy just walked away. Here is the son’s father, heartbroken; pangs and pines; went out into the rainy street to use the phone to call his wife. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lA8_kcENDxM&feature=related

MAIN YAHAAN TU WAHAAN

[This is what he was singing to his wife from the phone booth]

(ENGLISH TRANSLATION)

You and I are separate

What has life come to?

You are the only one I see

Everywhere I cast a glance

I get no sleep

I miss you badly

I can’t live without you anymore

You and I are separate

What has life come to?

It is as if time has come

To a standstill

There is gloom everywhere

I pine for you

I am lonely in body

Thirsty in soul

Not even for a moment

Why wouldn’t your face

Fade away from my eyes

Day and nights do go by

A lonely life

Just won’t go by

You and I are separate

What has life come to?

[Here he stopped singing and said to his wife, Ok then, by, “don’t forget to write.”

[Now he is about to hang up the phone and he hears his wife, as she sings]

Whenever I hear foot steps

I feel as if you have arrived

Life is whiff of fresh air

You have lent

Fragrance to my breath

These were the days

When we were always together

And time is so much different

Between us now

You and I are separate

What has life come to?

Their father had adopted a child that used to shine shoes and placed him in school. The boy did very well in school and went toEnglandand graduated there. He returned toIndiaand started a business. To this “boy,” his adopted father was “the image of who God is!” He got married and brought his adopted parents to their home. When you look at the short video you will see the photograph of their adopted parents. Amazing, because when his adopted parents saw this, their heart was happy and their heart was breaking as to how, their own children treated them like dirt, and this adopted son, saw them as God and Goddess! But I thought about it and thought about it, and my conclusion from my own experience in life tells me:

SUCH IS LIFE!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPUUKQjKxek&feature=related

Sheriff G Ali

http://sheriffali.blogspot.com/2011/11/baghban-translates-care-taker.html

After the Congressional Supercommittee failed to reconcile its differences on budget reduction this week, many disappointed citizens may have the urge to reminisce on America’s Golden Days. But those looking back should be mindful of how far they let their gaze drift. At some points in US politics, the sword, or pistol, was mightier than the pen.

Nowadays, challenging someone to a duel sounds like a line from the latest Three Musketeers remake, but dueling used to play a part in American society – and Congress. According to a New York Times article from 1859, “all of the Congressional challenges that have been sent … do not exceed twenty-five in number, and not half so many as have been fought by members of the British Parliament.” The article continues in response to British criticism of “the state of civilization” inAmerica and gives a rational-sounding recount of dueling politicians until that point in time.

The first recorded duel involving a member of Congress was in 1777, all of a year after the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Army Officer Jackland McIntosh and Congressman Button Gwinnett (who actually signed the Declaration of Independence) squared off, and Gwinnett lost more than his honor. “The dispute was of a personal nature,” so the New York Times was hesitant to call it “a Congressional encounter, as it did not grow out of any act of either party connected with politics.”

At the time, such an “affair of honor” was increasingly commonplace inAmerica, after the practice was brought over by European nobles. Unlike their Atlantic counterparts, though, lower-class Americans elected to engage in gentlemen warfare. According to the PBS website, two servants of the same master, “Edward Doty and Edward Lester, of theMassachusettscolony, fought the first recorded American duel in 1621, just a year after the Pilgrims arrived atPlymouth.”

Dueling was a practice enjoyed all the way to the top of the society. Before becoming the seventh president and winding up on the 20 dollar bill, Andrew Jackson earned quite the name for himself as a skilled duelist, until an unfortunate encounter with Charles Dickinson (theTennesseehorse breeder, not the British novelist). At the time of the duel,Jacksonhad already served as aTennesseesenator and was practicing law, according to the History Channel website. What began as a bet on a horse race ended in Jackson and Dickinson crossing the border intoKentuckyin 1806 and exchanging fire.

As the duel began,Jacksontook a bullet in the chest next to his heart, but put pressure on the wound long enough to shoot back. His pistol misfired, and in a breach of etiquette,Jacksoncocked his pistol a second time and shotDickinsondead.Jackson’s fighting faux pas was a slight to his honor, but not enough to prevent him from later becoming president.

Not all politicians were so lucky. In 1804, a political duel shook the nation. Over a series of campaigns, Vice President Aaron Burr and former Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton engaged in a series of personal attacks. To settle the matter once and for all, Burr challengedHamiltonto a duel. They set the location outside ofWashington, where dueling was illegal, and met in the early morning hours nearWeehawken,New Jersey. What happened next isn’t entirely clear, according to the History Channel website. Some sayHamiltondeclared the duel immoral and merely fired into the air. Others say he took a shot at Burr and missed. What then ensued is irrefutable: Burr fired back, the bullet going throughHamilton’s stomach and lodging itself next to his spine. Within a day,Hamiltonwas dead.

The country was outraged to lose a man as notable as Hamilton, one ofAmerica’s Founding Fathers. Even though Burr was charged with murder inNew YorkandNew Jersey, his immunity as vice president prevented a conviction. By the time he finished his term, he had lost so much political standing that he devised a scheme to annex theLouisianaTerritoryand establish an independent government. When he marched a militia towardNew Orleansin 1806, though, he was charged with treason. He was later acquitted, but the public labeled him a traitor, and he left forEurope, never to return to American politics. In Burr’s case, political grievances caused the country a great hardship. If current Congressmen don’t take heed of history, they might find themselves making a similar mistake.

Do not bet the saint in public and a devil in private, dealing in soot by night.

A cake not turned is uncooked on one side, and so it is with us in many respects, untouched by divine grace: though there is some partial obedience, there is very much rebellion left. My soul, I charge thee, see whether this day be thy case.

Are we thorough in the things of God? Has grace gone through the very centre of thy being so as to be felt in its divine operations in all thy powers and thy actions, thy words and thy thoughts? To be sanctified, spirit, soul and body; should be our aim and prayer; and although sanctification may not be perfect in thee anywhere in degree, yet it must be universal in its action; there must not be the appearance of holiness in one place and reigning of sin in another, else we too, wilt be “a cake not turned.”

A cake not turned is soon burnt on the side nearest the fire, and although no one can have too much of God, there are some who seem burnt on black with bigoted zeal for that part of truth which they have received, or are charred to a cinder with a vainglorious Pharisaic Ostentation of those religious performances which suite their humor. The assumed appearance of superior sanctity frequently accompanies a total absence of all vital Godliness.

The saint in public is a devil in private! He deals in flour by day and in soot by night. The cake which is burned on one side; is dough on the other!

If it be so with me, O Lord, turn me! Turn my unsanctified nature to the fire of Thy love and let it feel the sacred glow and let my burnt side cool a little, while I learn my own weakness and want of heat when I am removed from Thy heavenly flame. Let me not be found a double-minded man but one entirely under the powerful influence of reigning grace; for well I know if I am left like a cake unturned and am not on both sides the subject of Thy grace, I must be consumed for ever amid everlasting burnings!

http://sheriffali.blogspot.com/2011/11/give-thanks-unto-lord-thy-god-for-your.html

The top-secret mission dubbed OPERATION X that gave away no clues used the latest hi-tech ELINT electronic intelligence technology to bug Saif al-Islam along with his friends and family.

Saif al-Islam had been hiding out in the desert for weeks but the breakthrough came when Saif made two consecutive calls to advise that he was alright. It allowed the joint British and French bugging operation to pinpoint where he was.

M16 Agents using the £25 million top-secret equipment to close in on Saif before calling in the Libyan Snatch Squad. Saif was targeted by the British but it was essential for the Libyans to capture him.

Saif al-Islam, the London-Educated son of Gaddafi was picked up with two aides while trying to flee to neighboringNiger. He was taken to Zintan in northernLibya.

Saif told reporters that his right bandaged hand was the result of a Royal Air Force strike during the month of October, but that he was alright!

Comment:

Saif al-Islam (39 years of age) could have done so much more with his life. He earned a PHD in Economics inLondonand seemed to have had in the past, much aspiration in helping his country to remove his father’s dysfunctional rule that kept the Libyan people in turmoil for forty-two years. But in the end he decided to collaborate with his father, in the further slaughter of the Libyan people that lead to the demise not only of his father but also, two of his brothers.

I do not believe that the Libyan Government would send him to the International Criminal Court, but he would be tried inLibyathat would be witnessed by outside observers. However, the inevitable outcome for Saif al-Islam would be execution. Perhaps this could be a great lesson for the other Dictators that subjugate their people for the avarice of money and power! 

Saif al-Islam means “Sword of Islam”

Sheriff G Ali

http://sheriffali.blogspot.com/2011/11/british-agents-assisted-in-capture-of.html

To what dignity are the chosen elevated when the brilliant courtiers of heaven become their willing servitors! Into what communion are we raised since we have intercourse with spotless celestials! How well are we defended since all the twenty-thousand chariots of God are armed for our deliverance! To whom do we owe all this? Let the Lord Jesus Christ be for ever endeared to us, for through Him we are made to sit in heavenly places far above principalities and powers.

He is to whose camp is round about them that fear Him; He is the true Michael whose foot is upon the dragon. All hail, Jesus! Thou Angels of Jehovah’s presence, to Thee this heart offers its vows.

Our lives are no different than Kings,Queens, Presidents, Prime Ministers and the Likes, for The Almighty gives Sun, Rain, Light and Darkness to all. See how this mighty man of God handled his troubles during his time on Earth!

THE SWEET PSALMIST OF ISRAEL.” 2^ND SAMUEL 23:1

Among all the saints whose lives are written in Holy Writ, David possesses an experience of the most striking, varied and instructive character. In his history we meet with trials and temptations not discovered, as a whole, in other saints of ancient times, and hence he is all the more suggestive a type of our Lord.

David knew the trials of all ranks and conditions of men. Kings have their troubles, and David wore a crown: the peasant has cares, and David handled a shepherd’s crook: the wanderer has many hardships, and David, abode in the caves of Engedi: the captain has his difficulties, and David found the sons of Zeruiah too hard for him.

The psalmist was also tried in his friends, his counselor Anithophel forsook him, “He that eateth bread with me, had lifted up his heel against me.” (Psalm 41) His worst foes were they of his own household: his children were his greatest affliction. The temptations of poverty and wealth, of honor and reproach, of health and weakness, all tried their power upon him. He had temptations from without to disturb his peace, and from within to mar his joy.

David no sooner escaped from one trial than he fell into another; no sooner emerged from one season of despondency and alarm, then he was again brought into the lowest depths, and all God’s waves and billows rolled over him. It is probably from this cause that David’s psalms are so universally the delight of those that “truly” believes in God.

Whatever our frame of mind, whether ecstasy or depression, David has exactly described our emotions. He was an able master of the human heart, because he had been tutored in the best of all schools – the school of heart-felt, personal experience.

As we are instructed in the same school, as we grow matured in grace and in years, we increasingly appreciate David’s psalms, and find them to be “green pastures.” My soul, let David’s experience cheer and counsel me this day.

For many people they make a calculated decision to join a particular religion or they were born into a respective religion. Many attend Churches, Mosques, Temples and what other form of worship they freely choose, but the question is how many people find “religion” and a house of worship that they attend, but “never” find that “Oneness” with God. You can find out if you have found religion or you have found God when affliction strikes. Affliction like God is no respecter of person, be it age, nationality, financial circumstances or anything that is part of this world that we live in. Death comes without any invitation and no amount of wealth can purchase even an additional second of life, for when your spirit (Spirit is derived from the Hebrew word meaning “breath”) is recalled, you must go, and naked as you came into the world, naked you shall go!

All over the ancient Middle East we find reference to the bull which is used as a symbol of strength and fertility, as well as to bull gods. El, the supreme deity of the decadent Canaanite pantheon, was often called the Bull El (he was a fertility god). Baal, the god of fertility, storms, rain, and vegetation, is also called the Bull.

Similarly among the Hittites, Aramaeans, and Babylonians, the bull gods were a dominant feature of their religions, not to mention the many bull and calf-cults linked closely to the Egyptian god Horus. Cattle cults among the Cushite peoples of Ethiopia and India may be found to this day! In Mithraism, bull worship was an important aspect of their beliefs.

Present day! 2011

A political facelift in Europe’s troubled south, following the appointment of technocrat-led governments in Italy and Greece and a pending election in Spain, will likely help shape the next phase of the euro-zone debt crisis against a backdrop of spiraling borrowing costs and continued policy uncertainty.

Spain has crept back up the crisis agenda as Sunday’s national elections have zoomed into view, sending yields on its government bonds sharply higher. So too has France due to its heavy banking exposure to heavily indebted Italy, and a new emergency government headed by former European Union Commissioner Mario Monti.

In Greece, where it all began, a new government headed by former ECB Vice President Lucas Papademos has to move quickly to shore up the country’s deteriorating finances to qualify for European aid even as the country enters an ever-deeper recession.

By Dan Eggen, Published: November 17

A think tank founded by GOP presidential candidate Newt Gingrich collected at least $37 million over the past eight years from major health-care companies and industry groups, offering special access to the former House speaker and other perks, according to records and interviews.

The Center for Health Transformation, which opened in 2003, brought in dues of as much as $200,000 per year from insurers and other health-care firms, offering some of them “access to Newt Gingrich” and “direct Newt interaction,” according to promotional materials. The biggest funders, including firms such as AstraZeneca, Blue Cross Blue Shield and Novo Nordisk, were also eligible to receive discounts on “products and workshops” from other Gingrich groups.

The health center advocated, among other things, requiring that “anyone who earns more than $50,000 a year must purchase health insurance or post a bond,” a type of insurance mandate that has since become anathema to conservatives.

The group also pushed proposals to build centralized electronic medical records and use such data to research treatment effectiveness, both central features of President Obama’s health-care reforms.

Gingrich, who has been under fire recently for his lucrative consulting business, left the health-care think tank earlier this year to run for president. But his time there exemplifies the formerGeorgia congressman’s post-legislative career as a well-paid consultant and policy guru, a role that earned him and his companies tens of millions of dollars over the past decade.

His experience at the think tank also illustrates Gingrich’s past flirtations with moderate policies — on health care, the environment and other hot-button issues — that have become the subject of controversy and criticism in the presidential race.

The Gingrich campaign referred questions about the center to the think tank. Susan Meyers, a center spokeswoman, declined to comment on the think tank’s income or staffing levels because it is a private-sector organization. She said that neither the center nor Gingrich has engaged in formal lobbying.

Meyers called Gingrich “a health-care visionary” who was advocating far-reaching reforms “before many of these concepts in health care became mainstream.” She said the think tank’s members don’t always agree on specific issues but are working “toward a common vision of saving lives and money.”

Gingrich has been criticized in recent days after Bloomberg News reported that he earned as much as $1.8 million in consulting fees from Freddie Mac, a quasi-public corporation that many conservatives blame for the housing crisis. After first suggesting he was hired for a short time as a “historian,” Gingrich has since acknowledged acting as a consultant for the mortgage giant “over a long period of time.”

“I was approached to offer strategic advice; I was glad to offer strategic advice,” Gingrich told reporters inIowathis week. “We did it for a number of companies, and Gingrich Group was very successful.”

Mixing policy, marketing

One of the key organizations of the Gingrich Group over the past eight years was the health-care center, an unusual hybrid that married the policy focus of a traditional think tank with Gingrich’s instincts for self-promotion and marketing.

The center attracted a long list of global health-care firms and interest groups, which paid $5,000 to $200,000 a year, based on their size, to be members. Based on archived membership lists going back to 2003, that means the center brought in as much as $6.25 million per year from higher-level members giving $50,000 or more, totaling at least $37 million since 2003.

That does not include many other sources of revenue, such as dues from smaller members and fees for polling, research and other services the center offered.

The center has listed scores of firms and industry groups as members over the years, amounting to a Who’s Who of the medical field, from GE Healthcare to the American Hospital Association to Wellpoint, the nation’s largest health insurer. The think tank also drew funding from employers with sizable health-care costs, such asDetroit’s Big Three automakers, records show.

Several firms characterized their membership as a way to share information about potential health-care reforms.

“We engage with a variety of organizations to participate in public policy discussions on issues impacting our business,” said Tony Jewell, spokesman for drugmaker AstraZeneca, which has been listed as a “founding charter member” since 2005. He said the company is reviewing its membership for next year.

Rick Tyler, a longtime Gingrich spokesman who left as part of a staff exodus from the campaign over the summer, said the think tank “was very successful financially” and played a vital role in promoting free-market solutions for the health-care system. He said Gingrich could have easily cashed in as a registered lobbyist after leaving Congress but chose to try to shape the debate over major public policies instead.

“I don’t think Newt was trying to be an influence-peddler,”Tylersaid. “If he had wanted to do that, he could have done that, and he would have been rewarded handsomely for it, I’m sure.”

Although Gingrich gave up ownership of the think tank earlier this year to begin his candidacy, the group still bills him prominently as its founder and sells a long list of Gingrich-related books, videos and other products. Another Gingrich venture, a nonprofit called American Solutions for Winning the Future, closed its doors over the summer amid financial problems.

An issue on campaign trail

A financial disclosure form filed by the candidate in July said his net worth was at least $6.7 million, with income of at least $2.7 million in 2010. The form listed a “convertible promissory note” — a kind of loan that can be paid back or converted into stock — worth $5 million to $25 million from Gingrich Group to Gingrich Productions, a media company run by his wife, Callista. 

Gingrich has clashed with other Republican presidential candidates over his evolving positions on health-care issues. FormerMassachusetts governor Mitt Romney, whose own state health-care reform plan was a model for Obama’s national approach, attacked Gingrich at one debate: “We got the idea of an individual mandate from you!”

The Gingrich health center’s support for such a mandate was part of an “Insure All Americans” plan that appears to have disappeared from the center’s Web site Thursday.

Gingrich has characterized his previous support for insurance mandates as a response to President Bill Clinton’s more government-focused health-care proposal in the 1990s, and he has said he turned against the idea.

“I am completely opposed to the Obamacare mandate on individuals,” he says in a recent campaign video. “I fought it for 2¹ / ₂ years at the Center for Health Transformation.”

During a recent interview inSouth Carolina, Gingrich said that ending his involvement in the health-care think tank and other businesses was difficult. He also said that if he fails to win the Republican nomination, he doesn’t know whether he will “do anything as big as the center” again.

“You know, I’ve made a good deal of my income off the speeches and off of being a commentator,” Gingrich said. “All of that went away. So it just got to be much more challenging.”

Staff writer Karen Tumulty contributed to this report.

Newt Gingrich dumped his first wife while she lay in a hospital suffering from cancer and married his second wife (left photo). Then he dumped her and married his third wife (right photo). I did not include Gingrich’s first wife out of respect for her.

For added chutzpah, Gingrich recently suggested that Democratic politicians who were influenced by lobbyists at Freddie and Fannie ought to go to jail. But Gingrich draws a distinction for himself. “I did no lobbying of any kind,” he said on Wednesday. No, that would be wrong.

As a young graduate student pursuing an advanced degree in modern European history, Newt Gingrich wrote a dissertation titled “Belgian Education Policy in the Congo: 1945-1960.” Thereafter, in the course of writing 23 books, the scholar-politician pontificated on many subjects, from the pope to a “pouting sex kitten,” who appears for a quick romp in a novel about the Civil War.

None of his work had anything to do with the home lending practices that would help to destroy the American economy. So why would Freddie Mac pay $300,000 to Professor Gingrich in 2006 – just as the troubled mortgage lender was facing calls on Capitol Hill for increased regulation?

Turns out, that was just small change in the overall sweetheart deal that no historian but Gingrich could ever get. Bloomberg News reported this week that Gingrich made between $1.6 million and $1.8 million for giving additional “advice” to Freddie Mac. When I asked about the amount, a Freddie Mac spokesman refused to comment, but officials at the agency who are familiar with the contracts confirmed the numbers reported by Bloomberg.

This is not just another Gingrich laugher, up there with his revolving Tiffany’s account or his multiple personal hypocrisies. This story encapsulates whyWashingtonis broken and how the powerful protect and enrich themselves, unanchored to basic principles.

At the same time, it’s a case study in the Gingrich method: denounce something as outrageous, while doing that very outrageous thing himself. (Politicians with ties to Freddie Mac came in for scathing Gingrich criticism in 2010.) There is no evidence, as Gingrich claimed last week in a debate that he offered Freddie Mac a dime’s worth of advice in his capacity as a “historian,” or warned against a surge in subprime lending. To the contrary, former Freddie Mac executives told Bloomberg that Gingrich was brought in to help the agency continue down the very path of its ruination – backing subprime mortgages.

Plain and simple, Gingrich was paid for his influence. A former speaker of the House, even a disgraced one, is still worth something. And so, what Gingrich actually did was praise Freddie Mac’s business model, according to an Associated Press article in 2008. On top of that, he was asked by executives at Freddie to help frame the debate to win over fellow conservatives.

Freddie Mac and its sister firm in government-sanctioned lending assistance, Fannie Mae, were forced into government receivership in 2008. Since then, they have cost taxpayers $181 billion. These two agencies are often cited by Republicans as the main reason for the financial collapse.

With Gingrich, there ought to be a special category for gall. Here’s what he said when asked in last week’s debate about his $300,000 deal with Freddie:

My advice as a historian, when they walked in and said to me, “We are now making loans to people who have no credit history and have no record of paying back anything, but that’s what the government wants us to do,” as I said to them at the time, this is a bubble. This is insane. This is impossible.

If he can provide a single speech, audio transcript or paper backing this claim, I promise to personally sell copies of “Belgian Education Policy in theCongo,” on street corners for a day.

And if he had come to such an enlightened and early conclusion about the pending housing collapse, why didn’t Citizen Gingrich sound the alarm for his fellow countrymen? From this most gaseous of politicians, an op-ed, or quick sit-down with the sycophants at Fox News, would have helped warn a nation of its folly. But there is nothing. The narrative of Newt Gingrich as the Paul Revere of the housing crisis is a self-fantasy to cover up his complicity.

As to the Gingrich method, this latest episode is textbook. He’s best known, of course, for blistering President Clinton for his dalliance with Monica Lewinsky at the same time that he, then speaker, was carrying on an affair with a House aide, now his third wife, Callista Gingrich.

In his latest incarnation, Gingrich poses as an outsider who will break up theWashingtonestablishment — a scourge of the elites who feed off its culture of cronyism. But after 33 years inWashington, if Gingrich were any more embedded in the establishment, pigeons would be landing on his shoulder seeking the kind of relief normally accorded statues. Wednesday, while defending his work for Freddie, Gingrich said, “It reminds people that I know a great deal aboutWashington.”

His tax-exempt entity, called American Solutions, allows him to make grand policy statements and promote his brand, while his private entity, Gingrich Productions, is a money-making machine. Most recently, Gingrich Productions has been cranking out DVDs in consort with Citizens United, the same group that prompted the infamous Supreme Court decision that corporations are people. And it was Gingrich Productions, he said on the campaign trail Wednesday that took in all the money from the now-bankrupt lending agency.

The Freddie Mac deal shows just how easy it is for former public servants to enrich themselves. In this case, a well-connected politician gets paid an extravagant fee to “consult” with a runaway mortgage backer that is fighting off calls for increased scrutiny. He was hired, Bloomberg reported, to build bridges to fellow Republicans in Congress.

For added chutzpah, Gingrich recently suggested that Democratic politicians who were influenced by lobbyists at Freddie and Fannie ought to go to jail. But Gingrich draws a distinction for himself. “I did no lobbying of any kind,” he said on Wednesday. No, that would be wrong.

New York Times! Timothy Egan