Rick Warren Admits Not Voting For An Adulterer (McCain? Edwards?)

It appears that Saddleback Church Pastor Rick Warren admits that he would not vote for an adulter. The question came up before the Saddleback Forum, where U.S. Senator and GOP Nominee for President John McCain did say that he regretted how he treated his first wife.

It's widely known in political circles that McCain cheated on his first wife with the woman we now know as Cindy McCain. CNN's Mary Snow asked her about the question, without success:



This liberal Christian group called Matthew25 also took issue with the McCain Adultery matter in this commercial:



This is the story:

In 1965 John McCain, a member of the US Navy, married an attractive model named Carol Shepp. In 1967 McCain was sent to Vietnam. It didn't take long before McCain was shot down and taken prisoner. Carol waited faithfully for McCain during his imprisonment. In 1969, Carol was in a terrible car crash. She was thrown through the windshield and suffered serious injuries. But Carol would not allow her POW husband to be notified of what had happened to her because she didn't want him to feel any additional stress. She stood by her man, alone, for the 5 years he was in prison.

McCain was released in 1973 and returned home to find that Carol's accident had "left her 4 inches shorter and on crutches, and she had gained a good deal of weight." [4] McCain no longer had a trophy wife he could feel proud of.

By the late 70's McCain had engaged in adulterous behaviors, as chronicled in the book "The Nightingale's Song" by Robert Timberg. Timberg wrote:

"Off duty, usually on routine cross-country flights to Yuma and El Centro, John started carousing and running around with women. To make matters worse, some of the women with whom he was linked by rumor were subordinates. At the time the rumors were so widespread that, true or not, they became part of McCain's persona, impossible not to take note of."

In 1979 John McCain met Cindy Lou Hensley at a military reception in Hawaii. [1] Cindy was a millionaire and very attractive. McCain was eighteen years older than the wealthy Hensley, but that didn't stop him from developing an adulterous relationship with her. [2]

McCain says of their first meeting, "She was lovely, intelligent and charming, 18 years my junior but poised and confident. I monopolized her attention the entire time, taking care to prevent anyone else from intruding on our conversation. When it came time to leave the party, I persuaded her to join me for drinks at the Royal Hawaiian Hotel. By the evening's end, I was in love."

That's what happened. How the public will handle this as the campaign wears on is the unknown story.