Today, three of the GOP's top prospects for 2008 -- former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, U.S. Sen. John McCain and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich -- are dragging hampers stuffed with failed marriages, adultery and family estrangement into the contest. On the Democratic side, U.S. Sen. Hillary Clinton is stained with her husband's serial wanderings and what some people see as a phony and opportunistic fidelity.

Recent polls, however, indicate that some voters do care. The Pew Research Center for the People and the Press found that 62 percent of Republican respondents and 25 percent of Democrats said they would be less likely to support a candidate who had an extramarital affair in the past. A USA Today/Gallup poll showed that fewer than half of those who attend church weekly would be "completely comfortable" with a candidate who has been married three times, a description that fits both Giuliani and Gingrich.

PHOTO 1-2: COLOR, BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI, GETTY IMAGES (ABOVE) / ASSOCIATED PRESS FILE PHOTO (BELOW) PHOTO 3: (B&W), ASSOCIATED PRESS FILE PHOTO; PHOTO 1: FORMER PRESIDENT [Bill Clinton] hugs his wife, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, at a fundraiser for her presidential campaign in Washington Tuesday. Clinton withstood stories about his sexual activities through two campaigns for the presidency and two terms in the White House. PHOTO 2: FORMER NEW YORK CITY MAYOR Rudy Giuliani and third wife, Judith, answer reporters' questions in New Hampshire in January. PHOTO 3: [Ronald Reagan] and [Jane Wyman], with daughter Maureen, divorced decades before Reagan became president.