John Edwards, Bob Filner, Mario Lopez, Mark Sanford, Elliott Spitzer and Anthony Weiner are all men who did or do hold public office and either did or do continue to remain in or aspire to elective office in state, local or national politics in the United States of America in this, the thirteenth year of the twenty first century. What do they have in common? They all have been accused of and revealed to have been involved in immoral and unfaithful behavior related to their unchecked libidos. Except for Edwards and possibly Lopez, a.k.a. "Grope-ez" (he of the perhaps slowly dawning self-awareness due to his age and sudden unemployment) these men are adjudged by this blogger to be ethically challenged narcissists in continued denial who therefore are unwilling or unable to remove themselves from the public square and whose fragile inhibitions are neither nourished nor encouraged by a growing portion of the electorate that has increasingly demonstrated itself to be morally obtuse and similarly disinclined to consider self-control about its own promiscuity.
The time has long since passed that one needs to preface any condemnation of sexual indiscretions with the defensive assurance to the reader that one is not a puritan. The ethos of the 1960's ("free love", the championing of non-judgmental ways and the constant urgings to "do it if it feels good') has held sway for far too long in America. Allying itself with the "New Morality" of that era of counter-culturalism is really now, what one may safely identify as the "Old Immorality." In Weiner's case he has repeatedly lied about his "sexting." When his dissembling was revealed, and only then, did he come clean about these activities. Resignation from national office did not come easily for the former congressman. Two years after he did agree to step down, he began very recently, a renewed campaign for the mayoralty of what was perhaps the greatest city in the world, New York. We were assured that his rehabilitation was complete and that he was ready, in the dreary parlance and empty sloganeering of Democratic Liberalism to "move forward." Speedily it was announced that other "sexting" incidents occurred AFTER he had resigned his office. With equal alacrity Weiner called a press conference and rationalized all of his behavior with a wife by his side who chimed in with her own little apologia for why, in effect, Anthony was not deeply disturbed and did not deserve to be denied a chance to become the next mayor of the very wormy "Big Apple." Neither was convincing, but their ambitions and again, the weakness of the objections to his deeply flawed character keeps the unpleasantness of his continued presence in the public consciousness alive, like a hopefully dying rat that is for the present, too strong for the particularly weak dose of vermicide, i.e. opprobium that it has ingested.
When Bill Clinton avoided removal from the most powerful office in the world in 1999 for his perjurious acts growing out of his illicit sex life, it marked a milestone in the nation's cultural climate. While our traditions about privacy and the almost religiously held view about the inviolable bifurcation between public service and one's personal life were then and are now as strong as they ever were, the Clinton scandal inoculated, for the first time, other and future politicians from the fear of "infection" caused by repulsive behavior. In short, the negative consequences of indulging one's appetites receded to the point that there increasingly became no consequences. Routinely, more and more offenders paid lip service to traditional sensibilities by remarking that they had taken "full responsibility" for their actions and that they had, at the very least (and it was all too often demonstrated to be the very least of their peccadilloes), "exercised poor judgment", as if their transgression was no more than that of a mediocre outfielder who didn't account for the sun's rays while unsuccessfully trying to settle under a pop fly.
But conjoined with this behavior that many dismiss as just "naughty" comes a more systemic nastiness that one is inclined to view as not just coincidental. In the case of Spitzer, there is no great debate about his penchant for arrogance. He in fact, evinces a certain pride in his past behavior that he no doubt views as heroic, i.e. that of a "kick ass" reformer whose self-description early in his aborted gubernatorial term of office was that of a "f--king steamroller." More than a few other incidents point to the gracelessness of this man, including the "Troopergate" issue and his vindictiveness in other areas.
The vileness and mental cruelty of Edwards towards his dying wife is well documented and Weiner's combativeness along with his self-destructive sexting nonsense reinforces what former Mayoy Giuliani once said of him not long after the former congressman first appeared on the national scene: "there was always something wrong with Anthony."
Well, the ancient saw is true. As our politicians are democratically elected "we get the leadership that we deserve." Do we really want to be deserving of morally feculent and bankrupt leaders? As software operators and others in the early days of computers warned those seeking excellence and accuracy from dubious facts and data: "garbage in….garbage out." The flotsam and jetsam on the seascape of our political world cannot endlessly be cleaned up and removed. The hubris that asserts that these "oceans" cannot become irretrievably polluted is a risky mindset akin to the conduct of these pathetic yet dangerous men.
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