OMG, John Edwards Had Sex! (Russia & Georgia At War, Too.)
love how they’re labeling John Edwards’ affair as a “sex scandal” all over the place. And they talk about in such lurid tones, as though something truly twisted has gone on. I’m baffled.
Unless I’ve really missed something, and I wouldn’t put it by me, because I haven’t been paying that much attention, basically, a year or so ago, one of the gals working for John Edwards’ campaign doing political videos, hooked up with John Edwards, and they did the wild thing a few times. Or maybe several times. Possibly in some other position than the missionary position, but we aren’t sure, because they don’t seem to have taken any icky pictures that have been splashed all over the news, or made a sex tape or anything. It was just a decent-looking 50-year-old married man, and a very pretty 40-year-old woman, who happened to quietly hook up, and conduct a discreet little affair. Possibly there was an oops, which resulted in a pretty baby girl, but the woman, this Reille Hunter, doesn’t want to make a big uproar over it, and Edwards says no, not his.
It’s all been very dignified, honestly, and I have to applaud the behavior of Edwards and Hunter so far. I mean, let’s contrast and compare, here. Bill Clinton hooks up with an intern in the Oval Office, and we get stories of BJs, fluid-stained dresses, and penetration with cigar cases. Clinton lies and denies and gets caught, and Lewinski goes on the talk circuit for a few months and tells all. Scandalous, and, frankly, trashy. There was that married male senator who’s name I can’t recall, a couple of years ago, who got caught diddling some of the male congressional pages, and we had to hear all about his icky IM conversations with these young men. Spitzer got caught nailing a call girl, and that had to be all over the news, including cover girl pictures of the prostitute. Larry Craig got caught and arrested for trying to hook up for anonymous gay sex in the public bathroom of a major airport, and made an ass of himself in the news denying his homosexuality/bisexuality. (Right. You were trying to get strange men to have sex with you in a bathroom, but you’re not gay. Sure.)
By contrast, Edwards’ burst of poor judgment and bad behavior has been quite classy and well handled, and I kind of don’t see how it’s rating the big “Edwards Sex Scandal!!!1″ splashes all over CNN. I shit you not, on Friday, CNN covered the Edwards’ affair for six solid hours. I think they took a quick break for Wolfe Blitzer to briefly mention that Russia may have started some sort of little argument with Georgia, and there may have been a few shots fired or something like that, and then back to “OMG, Edwards is having sex!!!”
Seriously, people. Isn’t it about time we got over this sexual fixation of ours? We aren’t Puritans. Lots of people are having sex. Plenty of people are having some very strange sex. In fact, I’m willing to bet that there may be people who are having sex while reading this post. (Wash the keyboard when you’re done, or the keys will get all sticky.) Sex happens. Politicians cheat on their wives/husbands. It doesn’t matter if they’re Democrats or Republicans, or if it’s gay or straight sex. It happens. Does it really need to be front page news? Especially when we’re fighting two wars, there’s a third getting started in Russia, and the Olympics are on. Don’t we have better things to be covering in the news? Really?
I suppose, thinking it over, that these sorts of things should be mentioned. Republicans sneaking out to have gay sex makes news, because Republicans belong to the party which is vociferously going out of its way to oppress gay rights, and the hypocrisy should be pointed out. And, I suppose, we should know which of our politicians are adulterous, just because I — and I’m sure, plenty of others — don’t really want to vote for the kind of person who would cheat on their spouse. So, yes, it’s nice that the news mentions these things.
But it doesn’t need to be a week-long media Mardi Gras, okay? It’s just not that interesting, and I have a hard time imagining that so many of us really care that much, that they need to kick up such a big stink about it. (Except for, possibly, Republicans and gay sex, because, again, oppression of a minority and the hypocrisy.)
Meanwhile:
- Russians Open Second Front In Georgia — Russian soldiers plunged into Georgia today to open a second front in the two countries’ 4-day-old war, storming out of the Russia-backed breakaway republic of Abkhazia to seize control of a western army base.
- Russian Ultimatum — Russia issued an ultimatum to Georgia on Monday to disarm its troops along the boundary with the pro-Russian separatist enclave of Abkhazia as Russian tanks rolled across the border and occupied a military base in western Georgia.
- Diplomatic Efforts — Russian planes continued bombing raids on Georgia Monday, ignoring international appeals for the country to observe Georgia’s offer for a cease-fire. Russian leaders say Georgia has yet to fully honor the cease-fire, claiming that Georgian forces have continued to attack the breakaway province of South Ossetia’s capital, Tskinvali.
- Georgia Signs Peace-Fire, Russia Keeps Shooting — Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili says he has signed a European-backed cease-fire document aimed at halting fighting between Georgian and Russian forces.
(Photo credit: John Edwards.)
August 11th, 2008 at 2:10 pm
John Edwards is not responsible for his actions. He has narcissistic personality disorder(kind of like the “insanity defense” for depressed women who kill their children). So, let him off the hook! The snake (trial attorney) bit you, but you knew what he was when you picked him up!
August 11th, 2008 at 9:53 pm
Yes we should know these kinds of things about our candidates. But now that Edwards is out of the picture I don’t think it was necessary to bring it up. And I feel really bad for Mrs. Edwards to have it made public and everyone will look at her with all their pity. I’d hate that myself. I think the only reason he finally told about it was to make himself feel better–to take off some of the guilt and his poor wife (who was going thru cancer treatments at the time) has to handle all this. What a shit head!
August 11th, 2008 at 11:40 pm
Hows that old song go?
It’s the end of the world as we know know it and I feel fine!
War here and there, figthing, death, destruction, and look the olympics are on! Yes the olympics a symbol of peace and international cooperation.
….seriously what the hell is going on???? Didn’t the leaders of the world read those books by Nostrodomas? I mean hello, they made several movies about it on the discovery channel.
And it’s on the cover of every issue of star magazine (the tabloid).
Were I inclined to believe in god and I’m sure he/she/it would be laughing till stomach staples were needed!!!
Oh I like how the first two comments are about the sex bit when you say we’ve had enough attention to that already!
August 13th, 2008 at 5:32 pm
Then why are magazines like Playboy and Penthouse sold in opaque wrappers, and hidden behind boards that hide all but the title? Why were people up in arms over a half-second shot of Janet Jackson’s nipple? Why are so many people opposed to sex ed in public schools? Why is there porn that pretends not to be porn (like the Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue)?
This may not be a Puritan nation in the “start a civil war and kill the king” way, but there’s still a lot of repression and “eww, sex is icky!” going on.
This, in turn, means that sex is lurid forbidden fruit. CNN doesn’t, strictly speaking, make money by providing a good newscast; they make money by gathering eyeballs and selling advertising space. Evidently they feel that anything sexual will draw eyeballs, and they may be right.
Interestingly enough, Russell Glasser, then a student at UT Austin, found that if you compare data from news sites and from sites like Digg, it looks as though people aren’t as interested in lurid stories as the news outlets seem to think.