Okay, I'll admit it. I love seeing self-righteous people eat a faceful of dirt. It's glorious fun. It's why clowns exist in the world, because if the clown bites it, you expect that. It's not funny when a clown walks into a wall or trips over his own feet or takes a banana cream pie to the face. It's -hilarious- when Rush Limbaugh does. Likewise, when Anne Coulter begins raging against the liberal Democrats who are destroying society and demanding that women stay at home and abdicate their careers to their husbands, I love seeing intelligent women step back and say, "Hey, weren't you a liberal pundit before they realized you weren't entertaining? And don't you have a career you put before cookies and staying at home with kids?"
But man oh man, do I like seeing someone who raised his entire concept of being a guy who put family, kids, wife and country first stand in front of press conference after press conference to a candidacy for Presidential aspiration in the GOP stumble his way through a speech without his wife standing by his side.
In point of fact, she booted his butt out, waiting until the kids hit summer vacation so the news, etc, wouldn't interrupt their schooling. And rather than stand behind him at a press conference with clenched jaw and plastic stony eyes as she "supported him" in his decision for his political reasons, I have visions of her simply putting down the phone and walking away from it the minute the subject was breached.
Look, how people handle infidelity is their own lookout, but I can assure more people that after being on the opposite ends of that coin several times during my dating career, if infidelity occurs in a relationship, it's pretty obvious I'm going to not feel terribly tied down myself.
And men in power have a magnetism about them that some girls just really dig, but when one attaches the identity they've self-created to an image of God, Momma's Apple Pie and the Flag, with a white picket fence and the American Dream, to convert to philandering Latin playboy on the sly just won't end well.
I mean, don't get me wrong. Part of the reason I happily and cheerfully voted for Obama was the disclosure that they had discussed it as a family, and without a commitment to his family in the form of the grandmother living with them in the White House, they weren't going to seriously consider it. Truth be told, how could you?
I greatly respect Ron Sims, the former King County executive and current Deputy , because at one point someone called in on a local talk radio show and lambasted him for not attending what the caller said was a vitally important meeting. Sims replied, "That meeting was on a Wednesday. I have dinner, every Wednesday night, whatever else goes on in my life, with my wife on Wednesday. There is no compromise on that." When asked if that was her rule, he said, "No. That's my rule."
I'm currently hanging out in T's flat with her cat, who seems to enjoy the common feline protest method of gorging oneself and hurking it up on my shoes. He's doing this because she's in eastern Washington at the moment doing family stuff for the next few days, and I'm here because he's neurotic enough as it is without being left alone for four days. (Also, she has cable. And Food Network.) And as far as that goes, having to spend more than two days away from T is annoying as hell.
Sure, I happily enjoy the summer dresses and the steady realization that there's a LOT of blonde chicks in Seattle who seem to appear more often when the weather changes for the better, but would I throw a wrecking ball into my current life and love just to try a new sexual smorgasbord? Not a chance. I miss T a stupidly large amount at the moment and I know part of that is remembering that there are reasons I'm with her and not with, say, Slutty Summer Dress Chick Number 12, ranging from the fact that No. 12 was carrying Bud Light and talking about Dolce and Gabbana's product placement in the new Bruno movie to the fact that T's perfectly okay with me hanging out on her couch on some random evening just poking at the keys on my Mac while she pokes at the keys on her new PC.
We probably wouldn't do that on, ay, any given birthday/celebration/holiday, but it's a pleasant feeling when you realize you can let some of the barriers go.
With Sanford and his wife, I feel deeply for the fact that they grew apart, like I do for any couple who find themselves in a strained relationship, but it's kind of like people who jump on a refinance deal for their Jumbo Loans by borrowing MORE money. Really, the idea that if you can't pay your current mortgage that getting yet MORE debt is going to solve your problem is a very 2001-2008 sort of economic solution.
I suppose that's not out of character, though. The running gag of the Republicans in Congress has been "more more more more" for the last ten years and scooting out the door before the check comes. When it happens in a marriage, though, the aftershocks of the selfish bastards out to squeeze whatever they can ripple to the innocents more than they do to the people causing the problems in the first place.
But Sanford could take heed from the late Michael Jackson' reported conversation in the car on the way to his final court appearance of "Why Me? Why Me? Why are they targeting ME?" the day of his jury decision in his sexual abuse case, the answer is pretty simple.
You. Slept. With. People. Who. Were. Off. Limits.
That's not a terribly hard concept to grasp. Sure, Sanford admitted to schtupping an Argentinian MIHF and MJ was acquitted of trying to do the same to a prepubescent boy, but the action that got both of them in trouble was the same. Sanford, consensually, MJ acquitted, but accused of nonconsensually.
But eh. People in powerful positions are interesting. On some level I think it would be incredibly cool to be on TV and be a contestant in X, Y, or Z reality show, but on another level I've seen the supermarket tabloids, and I'm fully aware that there is no human on the face of the planet who is protected from that media spotlight once it lands on them.
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