I was really happy to see Anthony Weiner mounting a comeback
in American politics. While short on actual accomplishments, Weiner was a good
liberal advocate in Congress. More to the point, though, I’m not really
comfortable with people losing their jobs because of their marital
infidelities.
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| Anthony Weiner (NSFW) |
America has proven time and again in recent years that, in
regard to sex scandals, there can be second acts in politics. Bill Clinton is
the most obvious figure here, but more recently, Mark Sanford was elected
to congress after stealing
taxpayer money to go on a sexy excursion with then-mistress/now-wife. Even
Weiner’s NYC pal, Eliot Spitzer, who had some fun with prostitutes on the
public dime, is up
15 points in his primary for New York Comptroller. All three of these
examples were pretty indisputably worse infidelities than Weiner sending
selfies to women not named Huma. And worse still, all of the above cost
taxpayer dollars which, unless you’re counting a data plan, Weiner did not do.
So I was happy to see the Weiner surge in the polls. He was up
3 points on City Councilor president Christine
Quinn as recently as last week. Then he had to go and muck it up again.
If you’re not following me, yesterday Anthony Weiner had to
have a
press conference to talk about more sexy texties he’d sent after
his resignation to a 22 year old woman, forcing himself back into a
scandal he was coming out of and really
making his wife look bad. Apparently, losing your seat in congress,
embarrassing yourself on national television, and having to explain yourself to
your pregnant wife whose mentor is America’s poster child for being cheated on wasn’t quite rock
bottom for Anthony Weiner. After all that, he kept on doing the thing that
brought him down.
Now, I agree with his wife, Huma Abedin, who said that this
was a private matter. That said, continuing to engage in that kind of behavior
after you already dragged your family through the mud, lost your job, and
apologized for a thing that was none of their business anyways is kind of difficult to swallow. It is difficult
to trust in your sincerity if you are back at it right after the press
conference is over.
Truthfully, I hope this scandal doesn’t derail Weiner’s
candidacy for mayor (though that seems unlikely, given the calls for him to
pull out of the race). I fully expect that it will. While the scandal itself is
really none of the public’s business, Weiner knows the rules of the road at
this point. And even though sexting without actual sex is the
0.08% blood-alcohol of sex scandals, after you get pulled over for it once
and lose your license for a while, it’s really your own fault if it happens again.
4 comments:
He personally only ever had one bill passed, which is exceptional given his refusal to do anything unless he gets star billing and given his more immediate, pressing interests. If his wife admits, after being pressured to publicly respond beside Weiner, that it has taken a lot of "hard work" and a "lot of therapy" for her to save their marriage, what can Joe Public expect with this man servicing their interests?
Well, I think it's difficult to attack a congressman for not getting too many of his own bills passed. Plenty of congressmen have that record. What I'd look at is his voting record in the NYC council and US Congress. He was present and took positions, which is kind of what legislators do.
The point of this post was to argue that Weiner is kind of an idiot but not about things that matter in public. I mean, are you seriously going to argue that Bill Clinton hasn't been a productive public servant since he proved untrustworthy to his wife?
You've silenced me with your Clinton comparison. Whilst there's no equivalence between the two men, both did some rather egregious acts; even, if Christopher Hitchens is to be believed concerning Clinton, rape and mass murder.
I try.
Thanks for reading and posting!
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