I am really really really sorry. Vote for me.

Yesterday former Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi made a public apology in the newspapers to his wife for flirting with other women. Today San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom publicly apologized for having an affair with his re-election campaign managers wife. The President of Israel is about to be indicted on a rape charge. I am holding my breath. Can his heartfelt message of deep regret be far behind?
In recent years we have suffered through a lot of this mea culpa stuff in politics, all of it for bad behavior that could have been easily predicted based on the life long patterns of the perpetrators. In every case, I bet the insiders who knew these guys personally just sat there, rolling their eyes and shaking their heads. It always turns out that everyone around them knew what was going on. Only the candidate himself was delusional and egomaniacal enough to believe that if he pretended it wasn't happening, then that would be enough. Kind of the way that Richard Pryor recommended you respond when you are caught cheating: " Who you going to believe? Me or your lying eyes?"
Meanwhile we, the poor beleagured members of the voting electorate, are the ones who are forced to sit patiently through all these transparent pretend apologies. We are the ones forced to play along with a ritual that is not only embarrassing but insulting to our intelligence since in almost every case the apology comes right on the heels of equally vehement denials that anything ever took place.
Oddly enough it is only after the shit hits the fan that these guilt ridden, momentarily confused and suddenly desperate elected officials are able to take the time to fully comprehend how terribly disappointed in themselves they really are. Who could ever forget that unhappy day a few years ago when a deeply troubled Arnold Schwarzenegger was forced to apologize to about a tenth of the women he had groped because his life long compulsion to do so finally hit critical mass.
Same could have been said about Bill Clinton. Luckily this whole trend didn't exist in the sixties or JFK would have spent most of his too short presidency consumed with being terribly sorry.
In the name of not having to see any more politicians acting like humiliated eight year old boys, and in the name of freeing us all from having to watch them pretend to suffer and rehabilitate, I would like to offer the following solution. When someone runs for office, part of their campaign ought to be a list of the vices they know they will commit, complete with their heartfelt apologies in advance.
For example, lets say that someone is running for the senate who knows that he has a life long compulsive weakness for inappropriately grabbing young women.( Or underage pages, as the case may be). Under my new plan, his general re-election campaign promises would go something like this: "If elected I promise to raise minimum wage, fund stem cell research and reform the current tax laws. i can also guarantee that I will grab a lot of hot young women in an inappropriate fashion.(or under age pages as the case may be.) If they freak out on me and strenuously object, I am going to be very very sorry. At that point, I promise that I will promise to try not to do it again."
If the candidate in question wishes, he can also insure himself a little additional voter sympathy by adding a few words of explanation for his actions with regard to his troubled childhood and/or confessing that his supposedly perfect marriage is mostly a sham, kept up for appearances only. If he' d like he might also want to list the rehab programs he might be interested in if and when it all comes to that.
Then if the voters in his district decide to elect him anyway, when the scandal erupts everyone can just shrug, roll their eyes, and shake their heads. "Duh. " we can all say to each other, "Like we didn't know THAT was going to happen."