Mark Sanford on The Huffington Post

Jeff Schweitzer: Advice to Tiger Woods: Ignore Brit Hume

2010-01-06T13:21:21Z

Brit Hume, a conservative commentator serving as an analyst for Fox News, said that Tiger Woods's recovery will be possible only if he converts to Christianity. Specifically, Hume said with a straight face, "The extent to which he can recover seems to me depends on his faith. He is said to be a Buddhist. I don't think that faith offers the kind of forgiveness and redemption that is offered by the Christian faith. My message to Tiger would be, 'Tiger, turn to the Christian faith and you can make a total recovery and be a great example to the world.'"

That obvious Christian bias would be astounding if not so disturbingly common. Hume goes unchallenged in a society in which 70% falsely believe the country to be a Christian nation. If the intolerance inherent to Hume's statement is not self-evident to the majority, then let's play a game of substitution and see how we would feel. What if Woods was a Christian and Hume told Woods he should convert to Islam or Judaism for redemption? We know that would go over well.

Since Brit goes unchallenged, let us judge the merit of his advice by looking for guidance from other good Christians.

• South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford, a vocally conservative Christian, was caught in a torrid affair with his Argentinean mistress, a crime under his own state's law, which he is responsible for enforcing. By the high moral standards of South Carolina adultery is a punishable offense defined as "habitual or carnal intercourse with each other without living together as a man and woman when either is lawfully married to some other person." Sanford has compared himself to King David, and has said that god wants him to remain in office in spite of his civil and moral crimes.

• Nevada Senator John Ensign, another Conservative Christian, had an extensive on-going extramarital affair with a woman on his campaign staff. Ensign is a long-standing member of the Christian men's ministry called the Promise Keepers. The irony!

• Former U.S. Representative Mark Foley had a yen for male pages, urging one to "get a ruler and measure it for me." According to ABC News, Foley emailed an invitation to one male page to stay at the congressman's home all for the low price of oral sex. This is the representative who piously introduced legislation to prevent exploitation of children under the banner of Christianity.

• Ted Haggard was accused of paying male prostitutes for sex while using crystal meth. This is the man who held weekly meetings with President Bush, teaching the president that homosexuality is an abomination. Haggard was at the time the head of the National Association of Evangelicals.

• U.S. Senator Larry Craig infamously was charged with soliciting sex in an airport bathroom. What makes that interesting is his vocal, loud and prominent opposition to gay marriage on the basis of his adherence to "Christian values."

• Bob Allen, a Republican Congressman in the Florida House of Representatives, was charged with paying an undercover cop $20.00 for the pleasure of offering to the officer oral sex. This act of illicit love is in bright contrast to his active sponsorship of Christian-inspired anti-gay legislation.

• Glen Murphy, Jr., while National Chairman of Young Republicans, allegedly got some young Republicans drunk, and then decided to practice some oral sex on the inebriated up-and-comers on the right.

• Republican State Representative Richard Curtis from Spokane, Washington was involved in a gay sex scandal. Donald Fleischman, Chairman of the Republican Party in Brown County in Green Bay, WI, was ensnared in his own scandal of homosexual yearnings.

This list is by no means comprehensive, nor do these activities include the more than 4,000 priests who have faced sex abuse charges in the past 50 years, involving more than 10,000 kids, mostly boys. These cases are so numerous that only the most hardened anti-rationalist could ignore the conclusion that immorality is not an anomaly of the Church but inherent to the blind teachings of faith.

So yes, Christianity certainly offers an example, but not the kind implied by Hume. And for the apologists out there, appealing to the ideal in contrast to actual practice is no excuse: actions speak louder than words. And the actions over the past 2,000 years are not pretty.

So why exactly would Hume make the absurd suggestion that Tiger Woods turn to Christianity for moral guidance in the face of overwhelming contradictory evidence of moral corruption within the Christian faith? Because Hume lives under a false premise. He makes the horrible mistake of confusing religion with morality; yet nothing could be further from the truth.

Religion offers only a false and dangerous morality by bribing people into good behavior with ugly threats of eternal damnation and alluring promises of eternal bliss. Our inherent good has been corrupted by these divine carrots and sticks. Under the burden of religion, morality has become nothing but a response to bribery and fear, and a cynical tool of manipulation for priests, ministers and gurus. We have forsaken our biological heritage in exchange for some primitive belief in life after death. Personally my morality is more fundamental than something that can be purchased with cheap coupons to heaven.

Instead of looking to Brit Hume, we should turn to another Hume from a different era. Over 200 years ago, the English philosopher David Hume dedicated himself to showing that moral life can be lived and fully explained without the resources of religion, and free of any reliance on divine authority.

Hume, born in Scotland in 1711, was even in his day one of the most important figures of Western philosophy, and a towering presence as a philosopher, economist and historian in the Scottish Enlightenment. His main idea still relevant today but often forgotten is that, "We hang in perpetual suspense between life and death, health and sickness, plenty and want; which are distributed amongst the human species by secret and unknown causes, whose operation is oft unexpected, and always unaccountable. These unknown causes, then, become the constant object of our hope and fear."

Hume also said of mankind, "They suppose their deities, however potent and invisible, to be nothing but a species of human creatures, perhaps raised from among mankind, and retaining all human passions and appetites, together with corporeal limbs and organs. Such limited beings, though masters of human fate, being, each of them, incapable of extending his influence everywhere, must be vastly multiplied, in order to answer the variety of events, which happen over the whole face of nature."

The idea that deities are "nothing but a species of human creatures, perhaps raised from among mankind" of course applies to more than the old discarded gods of the past. The words exactly describe Jesus. Hume knew then as we know now that god is a construct of the human mind, a myth arising from unreasonable fear and hope. He had to couch his conclusions in the haze of polytheism if he wished to avoid a burning stake, but his intent is clear when he says, "...it will appear, that the gods of all polytheists are not better than the elves or fairies of our ancestors, and merit as little any pious worship or veneration."

How can we be moral in a world in which god is nothing but an elf or fairy, and avoid the false conclusions of the modern Humes of the world? What is our motivation to be moral if not to please the Almighty? Those very questions rest upon the false premises that morality derives from god and that something has been lost by letting go of god. But nothing is lost. Morality is our biological destiny. Traits that we view as moral are deeply embedded in the human psyche. Honesty, fidelity, trustworthiness, kindness to others, and reciprocity are primeval characteristics that helped our ancestors survive. In a world of dangerous predators, early man could thrive only in cooperative groups. Good behavior strengthened the tribal bonds that were essential to survival. What we now call morality is really a suite of behaviors favored by natural selection in an animal weak alone but strong in numbers.

By shedding the burden of a wrathful god, we reveal the power to create our own meaning, our own sense of purpose, our own destiny. By rejecting the false premises of religion we are free to move beyond the random hand we are dealt at birth to pave our own road to a better life. Neither birth nor god defines our fate. Imagine for a moment this world in which no invisible man hangs in the sky using magical powers in "mysterious ways" to control our life. Imagine that we can toss away the crutch of false hope and bad myth to walk unhindered down the path of personal responsibility. If only Sanford or Ensign understood that message.

By walking this path, we collectively have the opportunity to enhance our humanness, to further define who and what we are, by choosing to behave morally because we can. A new moral code is based on the principle that with the ability to choose to be good comes the obligation to make that choice; choosing to be moral is what makes us special. The act of choosing to live a good life is the foundation for all pleasure, peace and happiness. Whereas religion claims that happiness is found from submission to a higher power, a new moral code defines happiness as the freedom to discover within ourselves our inherent good, and then to act on that better instinct, not because of any mandate from god, but simply because that choice makes us more human, more special. Happiness, virtue and morality are possible with nothing more than what is within each of us. We need not and cannot appeal to any other authority.

Virtue is its own reward, yes, but in a deeper sense than is often meant with that idea. Spinoza wrote in Ethics, "...men believe they are free in as much as they are conscious of their volitions and desires, yet ignorant of the causes that have determined them to desire and will." But we are not ignorant of those causes; we know, and we are each truly free. Our causes are our biology, our evolutionary history, our sociality. That the reward of pleasure, peace and happiness is achieved through the freedom to discover and act on our virtuous instincts is only half the story. Virtue is its own reward, too, as an essential element of humankind's nature that allows for our survival in large groups.

With this personal freedom, of course, comes also the obligation for each of us to act wisely and responsibly. That is the message lost by the Ted Haggards of the world who cling to the false morality of Christianity. What such hypocrites fail to understand is that we fulfill our moral duty first by taking a more modest view of our place in the world. When we see that humans are a natural part of the ecosystem, not above or separate from the environment, we will protect the resources that sustain us. When we reject the hubris and conceit of religion, we will redefine our relationship with each other without calling upon god to smite our enemies. When we understand that true morality is independent of religious doctrine, we will create a path toward a just society. A new moral code is our guide to a full life in which we no longer accept the arbitrary and destructive constraints of divine interference. We will finally take personal responsibility for our action when we no longer depend on the failed fears and hopes of religion.

So Tiger, here is the advice you need: reject Brit Hume and embrace David Hume. You will then be on the path to recovery.

Jenny Sanford Memoir 'Staying True' Due Out Next Month, Three Months Early

2010-01-05T11:29:27Z

CHARLESTON, S.C. — South Carolina first lady Jenny Sanford's memoir about dealing with her husband's infidelity will be published next month instead of in May as originally planned.

The 240-page "Staying True" goes on sale Feb. 5, according to the Web site for Ballantine Books, an imprint of Random House Inc.

Mark Joseph: Tiger Woods, C.S. Lewis, & The Faux Moralists Among Us

2010-01-02T02:53:58Z

The only thing worse than Tiger Woods' bad behavior with icky women is the faux outrage led by a) women who never understood men to begin with and b) their willing accomplices amongst the male species who feign outrage like Captain Renault in Casablanca: "I'm shocked, shocked to find that gambling is going on in here!"

What is admittedly hard to understand is why Tiger would cheat on such a beautiful woman with such a cast of losers, but even that can be explained by the male penchant for choosing quantity over quality in any number of things.

Ironically though, I find that it's the moralists among us with the most accurate understanding of human nature who are the least surprised by this kind of behavior. For twenty years now we've had our senses assaulted by unfaithful public figures-from religious leaders like Ted Haggard, Jim Bakker and Jesse Jackson to political leaders like Gary Hart, Bill Clinton and Mark Sanford and now Tiger Woods and just as Americans in 1980 began to question whether one man could handle the presidency after four failed ones, we're all left wondering if any public figure can stand in the glare of the spotlight and avoid skankish behavior.

My favorite moralist, C.S. Lewis, wouldn't have been surprised by any of this--he once wrote that if we men followed our natural inclinations we could easily populate small villages--for Lewis asserted that chastity was simply impossible without special help from God. I'm sure there are atheists and agnostics among us who would disagree with that assertion and though I don't have a position on that, I've always appreciated Lewis' insights:

"We may, indeed, be sure that perfect chastity - like perfect charity - will not be obtained by any merely human efforts," he wrote.

"You must ask for God's help. Even when you have done so, it may seem to you for a long time that no help, or less help than you need, is being given. Never mind. After each failure, ask forgiveness, pick yourself up, and try again. Very often what God first helps us towards is not the virtue itself but just this power of always trying again. For however important chastity (or courage or truthfulness or any other virtue) may be, this process trains us in habits of the soul which are more important still. It cures our illusions about ourselves and teaches us to depend on God. We learn, on the one hand, that we cannot trust ourselves even in our best moments, and, on the other, that we need not despair even in our worst, for our failures are forgiven. The only fatal thing is to sit down content with anything less than perfection."

I don't think Tiger Woods believes in the God C.S. Lewis did, but whether he's having plastic surgery in Arizona or still frolicking somewhere with Rachel Uchitel, I hope he'll remember Lewis' words and ignore all the fake moralists among us who pretend that given his circumstances they wouldn't have been tempted to do the same thing and instead focus on picking himself up, trying to make things right with his wife and becoming a different kind of person in the future.

B. Jeffrey Madoff: A Government Takeover of the Government

2009-12-30T17:25:05Z

I made a New Year's resolution to try to look at things in a more positive way and now that the year is ending, I'd like to share some of the more positive aspects of 2009.

For the first time in United States history, a black man, well, half black, but that's essentially all black to many of us, became our president. Racism was finally over! The good news was celebrated around the country as gun and ammunition sales skyrocketed. Obama began having a positive effect on the economy before he was even elected as gun sales began to explode at the end of 2008, once he was elected, sales shot to record heights. "Gun salesman of the Year" is how some gun sellers referred to Obama in an overt message of gratitude for the economic stimulus he provided their embattled industry.

We all know that General Motors, Ford and Chrysler were in big trouble. Ford decided to not take the funds. GM and Chrysler needed not only the free market system, but a government bailout to help them weather the tough times. The government insisted on firm rules, regulations and a solid business plan to justify the funds. As GM emerged from bankruptcy, their CEO, Fred Henderson, a 25-year GM veteran, planned a nationwide tour to reconnect with dealers and consumers. I salute the ingenuity of GM and Chrysler: after ignoring the consumers for so many years, their biggest job isn't selling cars, but convincing people that they're still in business so they can resume selling cars. Our family supports those efforts; my wife just bought a Chevrolet which she turned into a beautiful planter.

Economic concerns actually had a positive effect on our citizens. This is the first time in almost eighty years that we've had such a large, qualified workforce available. Lloyd Blankfein, CEO of Goldman Sachs, has modestly admitted that "We help companies to grow by helping them to raise capital. Companies that grow create wealth. This, in turn, allows people to have jobs that create more growth and more wealth. It's a virtuous cycle." He continues by saying he is "Doing God's work." By extension, that means that Goldman Sachs is doing "God's work," but since it was government funds that enabled Goldman to continue working, it's actually the government who did "God's work." Is God a socialist?

In the true spirit of the holidays Blankfein said, "I know I could slit my wrists and people would cheer."

Cries of socialism echoed throughout the land this past year; rather than a government takeover of the banks, the banks seem to have taken over the government. The closest we have come to socialism is the socialization of risk, which we the taxpayers undertook to give Goldman, Bank of America, Citibank and JP Morgan access to cheap money -- our money. I tried to understand why all the credit card fees and loan charges have gone up since the banks didn't pay interest on the money they got, and they got it from us, why are we charging ourselves more? I guess we are all willing to sacrifice for the greater good of those who accumulate the greatest wealth.

I believe in spreading the love. We're never too busy to do that, just look at Nevada Senator John Ensign, presidential candidate John Edwards, South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford, New York Governor Eliot Spitzer and of course, Tiger Woods. These are all very busy men, but they found the time to spread their love, despite their busy schedules, to many others. That is the true spirit of the holidays.

We are a nation that celebrates our differences. Like the tea baggers, birthers, gun toters and others who got together to show how different they could be. Nobody was going to force universal health care down our throats, even if the majority wanted it. Our President has prevailed on getting a bill through the Congress and the Senate that is substantially less ambitious than initially proposed, but better than nothing.

As we had our holiday dinner together, my kids asked me why billions can be spent on an expanding war with no end in sight, bailing out the auto industry and the banks, but when it comes to health care, people are afraid of a "government takeover."

For the New Year, I hope for a government takeover of the government.

Chris Weigant: My 2009 "McLaughlin Awards" [Part 1]

2009-12-25T23:23:59Z

Welcome once again to our year-end wrapup and awards ceremony. Honesty dictates that I immediately genuflect to The McLaughlin Group, from whom I have stolen all these award categories. We will begin this week with Part 1 of these annual awards, and then next Friday on New Year's Day, we will present Part 2, with reduced volume levels (for those who are nursing hangovers... ahem).

Before we begin, though, we have to insert a free plug, for another year-end awards column with a slightly different theme -- awards for idiocy in the mainstream media (a subject near and dear to my own heart, I confess). Fairness and Accuracy In Reporting has their "2009 P.U.-Litzer Awards" up, and I heartily encourage everyone to read it as well, because it is excellent and well worth your time.

And, for comparison, it simply wouldn't be Friday around here if I didn't throw in a few plugs for my own columns, so if you'd like to peruse my McLaughlin Awards from years past, here are the previous three years' worth:

[2008, Part 1] [2008, Part 2]
[2007, Part 1] [2007, Part 2]
[2006, Part 1] [2006, Part 2]

But enough of that -- let's get right to the awards themselves!

Biggest Winner of 2009

I have a history of taking these first two categories literally (Michael Phelps won this award last year, for instance). And there were two political wins last year which stood out, for separate reasons, so we're going to hand out two Biggest Winner awards as a result.

The first, for "Biggest Deferred Win" goes to none other than Senator Al Franken, who had to wait until the end of June to be officially declared the winner in the Minnesota Senate race over Norm Coleman. Waiting eight months to be seated, on a razor-thin 314-vote margin, Al Franken certainly deserves some sort of award for his patience. Maybe I should call it the "Hardest-Fought Win" award, but whatever you call it, Senator Franken deserves a salute for becoming the 60th vote Democrats desperately needed in the Senate.

Over in the House, the "Most Impressive Winner" this year was none other than Representative Bill Owens, from the New York Twenty-Third Congressional District. Owens won a House seat that, when last held by a non-Republican, was a Whig -- in the 1850s. This stunning upset was made possible by the "Tea Party" movement within the Republican Party, which so savaged Republican candidate Dede Scozzafava that she actually dropped out days before the election -- and then endorsed the Democrat in the race. [Hundreds of television "journalists" immediately breathed a collective sigh of relief that they wouldn't have to learn how to pronounce "Scozzafava" correctly, as an indirect result.] Hopefully, we can all look forward to many more of these sorts of intra-party dogfights in 2010, but for his jaw-dropping upset, Bill Owens deserves to be named Biggest Winner this year.

Biggest Loser of 2009

My first inclination for Biggest Loser was "Progressives," for obvious reasons. But then I thought about it, and Progressives may not be progressing as fast or as far as they thought they were going to under President Obama, but they certainly didn't "lose" as much as they would have under President McCain. This is small consolation indeed, but "losing" isn't just the absence of winning.

But, on a very closely-related and somewhat-overlapping theme, I'd have to award the Biggest Loser to the people pushing strongly for some version of the public option, Medicare-for-all, or single-payer healthcare reform.

Proponents of fundamental and bedrock change in America's health delivery system lost. Big time. Although there is a small chance (measured as the length of time a roughly-packed spheroid of frozen dihydro-monoxide would survive in Hades) of some shred of one of these plans surviving in the House/Senate conference on the healthcare reform bill, I'm not exactly holding my breath.

So, to the millions and millions of people who wanted to actually reform our healthcare system, and are having to swallow the bitter pill of being thrown under a bus instead, we award the Biggest Loser of 2009, with sorrow.

Best Politician

This one is going to be a bit controversial, so allow me to explain up front. "Politician" can be either a neutral term or one loaded with negative connotations. But the best practitioner of politics this year was (surprise!) President Barack Obama.

Which pegs our definition somewhat towards the negative end of the scale. Obama was, to many, overcautious this year in flexing his political muscle, in using the mandate the voters gave him, and in spending political capital in general. All of which was true, to one extent or another.

But staying out of the sausage-making fray in Washington did exactly what President Obama intended -- allowed him to swoop in at the end, and claim credit for the legislative victory. He did this most noticeably on the stimulus package and on healthcare reform. In both cases, he was never tarred with the brush of "defeat" on any particular facet of the legislation, and emerged at the end with virtually the exact same line: "I got 90 percent of what I wanted."

Although this has frustrated a great many of his supporters no end, it (again) did exactly what Obama intended. So, tarnished as the term may be, Obama has to be seen as the Best Politician of the year for playing this political game on his own terms. I'm not exactly happy about it myself, but I have to give credit where credit is due.

Worst Politician

There are two names which pop instantly to mind in this category, but one of them is no longer in office, so we're not sure he qualifies.

Former Vice President Dick Cheney showed the absolute worst traits a politician can -- sour grapes -- at pretty much every opportunity he could during 2009. You'd think he was gone for good (or, more accurately, for worse)... but then there he'd be, popping up on the television screen yet again, with his opinion of why Obama was sending this country straight to Hell, on the Handbasket Express. The fact that he was so bitterly wrong didn't seem to deter the teevee shows from allowing him on whenever he felt the urge, even though he was so utterly irrelevant to the discussion at hand.

But, again, he's out of office, and I simply don't feel like giving the man an award for anything, personally, so we'll skip over him quickly.

Now, there were plenty of examples of corporate-owned "Democrats" in Congress (most noticeably in the Senate) this year, for whom you could make a strong case of being the Worst Politician. But again, I take this category more literally.

Unquestionably the Worst Politician of the year was the titular leader of the Republican Party, Michael Steele. Steele was an embarrassment to his own party, pretty much every time he opened his mouth, and he provided his opponents with so many gleefully idiotic quips that it is impossible to accurately count them all. He was, for Lefties, the gift that just kept right on giving, over and over again. So, for embarrassing his own party while creating joy and delight for his opponents -- while delivering absolutely no tangible political benefit whatsoever, either way -- Steele is hereby awarded the Worst Politician.

Most Defining Political Moment

Because it is fresh in the mind, it's tempting to say that the death of the public option in the healthcare reform debate was the Most Defining Political Moment of 2009.

But it really doesn't qualify, because it didn't define the debate so much as it did end it.

No, the truly Most Defining Political Moment this year was when Barack Obama named his economic team, and got them confirmed. This absolutely defined the first year of his presidency. Obama was stating loud and clear by his choices that he was going to be Wall Street's best friend, and that nobody should expect any radical populism from him whatsoever.

This shaded the debate on so many things during the year that, by definition, it was indeed the Most Defining Political Moment.

Turncoat Of The Year

In an absolute upset, for the first time ever this award is not going to Senator Joe Lieberman, of the "Liebermans for Lieberman" party. Ol' Joe has walked away with this award every year we've handed it out; but this year -- even with a spectacular finish killing off every progressive notion of healthcare reform -- Joe just didn't measure up. Because he's already turned his coat. He would really only be eligible this year if he had become the most liberal member of the Senate, which (as we are all aware) did not happen (see: previous statement on snowballs in Hell).

Towards the end of the year, we had a minor contender in the House, who changed parties from Democrat to Republican, but in the grand scheme of things this was fairly non-eventful, although it does deserve a mention here. Also worth pointing out was Olympia Snowe, who certainly didn't make any friends in her own party by occasionally crossing the aisle to vote with Democrats. And John McCain, who has pivoted to the extreme right of his party so hard he is denouncing things he used to support (quite recently, in fact), in a naked attempt to get re-elected (see: comment on fratricidal Tea Party primary challengers).

But, although it has receded into memory for the most part, the true Turncoat Of The Year -- in the most positive sense of the term you can imagine -- is Senator Arlen Specter. Specter's switch from the Republican Party to the Democrats is what made most of the rest of the year possible. Before Al Franken was seated, Specter was the one who made it possible for a 60-vote majority by his party switch. I can't exactly cite him for courage in doing so, because he also swapped parties in a naked attempt to hold onto his seat, from (once again) a Tea-Party-type of primary challenger. But Specter is now facing a serious Democratic primary challenger next year, so it may have all been in vain for him to do so. But whether he gets booted out or retained by Pennsylvania voters next year; for this year, he is fondly awarded the Turncoat Of The Year.

Most Boring

There are three candidates from the Democratic side for Most Boring. Actually, now that I think about it, pretty much "The entire Republican leadership team in both houses of Congress" should also qualify as well (Mitch McConnell? Seriously? That's all you've got? Wow.), but we'll stick to the Democrats for the actual award here.

Just on stylistic points alone, Joe Lieberman and Harry Reid deserve special mention here. [Yawn!] Man, you see either of this characters on television, and your head just involuntarily starts nodding off. I mean, watching Lieberman speak is about as exciting as watching paint dry, and listening to a Harry Reid press conference is about as packed with thrills as watching an icicle melt.

I have to slap myself across the face to even keep awake when writing about them, I have to admit.

But continuing this year's upside-down nature of how I am interpreting these categories, I am awarding this as a positive award. Because Barack Obama was without question the Most Boring this year. And I do mean that in a good way. The "no drama Obama" campaign theme continued right on into the White House, and Obama was cool and collected throughout a very intense year. Raging scorn was heaped upon him from the Left and from the Right (and from the media, in bucketfuls), and he somehow managed to stay above it all.

To the media, in particular, he stated over and over again that he was simply not interested in the "24-hour news cycle" where everything is about "winning the day's story," and feeding into whatever idiotic storyline the media is going apoplectic over that particular week. Obama kept the "long view" and he saw the "big picture" and -- with only one notable exception (see, below: beer summit) -- completely kept out of the snarling dogfight of daily political ups-and-downs, and trivial issues blown up into gargantuan proportions by bored media types with nothing better to report on. Actually that's not true -- there was plenty of better stuff to report on, but most of it was above the intelligence level of the so-called "journalists," leaving them to squabble over meaningless sandbox issues.

For being this cheerfully boring in the face of such strident idiocy, Obama wins Most Boring -- in the nicest possible way.

Most Charismatic

We're going to hand out two of these awards, one for the House and one for the Senate. Al Franken is trying as hard as he knows how to stifle his inherently and genetically (one assumes) hilarious nature, and thus appear as serious as is humanly possible in his new career as a politician. But every so often, he gets that wry smile on his face and just can't resist saying something amusing. This is a man who knows humor, and has a lighting-fast and razor-sharp sense of irony. To expect him to completely hide this light under a barrel is to ask too much of the man, and -- for these cracks of brightness which shine through occasionally -- we have to award him Most Charismatic in the Senate. No doubt this will be a disappointment to Franken, since, as I said, he's trying mightily not to let any of it show. But Al sometimes just has to be Al, and for that we are eternally grateful. Once he grows into his role as senator, and once he feels confident of his state electorate's support, we fully expect to see this side of him grow and mature; but, for now, we'll take what we can get.

Over on the House side is Representative Alan Grayson. Now, Grayson has occasionally overstepped the boundaries of good taste during the year, but he can be forgiven these rookie errors when you look at the totality of how energetically (and charismatically) he has injected himself into some very important debates, and (by doing so) made some very important points -- in plain, everyday, easy-to-understand language -- that nobody else on the Democratic side seems capable of making. Grayson has proved, this year, that he is a man to watch in the future of Democratic politics, and for his vigorous and entertaining ways of putting things, he has indeed earned Most Charismatic of the year.

So the "Als" sweep the category this year! Congratulations to both Franken and Grayson are in order.

Bummest Rap

This category was chock full of bum raps this year, I am sorry to say.

Not only a bum rap, but also one of the stupidest raps I've ever witnessed in politics were the early complaints that President Obama relied upon his TelePrompTer too much. What a crock -- as if every other politician dating back to Ronald Reagan (and even earlier) hadn't used the same exact device for pretty much all their public speeches. Sheesh. I mean, it's like complaining about Obama "using some newfangled personal computing device that seems to function much as a typewriter does," or, even, "using that science-fictional device which some are calling 'the telephone,' instead staying in touch via the time-honored and known-to-be-reliable telegraph system."

Sorry, my eyes were rolling so much there that I had to take a deep breath, and then re-focus on the page in front of me. Ahem.

Obama likewise got two other bum raps which were simply laughable -- that he was some sort of pacifist peacenik, and that he had said he would never sign a bill with earmarks. The first was downright laughable, because every speech Obama has ever made on war -- back to and including his initial denouncement of the Iraq invasion -- references the fact that there are indeed "just wars," and that Obama himself isn't against all wars... just stupid ones. The earmarks thing was astounding, too, because it was a campaign promise made by his opponent! That's right -- John McCain was the one who foreswore all earmarks. And yet the brain-dead media kept hammering Obama about it, as if he were the one who had made such a promise. Once again: SHEESH!!

Joe Biden deserves a mention here, since he has never lived up (down?) to the "loose cannon" bad rap the media types (and, admittedly, late-night comedians) have delighted in all year. Sure, he's made a misstatement or two (as any human being would), but he's said simply nothing like what we were all led to expect from "journalists" (see: previous brain-dead comment). Also notable for "beating the rap" (as it were) was former President Bill Clinton, who has been remarkably quiet during his wife's first year as Secretary of State.

But there were two raps which stood out as being sheer moose poop during this past year, and to these we give the actual Bummest Rap award. The first of these was Dick Cheney's comments on President Obama's "dithering" on Afghanistan. Obama took three months to make up his mind to send the second of his surges into Afghanistan (the media, in another bum rap, didn't even credit Obama for the first one). But this absolutely ignores the fact that George W. Bush took exactly the same period of time when deciding on his surge into Iraq. Making Cheney a complete moose's ass for suggesting Obama was somehow shirking his duty, and making this Bummest Rap number one for 2009.

Bummest Rap number two was pretty much everything the Republicans said about Sonia Sotomayor. Man, they threw everything at her but the kitchen sink, in a desperate effort to paint her as something she simply was not. None of it had the slightest effect, other than in the inane nature of the questions in her Senate hearing -- all of which she absolutely hit out of the park in her answers. But the caricature painted of her by her opponents was one bum rap indeed.

Fairest Rap

Two fair raps stand out for me. The first was a trivial one -- the rap that those claiming that "a million people" showed up for the Tea Party at the U.S. Capitol were, to be polite, talking through their hats. The photos showed a crowd of around 50,000 to 70,000 people. Now, as I admitted at the time, that's a pretty impressive crowd for a demonstration in Washington. But the Righties were simply not seriously credible when they attempted to inflate the crowd size beyond all reason, with their claim that a million people (or two million, or three million...) showed up. This got even more embarassing when Fox used photos of this rally to try and boost numbers for a later (and much smaller) rally by the same people. So the rap of wildly inaccurate crowd numbers was indeed a fair rap.

And, sadly, over on the Left, the rap that President Obama (and his chief henchman Rahm Emanuel) throws his supporters under the proverbial bus at pretty much every opportunity was indeed a fair rap. Emanuel comes out of the Clinton White House, with all the "triangulation" that implies. This thinking goes somewhat like: "we've already got the Left, we can afford to piss them off, we just need to peel off enough centrists to get things done." And, sadly (as I said) this is indeed a fair rap not just for Emanuel, but also for his boss.

The examples of this are almost too numerous to recall. On gay issues, on medical marijuana, on single-payer, on the public option, on anti-war types, on pro-choice, on immigration, on Wall Street over Main Street populism, on national security issues -- the list is indeed a long one of things that Obama has either disappointed on, or simply kicked the can down the road (a telling statement: I am positive I have missed a few in that list...).

So the rap that the Left should be vary wary of Obama's support, because he has a tendency to throw them under the bus, on pretty much any of their key issues, is indeed a fair one. Actually, it's getting pretty crowded under this bus, now that I think about it... sigh.

Best Comeback

The list of nominees for this one was fairly long -- Sarah Palin (for her book tour), Joe Lieberman (for being the most important senator for a few weeks recently), to perhaps even (from the other side) David Vitter. A good case could be made for "healthcare reform," since the entire effort was all but pronounced dead by the punditocracy (also known as the "inside the Beltway" set) around August. And yet, even with a heavily compromised bill, the effort marches on.

But my choice for Best Comeback is Mark Sanford, Governor of South Carolina. Sanford was caught in a sex scandal (see next week's category: Worst Political Scandal, for more) and the betting money was he'd either immediately resign, or be impeached and removed from office by his fellow Republicans. But when it came time to act, the state legislature did no more than slap Sanford on the wrist, and it is now clear he'll serve the remaining time in his term.

[Insert your own "don't cry for me, Argentina" joke here... ahem.]

But for such a downright "Clintonian" performance, Sanford deserves Best Comeback of the year, I have to admit.

Most Original Thinker

This one is easy, although his name will likely be unfamiliar to you. Atul Gawande wrote a brilliant article on healthcare reform in The New Yorker at the beginning of June, which examined the way a few areas of the country delivered health services. He looked at areas that did it right (and were under the national average in costs), and areas that did it wrong (that were far over the national average), while both delivering similar results.

This article quickly became "must reading" for anyone in the White House, and was probably the most-quoted piece of writing in the entire debate. It was referenced uncountable times by politicians, and did more to influence policy-makers' opinions than perhaps anything else this year.

For writing this article, Atul Gawande is the Most Original Thinker of the year. The article (like most New Yorker articles) is extremely long, but is definitely worth reading.

Most Stagnant Thinker

I have one group award here, and one special mention for an individual.

The group award: The Republican Party. The "Party of No." The idea-less ideologues. No further explanation should be necessary, really.

And for individual cognitive stagnation, a special "Retro" Most Stagnant Thinker for Governor Rick Perry (and all the others), who opened the door to Texas (and other states) actually seceding from the Union -- as if this was actually a valid political stance to take. Seriously, this throwback thinking from the 1860s goes beyond "stagnant," to downright "antebellum."

Best Photo Op

While Michelle Obama's "Victory Garden" photo ops with Washington schoolchildren were endearing, and while Barack Obama's Nobel acceptance speech was (in his own admission) nothing more than a glorified photo op; we tend to forget that 2009 also included last January.

And January 2009 saw two million people stand around for eight or nine hours in sub-zero temperatures just to watch the Inauguration of President Barack Obama.

No photo op in the successive eleven months even came close, I have to say.

Worst Photo Op

We're adding this category to the McLaughlin canon, just because.

There were a few "worst photo op" candidates, sadly all from Obama, in one way or another. The most galling of these were the two (one in the spring, one quite recently) photo ops of "Obama talks tough to Wall Street bankers," which produced exactly nothing in the way of tangible results.

And there was Obama bowing and being polite and overly-respectful (obsequious, even) to various world leaders. This is more symbolic than anything else, but I have to throw my lot in with the Obama-haters on this one (to my great chagrin and embarrassment). Because, I have to say, they're right on this one. America was built on an idea. Part of this idea was that we're all equal. This was a radical, radical idea for its time. And it meant that -- unlike the nobility and royalty in Europe -- no man would bow to our leader. He is not above us -- he is one of us. Equal. The first among equals, to be sure, but still: just a citizen. So we neither bow nor curtsey to him. But the flip side is that he also bows to no foreign leader. We are most decidedly not subjects of anyone. All of us -- individually and collectively -- are just not "subjects." Meaning we do not follow the protocol of royals. Like I said, both a minor issue, and a very major one. Such is the nature of diplomatic protocol. But Obama went too far in his efforts to reach out to the world, I have to conclude.

The third silly photo op was the whole "beer summit." The less said about this episode the better, at this point.

But the real Worst Photo Op -- which topped all of these in idiocy -- was having Air Force One (actually, technically, it was not "Air Force One" at the time, since that designation is reserved for when the president is actually onboard the plane) buzz Manhattan in order to get a photo of it flying by the Statue Of Liberty. Guys, really, there's this thing called "Photoshop," y'know? And... um... 9/11?

Sigh. Nothing really came close to this visual screwup all year long. What were they thinking? Were they thinking? Apparently not.

Enough Already!

As usual, there's a bunch of things which easily qualify for the "Enough Already!" award.

Here's where we just start ranting without abandon.

Tiger Woods? Enough Already!

Balloon Boy's parents? Enough Already!

Michael Jackson's dead? Enough Already!

Gate-crashers at the White House? Enough Already!

Death panels? Enough Already!

Town hall screaming idiots? Enough Already!

Tea Parties? Enough Already!

Sarah Palin? Enough Already!

Obstructionist Corporatist Democrats? Enough Already!

But the actual award has to go to a parliamentary rule, and how it is being abused. Filibusters (and attendant Republican obstructionism)? Enough Already!

Worst Lie

My first inclination was to just give this to "everything the Tea Partiers and town hall idiots let fly from their pie-holes," but then I thought a little more, and remembered this doozy:

Mark Sanford, explaining his absence from the state he was (and is) Executive Officer of (while he was really boinking his mistress down in South America) with the lamest lie of the entire year -- that he was hiking the Appalachian Trail at the time. Further irony was heaped upon this, by the bare-naked fact that during the period he was maintaining this falsehood, there was a nationwide celebration of "Nude Hiking Day," which must have included a few brave nudists hiking on that very same trail.

No other lie even came close, really, from Maine to Georgia (and in all other points of our great country, for that matter).

Capitalist Of The Year

This one's fairly obvious, when you think about it.

President Obama did more to advance the interests of Wall Street, and by inference "capitalism in general" than anyone else this past year. From naming his economic team at the start of the year, to allowing them to have their way with his healthcare reform plan at the end of the year; Obama did what he was told to do by his advisors, and by Wall Street itself.

More in sorrow than in anger, we have to give Obama the Capitalist Of The Year award.

Honorable Mention

This is a lead-in category to the final one for this week, and is somewhat of a catchall for odds and ends not adequately covered by the other categories in the list.

In that spirit, I'd like to give Bill and Hillary Clinton an Honorable Mention here. The fear of bringing Hillary into Obama's cabinet was that she had some baggage, and that this baggage was named "Bubba." But Hillary has been more than competent in her job, and has done so without attempting once to steal the spotlight from her boss. And Bill must be on a very short leash indeed, because there simply have been no "Bimbo eruptions," or other miscellaneous scandalous behavior (such as spotlight-stealing) from the Big Dog himself this year. For proving all the naysayers wrong, I give this extraordinary political couple the special mention they deserve.

And I have to say, it was a shame that Farrah Fawcett Majors died on the day that she did. Farrah was pretty much "Queen Sex Kitten Of The Universe" in the 1970s, with countless adolescent males discovering the joys of... um... a special type of self-love (that's as far decency allows me to go)... whilst staring fixedly (and sweatedly) at this ubiquitous bathing suit poster (still, if I'm not mistaken, the best-selling poster of all time).

Without the existence of this poster, for instance, Baywatch simply never would have occurred to anyone, later on. Farrah deserved better, on her grand exit from life's stage, than being a footnote. Which is what she wound up as, since she unfortunately chose the same day to die as Michael Jackson. All the "Charlie's Angel is now really an angel" prepared footage was woefully foreshortened and overshadowed by the final act in the circus known as the "King of Pop." Which was sad, in a way, for Farrah. So we're giving her an Honorable Mention, just for the smile she's wearing in that iconic poster.

[Full disclosure: I'll have you know, I do not speak from experience, since as a young lad I personally lusted after Kate Jackson ("Sabrina," or the "brainy one"); but I saw that Farrah poster in more of my friends' bedrooms than I saw Led Zeppelin posters -- which, for the 1970s, is saying something indeed.]

Person Of The Year

While both Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid deserve a lot of credit they simply do not get from pixel-stained wretches (such as myself) for shepherding through a raft of small-bore (and large-bore, for that matter) legislation that does not receive media attention, nobody else in particular stood out this year as deserving of the "Person Of The Year" award.

Obama obviously had the chance to shine, and pick up this award as a matter of course. But, sadly, he didn't. He fell short of the bar on any number of issues, and was simply not seen in Washington as driving the debate -- rather (sadly) as a bystander to the debate who would occasionally yell something from the sidelines.

In all honesty, and with absolutely no tinge of suck-up-i-tude, I have to say that Arianna Huffington is right. The "Person Of The Year" this year was "The Lobbyist." Here is her entire blog post on the subject:

This week, Time named Fed chair Ben Bernanke its Person of the Year. The magazine says its choice is "not an award," but rather a recognition of the person who "most influenced the news during the past year -- for good or for ill." Based on that criterion, Time should, without a doubt, have picked Washington lobbyists -- because no person or group was more influential in 2009. After an inspiring presidential campaign that promised to take on the special interests, the lobbyists flexed their muscles (and their wallets) and showed who really runs the show in DC. Lobbyists carried the day on health insurance reform, banking reform, financial reform, drug pricing, cramdown legislation, and credit card interest rates, to name just a few. And every time they won, the American people lost. It's Time for a reshoot. The Lobbyists: The Real Persons of the Year.

Sad to say, I couldn't agree with Arianna more this year.

Sigh.

As usual, for anything or anyone I've forgotten (or otherwise inadvertently omitted), please feel free to let me know your choices in the comments. Until next week's "Part 2" of these awards, I wish you a Happy Holiday!

Chris Weigant blogs at: ChrisWeigant.com

Follow Chris on Twitter: @ChrisWeigant

Cross-posted at: Democratic Underground

Michael Maslansky: The Year of the Apology: The Worst and Best of 2009

2009-12-24T15:04:56Z

Who did the best? Who did the Worst? A Report Card

The list of apologies in 2009 is almost too long to recount. But who did it best - and worst - and why? We tested 15 of the most public apologies of the year to see what makes for a good apology and a bad apology and what we can learn from our A-list of apologists.

First, the perp walk:

The athletes:
1. A-Rod for trying to be a superhuman,
2. Michael Vick for being inhumane,
3. Serena Williams for dressing down a line judge, and
4. Tiger Woods for carousing with anyone in a dress.

The politicians:
5. Sen. John Ensign for cheating,
6. Gov. Mark Sanford for cheating, disappearing and losing his mind,
7. President Obama for making it about bigotry, and
8. Rep. Joe Wilson for a total lack of civility.

The celebrities:
9. Chris Brown for being an abuser,
10. Kanye West for being a narcissist, and
11. David Letterman for being a philanderer.

The CEOs:
12. The president of Domino's apologizing for employees who did disgusting things with food, and
13. The CEO of AIG apologizing for employees who did disgusting things with taxpayer money.

The wannabes:
14. The State Dinner crashers for deceiving the Secret Service, and
15. The Balloon Boy's parents for deceiving everyone.

With this incredibly rich field of bad guys and girls to choose from, we wanted to know who handled the situation best. And who took a bad situation and managed to make it worse.

To do that, my firm assembled a focus group of thirty people, including an even split of Dems and Republicans to get a fair read on the politicians. We played them videos of the statements made by each of the people listed above. Where there was no video, we tested taped news coverage where printed statements were read aloud. We used Instant Response technology to allow our participants to judge the effectiveness of each apology by rating it on a second-by-second basis using hand-held dials. And we have embedded the videos so you can see the reactions themselves.

After taking a look at the scores we asked participants why they felt certain apologies worked and why others fell flat. Here's what we learned.

THE AWARDS

• Winner: The Worst Apology of the Year.

Rep. Joe Wilson. It's no lie that Congressman Joe Wilson failed to inspire confidence in his "the leadership made me do it" apology to the White House for interrupting President Obama's health care address. We can't put it any better than one of our dial session participants: "He sounded like my five year old."

• Honorable Mentions: The Worst Apology of the Year.

Serena Williams and Alex Rodriguez

• Winner: The Best Apology of the Year:

Domino's President Patrick Doyle. When two employees at a Domino's in North Carolina made a lewd video and posted it on YouTube, it could have soured the chain's reputation everywhere. But Doyle, rather than trying to sweep the incident under the rug, took decisive action. He localized, but didn't trivialize, the problem. He took responsibility for making things right. And, in the words of one person we talked to, "he looked like a dad apologizing for his kids." Whether you're apologizing for yourself, your kids, or your company, our best advice to next year's scandal-tinged glitterati is: act like an adult, own up to your mistakes, and above all, be sincere.

• Honorable Mention: Best Apology of the Year.

Senator John Ensign

FIVE LESSONS FOR GIVING GOOD APOLOGY

So what did we learn from all of this? And how can we help next year's inevitable class of wrong-doers and apologists prepare to be more successful when they feel the need to apologize? Here are five lessons for improving success in apologizing once you have failed doing something else.

1. Don't make excuses. Don't explain away your actions. And definitely don't hold rambling press conferences upon your return from Argentina. The worst apologies, from Serena Williams' offer to "hug it out" with the linesperson she berated to AIG Chairman Ed Liddy's explanation of why his company paid bonuses while it was collapsing, failed because they weren't apologies as much as they were explanations. If you feel the need to get in front of the cameras, it is because the public believes you did something wrong. That is not the time to try to explain why you aren't at fault. Take your lumps. The public - like the customer - is always right.

2. Say "I'm sorry." Not "I apologize." Not even "I take full responsibility for my actions." Senator Ensign's apology for his affair worked because he used those two simple words, "I'm sorry." More generic language like "I apologize" - used by Letterman and South Carolina governor Mark Sanford - simply isn't good enough. And vaguely apologizing on Jay Leno's show, as Kanye West did, won't win you any style points. For those who don't know, the definition of "apologize" is to "offer an apology or excuse." It doesn't mean you have any remorse, just that you have gone through the motions. Say the words.

3. Then stop. Mark Sanford's actions were bad enough. But his apology was worse. Instead of apologizing and moving on, he apologized and apologized and apologized. And it only got worse for him the longer he spoke. Say you're sorry. Move on. Don't turn a public apology into a therapy session.

4. Look the part. Athletes seem to be particularly guilty of not matching their words with body language. Serena Williams never looked like she wanted to apologize to the linesperson she cut down. Alex Rodriguez failed to convince anyone he was sorry for using steroids. And Michael Vick looked like he was apologizing because his lawyer told him to. The singer Chris Brown during his original video apology said all the right things in his apology to his fans for abusing girlfriend and fellow singer Rihanna, but because he was clearly reading from the teleprompter, those words failed to resonate.

5. Make it personal. David Letterman received generally low marks for his post-affair apology, but he became more sympathetic when he acknowledged "I got my work cut out for me" with his wife. And President Obama was scolded for not apologizing more directly to the Cambridge, MA police officer involved in the run-up to last summer's "beer summit." Apologizers should own up to their mistakes and apologize - by name - to those they hurt, and they should acknowledge a debt to rebuild trust. The public wants to see that are specifically apologizing for your actions, not for getting caught.

Arianna Huffington: Christmas 2009: We Know Who's Been Naughty... Nice Is a Little Harder to Find

2009-12-23T16:56:56Z

A recent CNN poll found that during this economically troubled holiday season 68 percent of Americans are buying gifts that their friends and family need, compared to 27 percent who are buying gifts they think they would enjoy.

As for me, as part of my annual tradition of getting gifts for my favorite -- and not so favorite -- public figures, I'm going for the middle ground, choosing gifts they need... and that I think you might enjoy.

Here's this year's list:

Joe Lieberman, Ben Nelson, Mitch McConnell and the other congressional obstructionists: a DVD of Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, so they can see the proper use of a filibuster -- to fight corruption, not promote it.

Health insurance and drug company lobbyists: Nothing -- they're getting enough from the Senate and the White House this Christmas.

Lou Dobbs: Just a simple "Feliz Navidad."

Mark Sanford and Tiger Woods: Love-sick emails that self-destruct 60 seconds after you send them. "Soul mates" they are actually married too.

Jenny Sanford and Elin Nordegren: Husbands they can trust. An at-home HIV test. The best divorce lawyer money can buy.

Joe Wilson, Kanye West, and Serena Williams: Impulse control.

Meghan McCain: More attention for her fabulous cleaving takes (Karl Rove is a "creepy" Twitter follower; Dick Cheney should "go away"), and less attention for her fabulous cleavage.

Taylor Swift: a Harry Winston-designed mace holder for her next awards show meet-up with Kanye West.

Tareq and Michaele Salahi: a Photoshop class -- it's a much less obnoxious way to get a picture of yourself with Obama and Biden.

Chesley "Sully" Sullenberger: the pilot's seat on my next flight. And the next one. And the next one...

The Iranian people: a green uprising that turns into a velvet revolution.

The American people: Real health care reform (Medicare For All).

Carrie Prejean: New breast implants, so she can give back the ones the Miss California pageant bought for her.

Roman Polanski: a cellmate who also believes that plying someone with champagne and a Quaalude and anally penetrating them is "making love."

Larry Summers: a Goldman Sachs pension -- after all, he's earned it.

Richard and Mayumi Heene: Parenting classes. Behind bars.

Falcon Heene: Classmates who've never watched TV.

David from "David After the Dentist": Classmates who've never watched YouTube.

All the cable anchors who spent endless hours expressing their deep concern for Balloon Boy: the names of some of the 13 million children living in poverty in this country who desperately need their concern and attention, and some time in the media spotlight.

Erin Andrews: a lifetime supply of masking tape. And a plush hotel robe -- floor-length.

Orly Taitz: Someone to tell her that her 15 minutes expired months ago.

The cast of Jersey Shore: a copy of "Dummies for Dummies." Vasectomies for the guys and a lifetime supply of birth control pills for the girls.

Members of the GOP: an Xbox 360. They might as well occupy themselves with something, since they've decided to do nothing in Congress.

Lady Gaga: Guy Ritchie -- She's already stolen everything else that used to belong to Madonna.

The recipients of the 3.9 million foreclosure notices sent to homeowners this year: a cramdown amendment that isn't killed by banking lobbyists.

Goldman Sachs: $23 billion of taxpayers' money. Oops, sorry -- that's what we gave them last year.

That's my list. Now it's your turn to play Santa. Who's been naughty and who's been nice? Please post your gift ideas for your favorite -- and not so favorite -- public figures in the comments section and we'll collect the best ones and unwrap them on Christmas Day.

***

UPDATE, Christmas Day

Click here to read your gift suggestions, including a GPS for Barack Obama, to show him the way from Wall Street to Main Street (submitted by manx).

Annabelle Gurwitch: The Year End Round-Up in Marriage

2009-12-22T13:18:45Z

It has been a banner year for marital tankings. We're talking supreme tankage here. Famous flameouts from the world of politics, sports, and celebrities provided countless hours of entertainment, overtime work for journalists, and taught millions of us the names of minor porn stars heretofore unknown (Ladies and gents... Jamie Jungers?).

So, let's do a round-up of the extreme highs and the lowest of the lows of marital woes 2009.

1. Tiger Woods and Elin Nordegren
This was marriage blow-up #1 with a bullet!

She Says: I don't have problem with Tiger. Men like sex. Men like to have sex with women they're not married to. Where was the news here? Besides, isn't the possibility of acquiring as much quality vagina as possible why men want to be successful and rich? Alas, Americans look down on this, publicly. However, as much as we drag our prized pets through the mud, we love seeing them redeem themselves. I predict that six months into the new year, Tiger -- post-sex rehab with Dr. Drew -- will regain his endorsements and Gatorade will change their slogan to, "I'll have what he's having."

He Says: Tiger must be stopped; it's just not fair! As a lowly beta male I can't even imagine the temptation Tiger Woods has to deal with on a daily, perhaps hourly, even minute-to-minute basis. The world is his vagina. The eminent evolutionary psychologist, Robert Wright theorizes that monogamy evolved to prevent males like Tiger Woods who can have literally thousands of wives which would leave men like me, Jeff Kahn, with none. Wright believes and rightly so that nothing is more dangerous to society than a pack of frustrated Jeff Kahns roaming around without a chance in hell of procreating.

2. Mark and Jenny Sanford
This was fun from Mark's first lie to his last.

She Says: It's sad! Though the governor will pine and beg Jenny to let him have more time to fall in love with her again, he will be spurned and spend the next year nostalgically campaigning to have the signage in the Appalachian trial translated into Spanish.

He Says: It's stupid! Mark's biggest mistake was flying back to South Carolina from Argentina. He should have resigned as Governor, gotten a divorce, married his Argentinean hottie, and then rode that wave of political passion all the way to being president of Argentina. They love this kind of thing down there. No one sings, "Don't Cry For Me South Carolina" do they?

3. Frank and Jamie McCourt
Foul Play.

He Says: If money were an aphrodisiac, this couple would never leave their bed, but instead they're trying to screw each other legally. Jamie wants her job back as CEO of the Dodgers, plus $488,925 a month for living expenses ($330,000 goes toward her residences and vacation homes). It's gonna get ugly, folks. I feel bad for their children. And by children I mean the Dodgers.

She Says: My favorite aspect of this contentious debate is that his lawyers are accusing her of having an affair with her driver, which McCourt's attorney has deemed, "an inappropriate relationship with a subordinate employee." What would he say if she had an affair with a player? I'm rooting for Jaime and her driver. I'm tired of men in powerful positions sleeping with employees. Thank you Jamie, for breaking the glass bedspring.

4. Jon and Kate
The real reality of the couple trying to create reality is that they suck at it.

She Says: The worst part of their divorce, sadly, is that many of us who managed to miss the show know the name Gosselin, which is a terrible sign of how reality TV culture has migrated into mainstream news. I predict Jon will meet Madonna at Kabbalah and after losing custody of his own kids become the manny for her children, Kate will lose custody of her children to the Octomom who will need to get more children in her brood to compete with the new 19-kid show on TLC.

He Says: I never watched their show, I don't read about them in gossip magazines, but just seeing their photos on the cover at the supermarket checkout makes me never want to watch or read anything about them ever again.

5. Madonna and Guy Richie
This marriage didn't have Like a Prayer.

He Says: Richie gave her a baby and a really bad movie to star in -- what more could a material girl want? No seriously, I think what Madonna was really after in this union was a chance to try out her British accent and when the world collectively cringed, it was only a matter of time before Madge dropped the hubby and the accent, and hopped the pond back to the States.

She Says: Madge looks great. Just great. What is she doing and who is doing it? Divorce? Whatever? Who's her dermatologist?

6. Avril and Deryck
Ah, the stupidity of youth.

He says: Avril Lavigne and Deryck Whibley, winners of the 2009 Very-Odd-Celebrity-Names-and-Who-Cares-That-They're-Getting-a-Divorce Award.

She Says: I think their divorce is robbing the world of equally incomprehensibly-spelled children's names: Abigile, Alleysun, Dawren, Duglous. It's a loss, really.

7. Senator John Ensign's affair with his friend and colleague's wife, Cindy Hamilton
Family Values go to Hell

He Says: On the Senate floor, John Ensign declared,

"Marriage is the cornerstone on which our society was founded. For those who say that the Constitution is so sacred that we cannot or should not adopt the Federal Marriage Amendment. It is not right to mold marriage to fit the desires of a few, against the wishes of so many, and to ignore the important role of marriage."

Sitting at my desk, Jeff Kahn declares, "John Ensign you're a huge fu#*ing hypocrite and the next time you're casting stones at gay marriage not being sacred remember to throw a big fat rock in your own lying cheating face. Good day, sir!"

She Says: Ensign was simply following in the footsteps of Nevada's governor, Jim Gibbons, who last spring was accused by his wife of sending more than 800 text messages to a mistress in 2007. Just another way that technology has let us down.

8. Marriage itself

2009 saw marital happiness lower than ever (same sex couples can marry in Iowa and D.C. but not in the West Village), but even more troubling, low property values and joint health care plans are forcing many couples to stay together. When the American Academy of Matrimonial Lawyers polled its 1,600 members, nearly 40 percent said that filings were down by 40 percent. We hope the economy recovers so couples can return to business as usual in America. And by that we mean screwing up their relationships and getting the chance to divorce repeatedly (like family values champion Rush Limbaugh, who announced that he'll marry wife #4 on July 4th, 2010).

Jeffrey Shaffer: We're Being Bad: Are Mom And Dad To Blame?

2009-12-18T17:08:46Z

The last half of 2009 deserves a special place in the history books and it wouldn't be inaccurate to title the chapter "Grownups Gone Wild."

Some of the glaring examples of the past few months include Congressman Joe Wilson calling President Obama a liar on national TV, South Carolina governor Mark Sanford hooking up with a soul mate in South America, and Richard Heene staging an elaborate aerial hoax (and for the record, I think his son should hereafter be referred to as The Not-Really-In-The-Balloon Boy).

The list of ignominious incidents, augmented recently by the antics of elite party-crashers Tareq and Michaele Salahi and golf legend-turned-Lothario Tiger Woods, has caused numerous media pundits to decry what appears to be a relentless erosion of civility and good citizenship from coast to coast.

You can find similar sentiments expressed in coverage of less sensational topics such as teachers being stressed by student misconduct, sideline rudeness at sporting events, and the proliferation of violent video games.

As I read and reflect on the wide range of opinions about these problems, I've noticed a common thread in many of the storylines. When it comes to assigning blame for our collective decline in courtesy, integrity, and good judgement, two popular culprits are the mommies and daddies of America.

I won't argue with anyone who says bad parenting produces plenty of nasty consequences across the cultural landscape. I also agree that lots of kids are growing up with a distorted sense of entitlement and lousy social skills.

But it's simplistic to think substandard child rearing is a major cause of our national character flaws. Plenty of other factors are playing starring roles in this drama. Scandal-oriented journalism is now mainstream. In the broadcasting industry the concept of "restricted material" is nearly obsolete. Every day, American kids (and grownups) are bombarded with media messages that celebrate rudeness and rule breaking for their high entertainment value.

And at the risk of sounding like a total cranky geezer, I have to emphasize that complaints about parental incompetence don't resonate with me because I've been hearing them all my life.

"Bringing up baby" became a hot-button issue during World War II and each passing decade produces a new set of bogeymen who are allegedly damaging the mental and emotional health of our country's young people. Social commentators hammered parents in the 1950s with stern warnings about the insidious effects of comic books and rock music.

In the 1960s a new threat was perceived: rising divorce rates and growing numbers of single-parent households. Law enforcement officials warned that lack of adult supervision left kids with ample opportunities to experiment with drugs and alcohol. Rock music turned psychedelic.

During the '70s conventional parenting wisdom swung heavily in favor of boosting self-esteem and helping every child excel in the classroom. More and more parents began to see themselves as advocates for their kids. Some commentators began to wonder if "advocate" was just code for "I'm going to make sure my kids are always first in line for anything that might help them succeed and nobody better get in our way."

In the '80s the mantra of many schools and community organizations was "We're all winners." Hosting a birthday party meant providing goody bags for each guest. Soccer, softball and other youth teams handed out trophies to all players. The accumulation of commemorative hardware was impressive.

As a new millennium arrived, the push to maximize opportunities for achievement was having the unpleasant side effect of driving up anxiety levels in households all over the country. The January 29, 2001 cover of Newsweek showed a smiling boy, two haggard adults behind him, and this headline: The Parent Trap--Is Juggling Your Kids' Sports, Music, Etc. Burning You Out?

Now, almost ten stress-filled years later, parenting is often viewed as a relentless, grinding ordeal. Recently, my local paper ran a brief excerpt from a blog entry. The author had decided to quit a paid job in favor of staying home with two young children, and summed up her feelings about the task with this prediction: "I fully expected it to be intense work--isolating, emotionally draining, thankless..."

You might assume such attitudes would create a willingness to consider suggestions for improvement and you'd be wrong. In spite of the widespread perception that parenting is a long, hard slog, hardly anybody seems willing to admit their kids aren't doing just fine.

The quickest way to get your face ripped in half these days is to admonish a child for misbehaving in front of his or her parents. Not very long ago a school principal told me it wasn't a normal year "unless I have at least two lawsuits pending against me." She wasn't kidding.

I think of parenting as the ultimate free-market system. There are very few regulations and almost no prohibitions on who can participate. Like the weather, it's easy to complain about but trying to impose some kind of large-scale management plan isn't a realistic option.

How the system affects our individual development is hard to analyze and always will be. I know families that have multiple children, and all the kids have completely different personalities. There can be cheerful geniuses and sullen jerks sitting around the same dinner table. Why is that?

On the rare occasions when prospective parents ask me for advice all I can do is offer a few anecdotes in the form of "Here's what happened in our situation and some of it might be useful to you." But there's no template for parenting that guarantees great results. Every family brings a different set of values, habits, and personality traits into the process.

To anyone who is about to become a parent for the first time, I do have one simple request: please, PLEASE teach your kids to embrace the notion of "don't touch other people's stuff without asking permission first." If more Americans could grasp that concept early on and maintain it throughout their adult lives, I think daily life in the USA would be a teeny bit better.

But that's not a demand. I'm not trying to pump unjustified expectations into this complex and stressful process. And rest assured that if I ever catch your kids in a supermarket opening the bulk food bins and running their hands through the granola (which I have witnessed several times), I won't yell at them to stop or make any other attempt to correct their improper conduct.

Not unless my attorney is standing right behind me.

Wayne Besen: Conservatives of Convenience

2009-12-16T14:13:58Z

A February 2008 poll by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life found that 16 percent of America's 225 million adults are unaffiliated with any religion. According to the report, "When 'childhood religion' is compared against 'current religion,' the unaffiliated show a net increase of 8.8 percentage points, compared to a 7.5 point loss among Catholics, for example, or a 2.6 percent loss among Protestants."

It is my belief that outrageously hypocritical behavior demonstrated by conservative religious authorities is directly responsible for the surge in non-believers and those who shun organized religion. The ubiquitous scolds who dominate cable TV and Republican politics are too often conservatives of convenience, who believe they are exempt from practicing the strident rules that they preach.

For example, South Carolina's First Lady, Jenny Sanford, filed for divorce last week after her husband, Gov. Mark Sanford (R), admitted to engaging in an affair with a woman from Argentina. Until the scandal broke, Mark and Jenny posed as a beacon of Christian family values.

I can understand Jenny's disgust with her husband, who left his four sons to cheat with his mistress on Father's Day. But one can't masquerade as a Bible-thumper when it comes to gay rights and other issues, and then say that the Bible is suddenly irrelevant when it comes to divorce.

Both Jenny and Mark profited from their charade, yet jilted Jenny wants to conveniently abandon biblical absolutism and utilize liberal divorce laws because her feelings are hurt. Sorry Jenny, but a mistress does not negate your marriage vows. Anyone can embrace the "sanctity of marriage" in good times. A true person of fundamentalist faith stays with the vows even when the relationship sours.

To highlight such hypocrisy, John Marcoa, a Sacramento Web-designer, has drafted a 2010 parody ballot measure that would ban divorce in California. Tellingly, the right wing organizations that fought to save marriage from gay couples have not lined up to support it.

From mega-churches to suburban strip mall ministries, fundamentalist youth rail against the secular culture, even as they ape it. They sport gaudy tattoos of Jesus, wear earrings in their noses and play imitation rock. On their fingers are silly chastity rings, when they really need chastity belts.

A recent New York Times magazine article points out that "More government money has been spent on the cause of sexual abstinence in Texas than any other state, but it still has the third-highest teen birth rate in the country and the highest percentage of teen mothers giving birth more than once."

Former beauty queen Carrie Prejean is the perfect spokesperson for liberal bashing libertines. She moralized over same-sex marriage, but expected forgiveness and understanding when, thanks to tabloid pictures, America got to know her in the biblical sense.

Perhaps the most amusing part of studying conservatives is their absurd claim that America is a Christian nation, which is impossible, because no two people can define what it means to be Christian. A new Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life report entitled, "Many Americans Mix Multiple Faiths," concludes that people are now choosing to "blend Christianity with Eastern or New Age beliefs".

Who knew crystals and Christ went so well together?

Last month, Watergate felon Chuck Colson joined a batch of wing nuts to write "The Manhattan Declaration." This supposedly conservative manifesto began by shamelessly co-opting historical liberal successes. The Declaration reads:

It was Christians who combated the evil of slavery...Christian women stood at the vanguard of the suffrage movement...The great civil rights crusades of the 1950s and 60s were led by Christians...

It is true that Christians played a role in these movements. However, it was non-believers teaming up with liberal Christians to overcome the opposition of conservative Christians. The anti-gay signers of "The Manhattan Declaration" are the ideological heirs to those on the wrong side of history. It was remarkable how efficiently they scrubbed their own embarrassing past and replaced their monumental failures with liberal accomplishments.

Social conservatives are a loud bunch, but their power is slipping. I think back to Middle school, when I attended a Houston Rockets basketball game with my father. During a time out the "Voice of God" announced that a gay rights measure had been crushed. The enthusiastic crowd burst out in to loud cheers, which was quite devastating to a thirteen-year old coming to terms with his sexual orientation.

On Monday, Houston voters elected openly gay Annise Parker to be their mayor. Unlike my youth, I watched a Houston crowd cheer for progress instead of prejudice. No doubt there were countless social conservatives across the city slamming beers, ogling women who weren't their wives and betting on sports -- while bemoaning the city's fallen values.

This is the lifestyle of today's conservatives of convenience. They are all creed and no deed.

Mark Sanford Rebuke Debate Gets Emotional

2009-12-16T12:53:50Z

COLUMBIA, S.C. — Lawmakers voted Wednesday to formally rebuke Gov. Mark Sanford, again sparing him from impeachment over secret trips to see his Argentine mistress and his use of state planes.

The House Judiciary Committee unanimously agreed to censure the Republican governor for bringing "ridicule, dishonor, disgrace and shame" to the state. The scathing reprimand has no practical effect on Sanford's ability to govern for the 13 months that remain in his term, but legislators insisted they were not giving him a pass.

Robbie Vorhaus: Tiger, Letterman, Madoff And More: Eight Lessons From The Decade's Biggest Flameouts

2009-12-16T12:32:57Z

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Catie Lazarus: The Year of the Man-Child

2009-12-15T19:41:23Z

What Did You Learn in 2009? Test your knowledge by answering these objectively scientific questions about the celebrities, politicians and fifteen minute famers who made headlines.

You would describe 2009: "THE YEAR OF
A) Undermining Uninsured, Unemployed, and Underrepresented Minorities.
B) The Man-Child
C) Hope in a Bottle
(You can answer differently than the scorekeeper)

If a female celebrity accepts an award for her work, a male peer should:
A) Corner her with an unsolicited kiss, you'll never get the chance again and not just because she is married!
B) Interrupt her speech to say she didn't deserve to win.
C) Promote a political cause, even if he can't pronounce Ahmadinejad.

When exploiting children for commercial gain:
A) Buy them matching uniforms.
B) Never read them books, it sends subliminal message to viewers.
C) Keep copies of the footage for their future shrink appointments.

If a male physically abuses his girlfriend or female colleague, he might:
A) Ditch her in their shared office, McMansion, or rental car.
B) Blame the media.
C) Apologize via Twitter, Facebook, MySpace or a YouTube video; someone else can forward her the link.

If a married politician or celebrity cheats, he ought to:
A) Engage in unprotected sex with as many people as possible, because if she takes you back, you may be stuck with her.
B) Do a prostitute or escort, she won't get how to sexually exploit someone for money.
C) Invent an original alibi, as coming out of the closet, hiking, and a fetish for S & M in trouser socks is already taken.
D) Hide any athletic gear or sharp objects from his spurned wife.

When gunning for your fifteen minutes of fame from infidelity:
A) Swipe toiletries from the hotel for proof of your lover's lust and hygiene practices.
B) Keep receipts of your rendezvous for taxes.
C) You want to hone your reality show pitch, like Skanks Doing Pranks or Males Are Hos Too.

After a failed Presidential campaign, politicians will:
A) Serve boxed wine in exchange for donors buying your memoir at full price.
B) Decry reform as socialism, while collecting government subsidized health care.
C) Consult on national security, when your international experience consists of finding a parking spot near the U.N.

If after skipping out on bail, you should:
A) Find a spokesperson whose own biological son is his brother-in-law, ex is his mother-in-law to stump on your behalf.
B) Describe his admitted drugging and raping a minor as not "rape rape."
C) Move to Europe where sexual assault is a poet's personal beeswax.

Say you carry a weapon, you want to:
A) Wear sweatpants without pockets.
B) Test it out on college campus, military bases, or crowded piazza, and then run!
C) Deploy to Afghanistan, apparently we need more armed bodies there.

For religious reasons, people will:
A) Veto gays and lesbian's liberal causes like marriage and the military.
B) Kill other humans, especially over holy land.
C) Practice polygamy, but only if the women dress in corduroy prairie dresses.

To win a US political election, a candidate should:
A) Spend $200 on behalf of voters in lieu of giving them cash during a recession.
B) Rant about immigrants, even if he's not Native-American.
C) Invest hundreds of dollars in hair care (true for tennis players too).

The Banking industry needs to:
A) Build sturdier pyramids.
B) Merge with the other conglomerates to form all we need: US Treasury-Google-Apple-Twitter-HBO-Netflix-H&M-CVS-Ikea-Trader Joe's-US Government.
C) Be paid more than less intelligent peers, like rocket scientists, doctors, teachers, professors, public servants, therapists, engineers, and nurses.

To ring in 2010, US Citizens will:
A) Blog, text, drink red wine, call their congressman, exercise more, eat less, take a second job, sanitize their hands, vote for viral videos, all while driving.
B) Crash a political function, just remember C-Spanners tuck in before the ball drops.
C) Fist bump.

Giles Slade: Adultery as an American Subject: Our Cheatin' Hearts

2009-12-14T17:41:10Z

There's much more at play in the recent spate of adulterous liasons made public than simply leering nosiness, and a seemy delight in watching the mighty and the accomplished dragged through the mud. America's fascination with the transgressions of Tiger Woods, Mark Sanford and David Letterman is really an old school theme in American cultural life. Adultery is a very American topic. We've been redefining the parameters of its acceptability and taboo with each new generation since the Scarlet Letter.

Adultery has become more visible recently due to the technological advances like texting which is now often involved in the discovery and proof of contemporary adulterous relationships. Then there's the Internet that lets people acquire and disseminate personal information about anyone anywhere in the world with the same effortlessness as standing around at the water-cooler when you're supposed to be working.

But the times themselves are also stressing marriages to the max, and - as we know from the great depression- this puts a strain on people's relationships. When divorces and separations spiralled during the thirties, Screwball Comedy was invented to describe, contain and discuss America's prolonged courtships and strained marriages. The catalogue of genuinely funny films that followed, It Happened One Night (1934) is still one of Hollywood's high water marks. If you haven't seen Bringing Up Baby, The Awful Truth, Philadelphia Story or Midnight you've got an inexpensive treat in store for those long afternoons with family during the coming holidays...

Well, times are tough again these days. People are still losing their jobs and houses. There are more homeless adults and children in America than ever before. More people are using food stamps and returning to live with their parents or parking in brother Bob's basement suite. There are divorces and separations and even postponements of weddings due to lack of cash, jobs, prospects.

Really important too, is the fact that after 9 long years of war, more and more military families are splitting apart under the pressures of anxiety, low military pay, and the prolonged absences of protracted service. In this environment of stress and hardship, its no wonder that websites that arrange assignations for cheating spouses -like Ashleymorgan.com- achieve greater popularity. America is lonely and stressed and needs, as my man Marvin once called it, 'Sexual Healing'.

Kudos to Tiger Woods for refusing Ashleymorgans offer of $5 million to endorse adultery and their website. If they are trying, as Hugh Hefner once did to change people's values they're facing a tough road. In conservative Toronto recently, the public reacted strongly against Ashleymorgan.com's bus ad "Life is short. Have an Affair." Even though in North America, 1/5 of all married women and about 2/3s of all men have an affair during their married lives, no one's happy about it. Sex is powerful stuff that shouldn't be handled casually. Guilt, shame and humiliation are the price of trivializing one of society's most powerful taboos. Just ask my ex-wife.

Anyway, my respects to Tiger now for trying to save his embattled marriage. But my respects to Jenny Sanford for 'walking away from trouble with her head held high'. Lastly, my respects to David Letterman for facing the music squarely and getting on with it. I'm going to hope that some clever writers in Hollywood read this and get the idea of writing a modern comedy that thematizes the changes taking place in our ideas about adultery.

Anyway, my respects to Tiger now for trying to save his embattled marriage. But my respects to Jenny Sanford for 'walking away from trouble with her head held high'. Lastly, my respects to David Letterman for facing the music squarely and getting on with it. I'm going to hope that some clever writers in Hollywood read this and get the idea of writing a modern comedy that thematizes the changes taking place in our ideas about adultery.

The Awful Truth (1937) (Irene Dunne, Cary Grant)
Casablanca (1942) (Bogey and Ingrid Bergman)
Dr. Zhivago (1965) (Alec Guinness, Julie Christie)
The Graduate (1967) (Ann Bancroft, Dustin Hoffman)
Bob & Carol, Ted & Alice (1969)
The Woman Next Door (1981) (Gerard Depardieu, Fanny Ardent)
Postman Always Rings Twice (1981) (Jessica Lange, Jack Nicholson)
French Lieutenant's Woman (1982) (Meryl Streep)
Fatal Attraction (1987) (Sharon Stone, Michael Douglas)
Sex, Lies and Videotape (1989) (Andie Macdowell)
Indecent Proposal (1993) (Robert Redford, Demi Moore)
Bridges of Madison County (1995) (Meryl Streep, Clint Eastwood)
American Beauty (1999) (Kevin Spacey)
Eyes Wide Shut (1999) (Tom Cruise, Nicole Kidman)
Unfaithful (2002) (Diane Lane)

SNL Mocks Media For Ignoring Political Affairs While Reveling In Tiger's (VIDEO)

2009-12-13T08:25:05Z

"Saturday Night Live" opened yesterday with a skit mocking both the sexual indiscretions of politicians and how little attention is given them by the media. John Edwards, John Ensign, and Mark Sanford gathered together to protest that their affairs barely registered despite the fact that one of them engaged in bribery, one of them abandoned his state in a time of need, and one of them had a love child with a campaign worker.

These stories, while reported by major news outlets, disappeared quickly and without much follow-up. All of these men still have their jobs. Tiger Woods on the other hand, a man with no public responsibilities, has been the subject of intense media scrutiny over several weeks and has indefinitely resigned from golf.

WATCH:

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Jenny Sanford Filing For Divorce From South Carolina Governor

2009-12-11T09:20:39Z

CHARLESTON, S.C. — South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford may be keeping his office, but he is losing his marriage.

First lady Jenny Sanford capped a tumultuous week by filing for divorce Friday, two days after state lawmakers stopped short of recommending her husband's removal for a top-secret June rendezvous with his Argentine mistress. He will not say whether he is still in contact Maria Belen Chapur, the woman he famously called his "soul mate."

Mark Sanford Wants To Reconcile With Wife

2009-12-10T15:43:23Z

COLUMBIA, S.C. — South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford said Thursday he still wants to reconcile with the first lady even though Jenny Sanford has made clear she won't be standing by his side in the wake of his affair.

Sanford spoke with reporters a day after a legislative panel rejected an impeachment resolution and instead decided to recommend a formal rebuke for his trysts with an Argentine mistress and his misuse of state planes. The panel said his actions had brought the state "ridicule, dishonor, disgrace and shame."

No Sanford Impeachment: South Carolina Lawmakers Considering Rebuke

2009-12-09T15:59:44Z

COLUMBIA, S.C. — South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford dodged impeachment Wednesday but was scolded by legislators for his travels to see a mistress in Argentina and his misuse of state planes.

A legislative panel voted down a measure to impeach the two-term Republican, opting instead to recommend a formal rebuke for bringing the state "ridicule, dishonor, disgrace and shame."

Dr. Jim Taylor: From Bill Clinton to Tiger Woods: The Price of Infidelity

2009-12-08T15:23:43Z

In the last 15 years alone, there has been Bill Clinton, Newt Gingrich, Jude Law, Eliot Spitzer, Kobe Bryant, Mark Sanford, Alex Rodriguez, David Letterman, the list goes on. Now, it's déjà vu all over again. Another successful man caught with his paws in the honey jar (pun intended). But not just any man. We're talking about Tiger Woods, the wealthiest and most famous athlete on Earth.

According to reports, we are now up to seven alleged mistresses. That image of Tiger as a humble, honorable family man has not only been tarnished, but now lays smashed in far too many pieces to ever be reassembled again. The price that will be paid for Tiger's infidelity is enormous.

There is the price of dishonesty in which what appeared to be the true mettle of a man, professional athlete, celebrity, and multi-millionaire aside, was nothing more than a carefully manufactured and cultivated façade. Another idol who has come crashing down from his pedestal.

And what about the price of perfidy. What must the legions of Tiger fans, who have followed him from his earliest successes as an amateur through the heart-rending illness and death of his beloved father to his awe-inspiring victories on the golf course, feel to learn that their adoration was for just another man with feet of clay.

Of course there is the financial price that will be paid. Yes, Tiger's sponsors have stood by him so far. To do otherwise would be to make themselves out to be fools. There is their public rationalization that what happened is a private matter that doesn't impact their relationship. But as the number of mistresses metastasizes, so will the embarrassment, and finally the corporate recognition that the damage is irreparable. A cowardly weekend press release will then be issued in which the sponsors announce that they have chosen to discontinue their relationship with Tiger for any number of reasons (the economy, a new marketing direction) totally unrelated to his recent transgressions (a word, by the way, that is an insult to all those whose trust he violated). And relationships that have generated hundreds of millions of dollars in revenue for those sponsors will end. Of course, Tiger's infidelity will cost him perhaps billions in earnings over the remainder of his career (not that he will end up in the poor house, of course).

Tiger will also drag the argyle-socked and perma-pressed sport of golf down with him. As the most visible face of professional golf, the sport will pay a huge price, easily into the billions of dollars in lost revenue from a decline in attendance, television, and merchandising revenue attributable to Tiger. His sleazy behavior will, by extension, also hurt the many professional golfers who don't live the gilded life that Tiger does, but rather struggle each week to eke out a living playing a game they love.

Can I muster sympathy for anyone in this sordid affair (pun intended)? I certainly have no sympathy for the sponsors who paid Tiger millions to be the shill for their products. They care only for the bottom line and will have their "come to Jesus" moment only when Tiger no longer serves to pad their balance sheets.

I have little sympathy for the fans who chose to idolize (and idealize) a man who just happens to have a spectacular talent for what is, as Mark Twain so aptly noted, "a good walk spoiled."

I leave my complete absence of sympathy (what I actually feel is contempt) for Tiger, who had the world by the tail (pun intended) and chose to dishonor himself and bring unimaginable sorrow to those who loved him for a few (okay, more than a few) cheap thrills with a bunch of floozies.

My sympathy does go out to those who paid most dearly for Tiger's infidelity. His wife Elin who must pay a personal price of betrayal for having to suffer the indignity of not only learning that her husband is a serial philanderer, but also the humiliation of having to live this very private nightmare under the spotlight of a salacious culture that feeds on scandal the way sharks feed on their prey. I also feel sympathy for the price that his children will pay as they get older and learn what kind of man their father really is.

A post like this would typically end with a hope of redemption on Tiger's part. He would "cowboy up" to what he did, ask for forgiveness, and promise to devote the rest of his life to atonement for his sins. But I just can't go there. He may truly be sorry for his infidelity, but, at this point, I think he's most sorry about having been caught. If Tiger really felt remorse, he would have felt it after his first affair (or at least his second or third) and would never have made it to his seventh. No matter what Tiger says or does in the name of redemption, for all of his wealth, he'll never be able to compensate those who have suffered the most from his repugnant behavior.

Jenny Sanford Barbara Walters Interview: I Wouldn't Have Stood With The Governor, Even If He Asked Me

2009-12-08T12:44:36Z

CHARLESTON, S.C. — Even if her straying husband had asked her to, South Carolina first lady Jenny Sanford says she wouldn't have stood with Gov. Mark Sanford when he faced cameras to tell the world about his affair with an Argentine woman.

Jenny Sanford told ABC's Barbara Walters for a special airing Wednesday her husband's actions have caused consequences but not robbed her of her self esteem. Excerpts of the interview were released Tuesday.

S.C. Impeachment? Lawmakers Debate Ousting Gov. Mark Sanford

2009-12-08T10:26:29Z

Lawmakers debating whether or not Gov. Mark Sanford should be impeached are focusing on his tryst in Argentina, reports the New York Times, and the fact that it should be considered state business is being challenged.

Said Rep. Greg Delleney: "It's just obvious that this trip was a personal trip and state business was kind of thrown in as a cover."

Today marks the fifth day of the impeachment hearings. Some lawmakers sought additional charges earlier this week.

An impeachment resolution is expected next week.

Earlier from the Associated Press:

COLUMBIA, S.C. — A cool-headed legal debate has replaced the once-passionate calls to oust Gov. Mark Sanford that began after his tearful summertime admission that he disappeared from the state to pursue an extramarital affair in Argentina.

A panel on Tuesday began debating whether his failure to inform his staff of his whereabouts and put anyone in charge rise to the high standard of impeachment, usually reserved for officeholders who break the law.

Two proponents of a measure to remove Sanford likened his five-day absence to a soldier leaving his post. But others on a seven-member legislative panel questioned whether the two-term Republican's actions rose to a high enough level to warrant removal.

"To speak about dereliction of duty, absence without leave, abandoning one's post are terms that ordinarily are reserved for those who are in uniform and who are not civilian citizens of our state and nation," said Rep. Walt McLeod, D-Prosperity. "It may constitute something. But it doesn't constitute dereliction of duty because those are military terms."

Sanford returned in June to confess to an affair that shattered his marriage and dimmed a once-bright political future. He told reporters in Charleston on Tuesday that it's obvious he wanted to keep an affair secret.

"Yes, I had a moral failing. I was gone for five days. I failed my marriage on a number of fronts. I mean, we've been through all of that. I don't know how many times one apologizes for that," he said. "How many times do we want to say the obvious? The nature of having an affair is you want to hide it."

Later investigations found the governor may have violated state ethics laws for travel and campaign finances, and he faces 37 civil charges that he used his office to personally benefit himself. Those charges weren't discussed Tuesday, but they'll be added to the panel's debate at later hearings.

Sanford has brushed aside repeated calls to step down before his tenure ends in January 2011, and his lawyers say they'll answer the ethics questions at separate hearings on them in January.

Anushay Hossain: Today's Politician's Wife Is No Longer Standing By Her Man

2009-12-01T13:33:09Z

Remember the way it use to be? Shamed politician stands at podium, admitting affair, acknowledging homosexuality, while his disgraced wife stands loyally by his side. Anyone who didn't know what the word humiliation really meant needed only to see pictures of Eliot Spitzer's wife standing by her husband's side as he confessed his involvement with a prostitution ring last year. A little piece of that woman died with each word her husband uttered.

Is it not ironic that the wife of a politician plays such a huge role in making her husband's public image a moral one. But if he does anything to damage how people perceive him, does he take his wife down too? Eliot Spitzer made his wife the pity of the world, a sorry and tragic character. It was painful just to watch that press conference.

But Spitzer's wife was not the one paying to traffick prostitutes across state lines. The wife of a politician must always put protecting her husband's image over everything else, but no one is giving her that same security.

Well that is no longer the case. Today's politician's wives are no longer playing the part of victim to their husband's charades. If anything, wives are "outing" their husbands before they get the chance to out themselves, sparing the wives the looming humiliation by exposing their husbands for who they really are. They are providing themselves with security and protecting their own futures.

Look at Veronica Lario, Silvio Berlusconi's estranged wife. Earlier this year, she bluntly came out to the press that she could no longer put up with her husband's "infatuation with young women," and wanted a divorce. Berlusconi, Italy's current Prime Minister and one of the richest men in the world, is now entangled in a sex scandal with a cocaine dealing businessman, accused of supplying Berlusconi with girls at his private residences in Rome and Sardegna.

Many Italian women credit Lario with igniting a new "feminist" fervor in Italy, where women are culturally encouraged to guard their men and their family's honor. No public hanging of dirty, private family matters, thank you. But Veronica Lario opted for telling the world what being married to Silvio Berlusconi was really like. If the status of cultural trailblazer wasn't enough for her, the $65 million a year in alimony she is currently seeking definitely will be.

Women have had enough of society's rules, which allow and condone men to be promiscuous while their wives are supposed to act oblivious to their husband's cavorting. Women are forced to be responsible for men, especially men who are public figures. The most important role a politician's wife plays is that of a loving, fiercely loyal spouse, and it is a role that has to be played very convincingly. After all, if the wife has seemingly forgiven her husband, the public will eventually follow her lead, right?

But while Lario is getting her revenge on Berlusconi financially, the political wife who is really coming into her own is Jenny Sanford.

When it came to light that South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford was actually having an affair with an Argentinean woman in Buenos Aires, and not hiking in the Appalachian Mountains, his wife Jenny Sanford opted out of standing by him during his public confession.

Now it turns out that Mark Sanford has run up 37 counts of ethic charges for his "improper use of campaign contributions," and "unreported use" of friends' private planes. He even openly referred to the other woman, Maria Belen Chapur, as his soul mate.

Jenny Sanford, a Georgetown University graduate and former investment banker, is having none of this. As her husband's political future falls to pieces, his wife is building a brand.

I recently read this article in the New York Times reporting that Jenny Sanford is writing a book (of course!) on her experience dealing with her husband's infidelity. She has also trademarked her name to sell clothing and other merchandise. Sanford even has her own website with press releases and pictures. To top it all off, Jenny Sanford endorsed State Representative Nikki Haley to succeed her husband as South Carolina's Governor. The NY Times labels Mrs. Sanford as, "the reluctant poster woman for not standing by her man."

More like poster woman for not standing by her man and coming into her own! Jenny Sanford is becoming Jenny Sanford INC. Sources cited in the article say that Sanford "has moved from promoting [Mark Sanford] as a loyal spouse to using those same talents on behalf of herself."

What would Jackie Kennedy have said?

Who cares? It is about time women stop doing their politician husbands the favor of abetting them in their illicit affairs, covering up their homosexuality, etc.

What we learn from women like Veronica Lario, and in particular Jenny Sanford, is that you do not have to pay the price for your husband destroying his political ambitions. Politician's wives have already sacrificed enough dignity by pretending to play dumb in the first place, for even a second let alone years.

Women like Sanford show us what it means to be a political wife in this day and age. More importantly, they remind us to be our own person when playing the "till death do us part" role of a wife.They remind us that when your husband ruins his career, instead of falling with him, build your own empire instead.

That is the best revenge.

Cross-posted from "Anushay's Point."

Andy Borowitz: Tiger Quits Golf; Will Become Politician

2009-11-30T06:57:09Z

ORLANDO (The Borowitz Report) - In a development that rocked the worlds of sports and politics, golf superstar Tiger Woods announced today that he was hanging up his clubs to become a politician.

"After two days of refusing to speak to the media about suspicious aspects of my personal life, I have proved to myself that I am qualified for a career in politics," Mr. Woods told reporters in Orlando.

His stunning decision immediately drew praise from such disparate politicians as Gov. Mark Sanford of South Carolina and Sen. John Ensign of Nevada, who called a press conference to welcome Mr. Woods to the Republican Party.

"Tiger Woods has not yet revealed what his party affiliation will be, but based on what I've seen, he has what it takes to be a Republican," Sen. Ensign said. More here.

Jenny Sanford To Be Named One Of "10 Most Fascinating People Of 2009"

2009-11-28T11:37:36Z

She is writing a memoir, "Staying True," to be released in April by Ballantine Books, about grappling with her husband's marital infidelity. She has applied to trademark her own name in order to sell clothing, mugs and other items. She will appear next month on a Barbara Walters special on ABC as one of the "10 Most Fascinating People of 2009."

Sanford Impeachment To Be Taken Up By South Carolina Lawmakers

2009-11-20T14:14:04Z

COLUMBIA, S.C. — South Carolina lawmakers plan to formally consider impeaching Gov. Mark Sanford for the first time next week, the chairman of the committee beginning that work said Friday.

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Harrison told The Associated Press he is appointing an ad-hoc committee of four Republicans and three Democrats who will begin meeting Tuesday. He said he expects to have a resolution to impeach ready before Christmas for the full Judiciary Committee to consider.