There are several ways to look at this whole John Edwards affair and the media frenzy that has joined it. Of course, when I first heard the rumors that he’d had an affair, it was a month ago when a tabloid was toting the story and trying to get a comment from Edwards, saying that they had photos.
Because a tabloid was involved, I questioned whether it was true, but still wondered in the back of my mind. I think we’ve all become accustomed to the idea that a high-powered, good-looking man is going to get around a bit, especially those running for president or already in office.
When I heard that Edwards finally admitted it was true (after weeks of denying the affair and watching his former staffers defend him), I also thought, “Why can’t guys like these just keep their zippers up? What is it with power and the penis?”
And I wondered about Paul Tsongas–yes, little ol’ Paul Tsongas. Remember him? I can’t imagine the guy getting it on during his campaign. Sure, Tsongas didn’t have the nice-nice hair, like Clinton and Edwards, and he had that little face and stature. He was a not a presidential hottie. Perhaps that’s my own bias.
Now, I’m thinking about reality. What if Edwards’ wife knew about this affair all along? What if it really wasn’t an affair, and this woman was simply part of a polyamorous relationship that was honest and well-intentioned? But in this society, that just doesn’t fly right, and that’s why someone like Elizabeth Edwards has to issue a statement that says, “I knew, he told me, I was hurt and we worked through it.” If she issued a statement that said, “John and I are in love and committed to each other and our children, but we also have relationships outside our marriage that are meaningful and important, etc,” that would be a different story, and we wouldn’t be sitting around blaming power and the penis, or Edwards’ wonderful hair. That would be a powerful story that would make these women married to these men far more interesting than being labeled a victim.
And that would mean we wouldn’t have to listen to shock-and-awe media stories about a candidate’s life gone wrong with power and his penis. Or we would have to change the way we look at possible presidential candidate–and vote for more people like Paul Tsongas.
This article appears in Aug 7-13, 2008.
Or John McCain??????
John Edwards is having an affair with John Edwards. He is also his own love child.
If you gave money to John Edwards’ campaign then part of your money went to pay an amateur videographer over $100,000 to press the “record” button on a Best Buy camcorder a couple times in between greasing John’s knob.
If you gave a 2nd contribution to the Edwards campaign, that went to pay an additional $100,000 of hush money to move Edwards’ little love muffin out of the state so she would hush up whispers about John’s waxed carrot.
John and Elizabeth might have had an arrangement, but it’s easier to believe that he’s just the preening lawyer we all wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt about not being. Seeing Edwards nitpicking his goldilocks in the mirror during a video feed for 4 minutes, or hearing about the poverty fighter’s $400 haircut and Winchester-sized mansion, it all starts to add up: The guy’s really as big of an attention-whoring nobody as his worst critics claimed.
I mean, what kind of legalistic weasel tries to claim he was “99% honest about everything” after getting caught lying? Remember that we’re talking about a guy who publically condemned Bill Clinton for his cigar-moistening adventures. But here he is trying to claim that the National Enquirer’s hotel-window photos were doctored, right after everything else printed by the N.E. turned out to be true and Edwards lied through his teeth to deny them.
Maintaining plausible deniability during an expression of contrition is self-negating. We may never know whether it’s really Edwards’ baby, but the man who claims to be the father already has a wife of his own, and his name is not on the birth certificate. There will be no Maury Povich paternity test. Edwards says the affair was over in 2006, so what was he doing in the woman’s hotel room at 3 a.m. in the summer of 2008? Sipping tea? Uh-uh, it was a John Edwards Booty Call.
Millions of people and millions of dollars were spent on the campaign of somebody who knew he could easily be Bill Clintonized. The Edwards votes skewed the Iowa election results, which might well have gone to Hillary Clinton had he not been a candidate, and this in turn would have changed the course of the primary. Perhaps John Edwards behaved like one Clinton and saved us from another.
This stand by your man business is crap. Hillary was an enabler and I hope to dog that Elizabeth Edwards isn’t too. Next time a politician mentions the word “morality” or “moral”, he probably has a closet full of secrets.