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Les anyone think that newspapers don't make editorial choices when they run photographs, take a look at the front-page photo the Chicago Tribune ran of discredited GOP Senate nominee Jack Ryan, on the day that Ryan's divorce records were unsealed, revealing that he had taken his ex-wife to sex clubs. Ryan responded, in his less-than-classy withdrawal statement, by implying that the media had overlooked similar foibles by Democratic nominee Barack Obama and fuming about the Trib:
The media has gotten out of control. The fact that the Chicago Tribune sues for access to sealed custody documents and then takes unto itself the right to publish details of a custody dispute — over the objections of two parents who agree that the re-airing of their arguments will hurt their ability to co-parent their child and will hurt their child — is truly outrageous.
In my mind, Ryan got what he deserved: he lied to the entire state party leadership about the content of the file, and bet on the fact that the truth would never come out. As an excellent analysis of the rules of contemporary politics in this morning's Trib reveals, that was a naive belief.
It is most unusual that a major-party Senate candidate withdraws after receiving the nomination. It happened, of course, in New Jersey in 2002, when Democrats pressured Bob Torricelli off the ballot when it became clear that the senator's ethical improprieties rendered him unelectable. They then held the seat with former senator Frank Lautenberg.
The New Jersey race was unusual, however: Lautenberg had thrice won statewide, and the GOP had run an exclusively anti-Torricelli campaign, so when the senator withdrew, the Republicans had no message. A more likely comparison for what will occur in Illinois is the other example from the past 25 years of a major-party Senate nominee withdrawing--the Oregon Senate race of 1986.
With Bob Packwood running for a fourth term, the Democrats nominated Congressman Jim Weaver, a Watergate class-member who was known as a strong foe of the lumber industry. Like Ryan in Illinois, Weaver looked like a viable candidate, despite a tendency for occasional bizarre statements (on the House floor, he once asserted that"bows and arrows" would better defend the US than nuclear weapons; on another occasion, he compared Reagan's agricultural policies to Stalin's purge of the kulaks in the 1930s). After getting the nomination, however, Weaver was subject to a House Ethics Committee inquiry (back when the House Ethics Committee actually did inquiries) regarding financial and campaign budget improprieties, and he withdrew. The Democrats nominated the runner-up in the primary, a state senator named Rick Bauman, who was crushed by Packwood in the fall.
The Illinois GOP, like the Oregon Democrats in 1986, is considering the second-, third-, and fourth-place finishers in the primary, as well as a first-time candidate who was considering a run for governor in 2006. Maybe lightning will strike and they'll capture the seat--but I wouldn't bet on it.
This actually wasn't a very good week for Democrats in the battle for the Senate; in the South Carolina GOP primary, the Republicans nominated their strongest possible candidate, Congressman Jim DeMint, making it likely the GOP will capture the seat vacated by retiring Democrat Fritz Hollings. With Georgia certain to go Republican and Illinois likely to go Democratic, the GOP should enter the fall with a likely net gain of one seat. For the Democrats to reach 51 seats, then, they'd need to hold their other three open seats (NC, LA, and FL), have their two vulnerable incumbents prevail (Patty Murray and Tom Daschle), and then seize three of the four vulnerable Republican seats (OK, CO, PA, and Alaska). Possible--but not probable.
Hi Richard Henry Morgan.I remember your previous post that is headed as the"Liar".I had a good time with it.
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siva
Richard Henry Morgan -
7/4/2004
That's very gracious of you, Derek, especially since I brought up the Red Sox (red meat territory).
I think a fair summary is that we disagree on the claim to privacy. You apparently (and feel free to correct me if I'm wrong) seem to attach such an absolute value to that claim that it excuses lying about private matters, and believe that one can be forced to lie in such cases.
I see it as analogous to a legal claim of privilege. Certain zones are protected until the claim is waived. A defendant can't testify about communications with his counsel, in his defense, and then claim the privilege again when cross-examined.
Similarly, it looks like Ryan was counting on the court seal, and the associated interests of his child and ex, as a shield to allow him to lie. I'm torn on what the court did. And I'm not comfortable with the idea that Ryan's lie voids the claims for privacy on the part of his ex and child. I think he spoke on the issue of the contents of the sealed files, and waived his claim thereby -- and now we can rest assured that at least one too-smart-by-half liar won't be in office.
I don't understand the theological basis for the church's claim to privacy in the matter of Kerry. And I think when Kerry played his annulment for yucks on Imus, he waived his claim in the matter. Then again, there are many, many politicians out there who availed themselves of the lie more than Kerry. One could do a lot worse than Kerry -- in fact we have.
I just found it passing suspicious that Laurie Goodstein's words about good standing were an exact replication of what Kerry has said on the matter. Since the church doesn't make statements affirming good standing or issue certificates, I can only wonder at her source. Methinks she is just claiming as fact what Kerry asserted. So too with "sought". Perhaps you can understand my suspicion that the Times is "mailining" (to borrow a phrase from Ralph) what Kerry told them off the record -- something he did so he can maintain he won't entertain questions on the matter on the record. Just a suspicion, I grant, but there you have it.
Derek Charles Catsam -
7/4/2004
RHM --
We've reached endgame here not on substance, but on the fact that we are already stalwarts by scrolling this far for this conversation. I'm sure we'll revive these wars agin on a topic easier to find!
I try to be a flinty Granite Stater, but after yet another move, I'm sort of a man without a state. Maybe Texas will have me and accept me as one of their own. Somehow, I doubt it. Which actually is something the contrarian in me likes.
dc
Richard Henry Morgan -
7/4/2004
We're similarly placed, inasmuch as I don't understand what you're talking about. I haven't read the WSJ. I don't take the WSJ. I have no idea what they have written or not written on the subject. I do have free access to the Times. I don't see where I've equated Ryan with Kerry (except to imply they have the same rights). I have no idea where special prosecutors managed their clandestine entrance into this. Perhaps that's an elliptical reference to Clinton and Starr on your part. There's an excellent article by Jeffrey Rosen some years back in the New Yorker, pointing out how Clinton championed the very changes in the Federal Rules of Evidence that Starr used to pursue him -- championed them and signed them into law over the objections of civil libertarians. Then when faced with the consequences that he, Clinton, was only too willing to visit upon everyone else in society, Clinton claimed a license to lie on the grounds that it wasn't anybody's business. If you're looking for hypocrisy you might start there.
One need not answer truthfully, or even not truthfully, when there is an option not to answer at all (which preserves a claim to privacy).
My point -- obviously poorly expressed if your writing is a reaction to it -- is not that Kerry has any obligation to answer at all, but if he does, to answer truthfully (and not plant misleading stuff in sympathetic papers -- if such is the case, as I suspect -- and then claim privacy). Nor is it the paper's business to promulgate a truncated and misleading version of events. If it's none of our business (certainly a defensible position) I should think you would be jumping up and down on the Times. And the bit about Bush's daughters? Where did that come from? Just plain bizarre.
You don't seem to have a grasp of the Ryan case. The judge sealed the case. When approached to open it, he said he would appoint a referee to decide the issue, and abide by that decision. When the referee came back with a recommendation not to unseal the records (a position supported by both Ryan and his ex), the judge (need I say it, a Gray Davis appointee?) then reversed himself and unsealed it, on the basis that the public had a right to know. You should take up your concerns about privacy with the Times (and the person who provided info for the Times), the Tribune, and the judge -- or equally insist that the public has a right to know about Kerry's mess (without equating the messes or the two people). The operative principle seems to be that the public right to know trumps everything, or at least if you're a Repub and the object of curiosity.
I'm not all that familiar with the facts in the Ryan case apart from the legal issues. I'm not sympathetic to the view that he has a right to mislead about the content of the file, and then retreat to a claim of privacy to prevent being found out. He characterized the contents of the files. If he claims its nobody's business, then he has no business saying there is nothing damaging in it. Same goes for Kerry. Perhaps the distinction that people hold firm to is that Kerry has maintained a claim to privacy, in a way Ryan didn't, by refusing to comment on the annulment. Fair enough. Unless of course he's playing the game, with the assistance of the Times, of not commenting on it publicly, while putting out to the public a false and misleading account not under his name.
I hope that's sufficiently non-elliptical. I think where I threw you off is where I said I don't understand how the church can claim privacy on the question of annulment, given that marriage is, by church definition, a public act of grace (without stating or implying that that mandated Kerry talk about it). It would seem also that Kerry, as I've admitted, can somewhat slip through the horns of the Catch-22 dilemma I outlined, by the method I outlined (which I suspect he did) -- I hadn't thought that out too well. I don't doubt he's in good standing with the church now, and from the political standpoint (at the least) the less he says about it now the better. To put it bluntly, I suspect the Times put out a phoney account -- or at least an incomplete account, covered with the vagueness of "sought" to give the impression that Kerry has been in good standing with his church all along. You can check the net. There's an interesting story from April 1997 which has the first Mrs. Kerry saying that Kerry is "now" seeking an annulment -- funny, since the Times had him seeking one in 1988.
Now is it your contention that the supposed "serious" quality of whatever it is Ryan did provides the distinction that allows the papers and the courts to do to him what they won't do to Kerry? Just wondering. Or is it a lie Ryan told that supplies the difference (or is it the lie that is serious)? Or is it, as I suspect, that you hold the view that certain things are so inherently private that talking about them doesn't surrender privacy claims -- that in fact even lying about them doesn't surrender privacy claims? That strikes me as defensible, though a view I don't agree with.
Richard Henry Morgan -
7/4/2004
I think we're talking past each other. I endorse Kerry's silence on the annulment -- it would be hypocritical of him to make a substantive comment on it and claim privacy in not expanding on it and answering questions about it.
I simply suspect he hasn't been silent. In fact, I suspect that he fed the incomplete story to the Times, in order to effect an impression without seeming to breach his own stance of privacy. Of course, I can't know that or prove it. Just a guess. I imagine it's possible (but unlikely) that the Times knows he rather vaguely "sought" an annulment when he divorced, without knowing when he filed for it or when it was granted -- what would be the reliable sources (plural) for the one without the other?
Perhaps somebody will explain to me the Times' principle of privacy such that the fact of his seeking an annulment is of public concern, but somehow the other details aren't. While I wait for an answer, I'll reread the more than 90 stories Howell Raines and the Times devoted to the great moral challenge of our times -- will Martha Burke achieve freedom for women by gaining admission to Augusta National? Certainly trumps slavery in the Sudan, doesn't it?
Cocaine use is illegal, and much more serious. Even more serious than the Gore pot-smoking marathon of the 70's, as detailed by his newspaper friend in Nashville (ah, a charge with a source!). I'm wondering what principle of privacy Bush has violated by not denying it. Seems smart to me. The way the media operates is it floats a rumour without a sufficient basis, the rumour becoming the basis for a question. If the candidate denies the allegation/question, then he has "put it in play", and the media can further report on it as a legitimate story coming out of his denial. I haven't seen any sourcing on any rumour of cocaine use, other than the one I cited, and it fell apart. Kerry is wise to follow suit, even if the one pales in comparison to the other.
And no, I'm not aware the WSJ has the story. And yes, I enjoy jumping up and down on the Times -- mea culpa. I became a convert to this sport after reading their whitewash of the Duranty affair -- you being an historian, you might find it interesting. My only surprise is that Bellesiles hasn't found a job at the Times.
Sling away with the shots. My teams are the Browns (down on their luck lately), and the Liverpool Reds (almost always in the top 5 teams in the EPL). Got my love for both in the 60's. Hated the Yankees in the 60's -- in fact, hated baseball pretty much, with exception of Koufax. I admire the loyalty of Red Sox fans, it's just their infinite capacity for self-pity that annoys me (you're an exception to that -- are you sure you're a member of the Red Sox Nation in good standing?). And yeah, I was wrong about Manny -- he's really quite mediocre as a fielder, not the disaster I thought I had remembered.
You wouldn't have an address where I can get in touch with Manny and Pedro? I'd like to send them each a package of Jerri Curl. Saw their equally entertaining loss to the Braves last night. Seemed obvious to me the ball was foul-tipped off the Atlanta bat, but nobody from the Red Sox complained -- they dropping 'ludes after the extra-inning loss to the Yankees? Your best virtue is you're a Granite-Stater -- no whining in you, Derek.
Derek Charles Catsam -
7/3/2004
I note you continue your slipperiness. Why pick out the times and not the WSJ? Why is Ryan's far more serious offense equatable with Kerry's? Why should special prosecutors have no limit on what they can explore, thus putting people in a position to lie about things that are no one's business in the first place? So if a question is asked one has to answert truthfully/ as for only one allegation of Bush's drug use, i find that curious, but then i also wonder why Bush did not simply deny it. I think I can guess why. And I say that is good -- he should now have had to have answered such questions. but if it is good for the goose, well, you know the rest. If you think Bush came slose to lying, and then you are holding Kerry up on his far less obvious case -- a case you still have not made, and I still don't know precisely what your issue is and how Kerry's marriages are any of your or my damned business. Not one little bit. I'm still not seeing a logical argument here that does not break down on party lines. What I do see is a lot of sanctimonious flatulence about integrity that effectively only runs one way, except when faced with the most obvious and egregious cases, namely Ryan's. I'll give you credit for being a slippery one. And for thinking all sorts of stuff in other people's lives is your business. I'll leave you to your National Enquirer now, sir, as 1987 Mike Tyson is about to knock some poor dude out on ESPN Classic.
dc
Richard Henry Morgan -
7/3/2004
"Interesting silence on the Bush drug question".
I think I addressed that under the assertion that one is not under an obligation to reveal the truth (outside of a legal proceeding), just not to lie.
"Again, why does this private-public divide only rise to the level of Morgan commentary when it only involves Democrats and the NYT?"
Reference my comments on Ryan, above.
Similarly, for DUI's and military service and "drug use". The press has reported allegations on drug use, and provided no evidence. In fact, the only book to claim a source was by an ex-con, writing under a pseudonym, claiming confidential sources, who committed suicide when exposed. Again, perhaps your questions should be addressed to the media. The media (led by Fox) reported on Bush's DUI -- certainly not a private matter, nor something he was obligated to reveal. He did come close to lying about it in an interview in Texas (and some might say, perhaps with some justification, that he did), and shame on him if he did.
I don't see where you get the idea that I don't agree there's a private-public divide. What I don't understand is the media going for sealed records in Ryan's case, and then ex post facto justifying it on the basis of the contradiction they reveal between what he said and what the papers claim, and not going after Kerry's. I also don't understand the church's position that a marriage is a sacrament, a public act of grace, but the later decision to annul a marriage (to, in effect, say that there was no sacrament, and that the people attending were not witnessing a sacrament as the church represented it to be) is somehow a totally private matter. I can understand their motivation, both the church's and Kerry's. It's a little embarrassing to talk about a marriage that lasted 18 years, and produced children, and deny it's existence (embarrassing for both the church and the candidate). Next thing you know, everybody will want one, and then it won't be a special indulgence for sale only to the wealthy and powerful. Look at the bright side -- it generates funds for paying off the victims of the church's sex abuse.
What I also don't understand is the view that claiming a matter private entitles one to lie about it -- or justifies the lie, or excuses it. If it's a private matter, then shut your pie-hole. Don't lie about it, and then make a claim about privacy when revealed as a liar.
I expect more from the Times. That's apparently naive of me. Maybe they can be shamed back into performing journalism.
Derek Charles Catsam -
7/3/2004
So again, the absence of commentaryt from kerry on an annulment that was by any stretch legal is more important than Bush's silences on cocaine use? On DUI? It's fine to be critical. Not so fine to be hypocritical. By the way, since you are jumping up and down on the NYT, surel;y the wall street Journal had this story right a long time ago, and you can cite that as your example of getting it right/ If not, why is the NYT at fault and not the Journal? Oh wait. I think i know that answer.
It's a long season, Richard. the Red Sox are killing me now, but we'll see how it goes in September and October. meanwhile I'll still support my team. And if i need a warm feeling, aside from the 103 degree texas heat, I'll think of the two Super Bowl titles the Pats have brought me in the last three years. remind me of your teams again, by the way? If cheap shots at the Sox are fair, I at least ought to know from whom I am taking the shots.
dc
Derek Charles Catsam -
7/3/2004
Interesting silence on the Bush drug question. I do draw the line between private and public, though the lines are not necessarily fixed. Otherwise how could Reagan have sold himself as a family man (beyond his divorce, for most of his life his kids hated him) or as a religious man (whose shadow never darkened a church door outside of obligatory public displays)? Again, why does this private-public divide only rise to the level of Morgan commentary when it involves Democrats and the NYT? Where the outrage over Bush's hidden DUI's, over the time no one can account for in his military service (even with $10,0000 on the table for anyone who can prove he was there?), over the drug use? And if private versus public conduct does not exist, surely you have harsh words for Bush's own inability to keep his daughters from being public, and at times criminal, spectacles. If it is the principle that you are really worried about, I should suspect that you'll at least acknowledge that it goes both ways, and yet that is not the way that you are playing it.
dc
Richard Henry Morgan -
7/3/2004
"So, no liars in office, even if those lies have to do with effectively privaye conduct?"
Yep, that's about the size of it, particularly because I don't think that those who lie about private conduct are drawing a line of privacy around the conduct. Seems to me that if you lie about something, you're no longer claiming a privacy exception for it.
BTW, the 'liar' in the previous post of mine (above) referred to Ryan. One could make the claim that hypocrisy that involves no explicit assertion doesn't count as a lie. Fair enough. My guess is that Kerry got his annulment after his civil remarriage, and then once again remarried in a church ceremony. That's kosher. It would certainly explain the way the NY Times danced around the subject. In any case, Kerry certainly isn't under any obligation to provide a complete record, only not to lie about it (which it hasn't been demonstrated that he has done). What I do suspect is that the Times has helped muddy the waters. If they did so too with Reagan, then shame on them -- but there's no surprise there -- the Times didn't want a case of Jimmy II (also known as Walter Mondale).
Richard Henry Morgan -
7/3/2004
A nine year "mistake"? Reporting on an issue the candidate refuses to discuss on the record. Any bet that he refused to discuss it with the press on the record, yet fed that "sought" (as opposed to "filed for") to the NY Times off the record? Not unreasonable, given the fact that for the last thirty years he said he resigned from the VVAW at St. Louis, and wasn't at the Kansas City meeting where assassination of the President was discussed -- which we now know ain't true. Fascinating that the NY Times would report (and presumably would know) when he "sought" the annulment, but not report when he filed for it, nor when he received it.
BTW, love the Red Sox.
Derek Charles Catsam -
7/3/2004
My God, Richard. You mean the NYT made a mistake? One that is based on a slippery conception of the terms and chronology of someone's personal life. The mendacity! Must be an agenda there. The NYT was not especially rigorous in pursuing Reagan's unseemly divorce tale. Must be because they are such radical right wingers. Are you really going to hang a case on the thin reed of the chronology of Kerry's annulment? Are you really that unaware of how common a practice it is for folks to try to get annulments when they want to remarry? I'm curious if you are going to become the caped crusader of all matters related to annulment, divorce, adultery, and what you perceive to be naughty, character maligning sexual escapades. You must be loads of fun on a date.
dc
Derek Charles Catsam -
7/3/2004
Richard --
So, no liars in office, even if those lies have to do with effectively private conduct? Then I do hope that as you ask for kerry's divorce records (divorce, or annulment, are both legal, yes?) you'll also ask for a more rigorous investigation into Bush's alleged coke use. Fair being fair and all. And coke being, you know, illegal? because since your definition of "lies' is actually more along the lines of "not coming forward and telling the whole story," and since what you are really about is truth, you want all of the truth, and not just those parts that make your ideological case, right? Of course you do.
dc
Richard Henry Morgan -
6/30/2004
I'd thought you'd direct that question to the NY Times -- after all, they're the ones who reported on it. BTW, Kerry was divorced in 1988, remarried in 1995, and according to all kinds of sources on the web (reliable?), filed for an annulment in 1997 -- two years after he had remarried. Interestingly, there's an article on this very website (HNN) claiming that he filed for an annulment in 1995.
But here's the NY Times" version (from the article cited above):
"Mr. Kerry sought an annulment from the church when he was divorced from his first wife. He later married Teresa Heinz, who is Catholic, and together they regularly attend Sunday Mass and take communion, a sacrament reserved for those in the church's good graces."
Somebody is very wrong here. I'm more interested in the reporting. Want to make a bet that the NY Times is right or wrong on this one, Ralph?
Ralph E. Luker -
6/30/2004
Richard, Why do you believe that the annulment of John Kerry's first marriage, which is exclusively a matter of church business, is a matter for public consumption?
Richard Henry Morgan -
6/30/2004
Came across an April 4, 2004, NY Times article by Laurie Goodstein , claiming that Kerry had "sought" an annulment when he divorced his first wife, and later married Heinz. Other sources on the net make it clear that Kerry didn't file for an annulment until two years AFTER he married Heinz. You don't think the NY Times ("the paper of record") would be carrying water for Kerry, do you?
Richard Henry Morgan -
6/29/2004
I think he's vulnerable on both counts, since I don't want a liar, nor a Clinton in office -- but I repeat myself. I understand that portions of Kerry's proceedings are sealed too. At what point the public interest in not electing a hypocrite trumps the privacy of an annulment can, of course, be argued. People draw lines in different places. Private hypocrisy should enjoy the protections of privacy. Whether publicly taking Communion while in an adulterous state (in the eyes of the Church) is a wholly private matter will certainly be argued.
What I still don't understand is how the performance of a sacrament, intended as an outward public sign of grace, is, well, public, while the determination that the later decision that a sacrament was never truly performed and no marriage ever really existed, is a solely private matter. I can understand the fact that the grounds for such a decision might not be made public, for privacy considerations, but that is a different matter altogether. That no annulment has been granted, as has been alleged, is perhaps even more surprising, inasmuch as the going rate for a politician in Massachusetts is a mere $50,000 -- well within the reach of Kerry, or at least his wife.
Jonathan Dresner -
6/29/2004
Indeed, his tactical judgement is questionable. But he's following the example of the highest leaders of his party, who insist that they aren't doing anything wrong while everything they do is shielded by executive privilege and national security. What will those files tell us, when we open them?
Ralph E. Luker -
6/28/2004
Richard, Your argument tends to confirm my own sense that we ought to draw a clear line of distinction between civil unions as relates to matters of state and marriage as a religious (or, in some traditions, a sacramental) act. It does seem to me that whether Kerry's first marriage was annulled by the church is wholly irrelevant to his fitness for public office; and that, at the _very_ most, papers relating to his civil divorce would be the only thing in which the public might have an interest in having access. Even on the latter, I share Jonathan's skepticism and agree with KC that it was Ryan's apparent coverup that left him vulnerable, not the contents of the divorce papers.
Robert KC Johnson -
6/28/2004
My sense on Ryan getting what he deserved came in his lie to state party leaders about the contents of the file. He could have showed them the file. Or he could have said its contents were none of their business, and that they had no right to be asking about it. But he didn't take either course: he told them there was nothing embarassing (not nothing illegal) in the file, and that the material was related to the custody battle over his son. I agree with the consensus here that the file's contents have nothing to do with Ryan's fitness to serve--and he could have handled it very easily by releasing everything at the start of his campaign, saying there was a contentious divorce, etc. etc. But he made his own choice.
Richard Henry Morgan -
6/28/2004
It's not public in the sense that the people there chose to be there knowing the nature of the activities. I'm not entirely happy that the judge has decided that the public interest outweighs the welfare of the child, and the desire of both parties to keep the papers sealed -- or the ex-wife solo, who has been stalked (of course, that's not how the judge put it). On the other hand, I don't want another Bill Clinton in office. I'm sure looking forward to the messy details on Kerry's divorce, though. It's only right, n'est-ce pas? The public has an interest, right?
As Kerry joked on Imus back in 97:
"Seventy-five percent of all the annulments in the world take place in the United States, and I guess the figure drops to fifty percent if you take out all Massachusetts' politicians."
Of course, it's been said that the annulment was never actually granted, and that Kerry takes Communion while in a state of sin. Kerry refuses to discuss whether or not he was ever granted an annulment -- probably a smart move. If he was, then he got an annulment for a marriage of 18 years that produced two children. If he wasn't, then he's taking Communion in a state of sin. That's some catch, that Catch-22. What I'm trying to figure out is how marriage, a sacrament, a public display of grace, is public, but an annulment of said marriage (just the fact, not the details) is a private matter. But I'm sure some Catholic priest somewhere by jesuitical casuistry can make the argument.
Ralph E. Luker -
6/28/2004
I'm no attorney and am unentitled to legal opinions, but intercourse in front of other people in a "private club" -- which is private only in the sense that one has probably paid a fee for admission at the door -- seems a little public to me.
Jonathan Dresner -
6/28/2004
"Public intercourse"? I haven't seen a lot of the stories. Did he want to do it in the street? I thought private clubs were involved.
If it was illegal behavior, then he's guilty of very bad judgement, but since he didn't actually do anything illegal, it's still a long way from "drop out now" level, in my view.
Ralph E. Luker -
6/28/2004
On the whole, I agree with you, Jonathan, that private sexual practices are irrelevant to qualification for public office. But if her claim is true, there might be an issue of whether he was insisting that she engage with him in an illegal act of public intercourse. Ordinarily, urging violation of law would cast doubt on a candidate's fitness for office, but would you shield this _because_ it is sexual? Why?
Jonathan Dresner -
6/28/2004
I want to take issue with your comment that Ryan "got what he deserved." He may have tried to dissemble, but the "scandal" is so preposterously unrelated to political fitness that his withdrawal strikes me as a failure of society. They were married, they didn't get along sexually (and millions of ST:V fans are screaming at their newspapers "you had Jeri Ryan and it wasn't enough? What were you thinking!") and they got divorced. I can't think of the slightest connection this might have to political fitness. I mean, even Clinton was clearly over the sexual misconduct line in ways that Ryan was not.
Call me consistent, but I really don't think private, legal sexual practices, even if you get divorced because of them, are a political fitness issue.
If they choose not to go after Kerry, it's evidence of liberal bias. If the Trib does go after Kerry it's as wrong and irrelevant as with Ryan's divorce records.
Sealed records- divorce, adoption etc. - should mean sealed. Not " sealed until we'd all like a peek to amuse ourselves"
mark safranski -
6/27/2004
I'm not so sure. The judge in the case thought unsealing the records was a bad idea as well.
Where before Illinois voters had a relatively clear ideological choice between Jack Ryan and Barack Obama two media organizations set out to destroy a viable candidate after having done a similar divorce papers job on Mr. Obama's very wealthy primary opponent.
Mr. Obama is by all accounts a much admired and decent man of fairly far left-wing convictions. so much so that he himself has commented to the Trib regarding a need to temper his positions in order to become an effective senator. Apparently however Mr. Obama will now cruise to an election victory untested by having to seriously defend *any* of his campaign proposals from critical scrutiny.
Some people may cheer that prospect but the last two candidates in Illinois who were given kid-gloves treatment during the campaign by the Trib - Carol Mosley-Braun and George Ryan ( no relation)- turned out to be shady, ineffective, embarrasing one-termers. Ex-Governor Ryan may be on his way to jail and Mosley-Braun is a disgraced laughingstock in Illinois politics.
It's enough for the media to report the scandals that come out through the actions of the players - it's very irritating as a voter in Illinois to have the media decide to try and tip the election to a particular candidate before the voting actually begins.
