*Note: I wrote this post before Anthony Weiner resigned, but didn’t get it posted until now (that’s why it reads like he hadn’t resigned). Such is the plight of a once-a-week (or so) blog.
Part of me can’t believe I’m actually doing this post, but I’d like to do a little compare and contrast exercise. We’re going to look at the sex scandals involving a pair of New York politicians, namely former Congressman Chris Lee, a Republican, and current (though potentially soon-to-be-if-not-already former) Congressman Anthony Weiner, a Democrat. This is not meant to extrapolate some kind of moral high-ground to one party or the other and this isn’t usually what I like to write about, but I think this could actually be an interesting exercise nevertheless. I feel that the two situations are similar enough that they can be reasonably compared to one another.
Lee, a husband and father, sent some pictures to a woman over Craigslist. I’m sure we can find them easily online. The picture was of him flexing shirtless and was fairly benign by internet standards.
Weiner’s also married and they’re expecting their first child. Weiner sent pictures and sexted with several women over Twitter. He also talked to a minor over Twitter, but as of this writing, nothing inappropriate (or illegal) took place there. Weiner had a Lee-like pic of shirtless flexing, but that was the most benign of them. He also had a picture of his underwear-covered guy parts and pictures of him posing suggestively in a towel in the House of Representatives gym.
So two Congressmen from New York got caught sending naughty pics. I think it’s clear that Weiner’s actual conduct was far worse in terms of number of women involved and how far he went. You just can’t seriously make a case otherwise. But, what I find intriguing is how radically different the two situations played out.
Chris Lee resigned within hours of the story breaking, no questions asked. He resigned so quickly that the story of his resignation seemed to hit the wires before we learned why he was resigning. It wasn’t until after we learned of his resignation that the reason why emerged. I found this fascinating.
Weiner, on the other hand, played it very differently. The initial defense was that his account was hacked when the underwear picture was sent. He kept referring to his office’s press releases and was at times fairly combative with the media. Weiner also tried frequently to change the subject in a, “There’s nothing to see here,” sort of way. Then, he changed his approach and started opening up to the media, at which point he said that he didn’t send the pic, but he, “Couldn’t say with certitude,” whether or not the pic was of him. Weiner finally came clean after several days of intense scrutiny and the evidence building against him was too overwhelming to continue his evasion and deception.
It has since been unveiled that he had such correspondences with multiple women and other pictures surfaced, most recently pics of him in the House of Representatives gym. Also, he was talking with a minor from Delaware, but apparently nothing inappropriate and/or illegal took place there. Weiner has now taken a leave of absence from Congress to seek treatment.
We established above that Weiner did far worse than Lee prior to getting caught. We’ve also now established that Lee did very little to cover up his actions and resigned almost instantaneously. It’s possible, but not likely in my view, that we’ll learn that Lee did more than this and he didn’t want it all to come out. By contrast, Weiner has been caught lying repeatedly, engaging in other evasive and/or combative behavior, and has taken a leave of absence from Congress versus resignation.
Note that, in this context, yes Weiner was lying. He was willfully, intentionally, and knowingly making factually false statements to the press. This is simply not one of those cases of a person being sincere without being truthful in which a person makes a factually false statement that s/he believes to be true. Being sincere, but not truthful, is not the same as lying to someone, even though the end result is the same in that the person receiving the message receives factually false information.
Am I the only one who sees a ridiculous double-standard here? Lee came clean and resigned almost immediately because of one shirtless picture, yet Weiner remains in office on a leave of absence after more numerous (and racier) pictures (including a shirtless pic) with more women followed by evasive, combative, and deceptive behavior. Also, note that (for once) I’m not being critical of the media because, from what I’ve seen, I think they generally did a pretty good job being persistent with the Weiner story once it emerged.
We’re thus left to conclude one of two things, or perhaps a combination of them. Either Lee resigned prematurely and should have tried to weather the storm as Weiner is attempting to do, or Weiner should have taken his cue from Lee and resigned by now. Regardless, I find it fascinating to compare and contrast the two somewhat similar situations.
Saturday, June 18, 2011
Saturday, June 11, 2011
Politicians, Sex Scandals, and Privacy
Is it me or does it seem like there are a lot of sex scandals in the news lately? Former California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger fathered a child with one of his workers several years ago and it’s just now come out. We have Dominique Strauss-Khan, the former head of the International Monetary Fund and former potential French presidential candidate from the Socialist party (DSK as the French call him), accused of sexual assault against a hotel worker. We also have comedic gold from Congressman Anthony Weiner (D-NY) who has been sexting over Twitter with several women. Incidentally, Congressman Chris Lee (R-NY) engaged in similar activity over Craigslist earlier this year and has since resigned. Furthermore, there are rumblings about whether the King of Sweden frequents strip clubs. John Edwards is now facing criminal charges stemming from his own sex scandal. And the list goes on.
I don’t really want to discuss the details and my views of each case. After all, you can find those kinds of details very easily. Instead, I’d like to address a different question here, namely what degree of privacy politicians are entitled to regarding personal affairs like these.
I’m conflicted on the question of how much privacy politicians should get. On the one hand, they’re people and as such, they’re bound to have issues like this. The attention and lack of privacy makes them that much harder to deal with, so from an individual perspective, I’m highly sympathetic. It’s hard enough learning that you’ve been cheated on, but when the whole world knows and the media’s grilling you about each excruciating detail, it’s that much worse and makes addressing the problem even harder than it already is. That’s hard on the politician and the politician’s family.
On the other hand, these are also elected officials. These are people that we’re voting for/against. These are the people we’re choosing to represent us in our republic. These are the people who are making the tough decisions. Because of the intense responsibility of public office, we do have a right to know who we’re voting for and who’s representing us. We have the right to know if the elected official has his/her own life in order because whether they do or do not impacts their decision-making. Character matters, and these kinds of things go to character. We can’t hold a politicians mistakes and/or shortcomings against him/her indefinitely unless it’s something truly terrible (the same applies for something good), but we need to know about them.
Here are some examples.
To me, a person who doesn’t have his/her own finances in order likely isn’t as qualified to make decisions regarding the finances of the town/state/nation as someone who does have his/her finances in order. Note there can be valid reasons to have financials in a less than ideal state, but it’s not always the case that there are.
I’d want to know if a politician has anger management issues because it could make him/her more likely to do something rash out of rage (starting a war is an extreme example).
We should know if a politician has a history of drug/alcohol abuse because that can cause all sorts of problems if a relapse occurs, or even worse, if he/she is still secretly abusing. On the flip side, this can also be a positive because the person may be determined to never go back. As with the finances, we need to know the full story.
Knowing that a politician cheats on his/her partner(s) naturally leads to the question, “If a politician has such little regard for the person/people he/she has committed to, how little does the politician think of voters/taxpayers/citizens like the rest of us and myself?”
And here are some positive examples. I include these for completeness and balance, however note that politicians generally aren’t shy about extolling their good sides.
I’d want to know if a politician donated, say a kidney, to save someone’s life. That’s the kind of selflessness we need in our elected officials. In the same light, we should know if a politician sustained serious injuries serving his/her community/state/nation.
Knowing that a politician has a proven track record as a leader and decider is a big deal to voters. Along those lines, voters have the right to know if the politician generally ‘plays it safe’ or likes to ‘take a risk’ because this can influence how someone perceives reward and risk, which is vital to understanding a person’s decision-making. This one can be a good thing or a bad thing depending on the situation because sometimes the truly riskiest thing one can do is to play it safe and sometimes the truly safest thing one can do is to take a risk. Dana Milbank wrote an excellent article about this topic earlier this week that can be found here.
By choosing to seek public office, I think they’re inherently forfeiting a certain degree of their right to privacy. It comes with the territory, but some privacy is needed to deal with difficult issues. There has to be a balance between allowing politicians to deal with these issues in private versus our right as voters to know the politicians we’re voting for/against.
Links:
http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article/574740/201106081800/Pols-Peccadillos-Pale-Vis-A-Vis-Official-Actions.aspx?src=SeeAlso
I don’t really want to discuss the details and my views of each case. After all, you can find those kinds of details very easily. Instead, I’d like to address a different question here, namely what degree of privacy politicians are entitled to regarding personal affairs like these.
I’m conflicted on the question of how much privacy politicians should get. On the one hand, they’re people and as such, they’re bound to have issues like this. The attention and lack of privacy makes them that much harder to deal with, so from an individual perspective, I’m highly sympathetic. It’s hard enough learning that you’ve been cheated on, but when the whole world knows and the media’s grilling you about each excruciating detail, it’s that much worse and makes addressing the problem even harder than it already is. That’s hard on the politician and the politician’s family.
On the other hand, these are also elected officials. These are people that we’re voting for/against. These are the people we’re choosing to represent us in our republic. These are the people who are making the tough decisions. Because of the intense responsibility of public office, we do have a right to know who we’re voting for and who’s representing us. We have the right to know if the elected official has his/her own life in order because whether they do or do not impacts their decision-making. Character matters, and these kinds of things go to character. We can’t hold a politicians mistakes and/or shortcomings against him/her indefinitely unless it’s something truly terrible (the same applies for something good), but we need to know about them.
Here are some examples.
To me, a person who doesn’t have his/her own finances in order likely isn’t as qualified to make decisions regarding the finances of the town/state/nation as someone who does have his/her finances in order. Note there can be valid reasons to have financials in a less than ideal state, but it’s not always the case that there are.
I’d want to know if a politician has anger management issues because it could make him/her more likely to do something rash out of rage (starting a war is an extreme example).
We should know if a politician has a history of drug/alcohol abuse because that can cause all sorts of problems if a relapse occurs, or even worse, if he/she is still secretly abusing. On the flip side, this can also be a positive because the person may be determined to never go back. As with the finances, we need to know the full story.
Knowing that a politician cheats on his/her partner(s) naturally leads to the question, “If a politician has such little regard for the person/people he/she has committed to, how little does the politician think of voters/taxpayers/citizens like the rest of us and myself?”
And here are some positive examples. I include these for completeness and balance, however note that politicians generally aren’t shy about extolling their good sides.
I’d want to know if a politician donated, say a kidney, to save someone’s life. That’s the kind of selflessness we need in our elected officials. In the same light, we should know if a politician sustained serious injuries serving his/her community/state/nation.
Knowing that a politician has a proven track record as a leader and decider is a big deal to voters. Along those lines, voters have the right to know if the politician generally ‘plays it safe’ or likes to ‘take a risk’ because this can influence how someone perceives reward and risk, which is vital to understanding a person’s decision-making. This one can be a good thing or a bad thing depending on the situation because sometimes the truly riskiest thing one can do is to play it safe and sometimes the truly safest thing one can do is to take a risk. Dana Milbank wrote an excellent article about this topic earlier this week that can be found here.
By choosing to seek public office, I think they’re inherently forfeiting a certain degree of their right to privacy. It comes with the territory, but some privacy is needed to deal with difficult issues. There has to be a balance between allowing politicians to deal with these issues in private versus our right as voters to know the politicians we’re voting for/against.
Links:
http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article/574740/201106081800/Pols-Peccadillos-Pale-Vis-A-Vis-Official-Actions.aspx?src=SeeAlso
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)