Editor’s note: Michael Ackley’s columns may include satire and parody based on current events, and thus mix fact with fiction. He assumes informed readers will be able to tell the difference.
Surely you heard the voice of the late Tammy Wynette in ghostly echo behind that of Huma Abedin last week, as Abedin stood up for her husband, the disgraced New York mayoral candidate Anthony Weiner.
Weiner, who resigned from Congress after the revelation that he sent women photos of his private parts, was still “sexting” even more flamboyantly more than a year after he stepped down in June of 2011.
So last week we beheld the spectacle of Abedin telling the media, “We discussed all of this before Anthony decided he would run for mayor, so really what I want to say is, I love him, I have forgiven him, I believe in him.”
This was a not-so-ghostly echo of her boss, Hillary R. Clinton, who said virtually the same thing during her husband’s Lewinsky scandal. At least Abedin has the excuse of a Muslim upbringing, with its subjugation of women to the will of their husbands.
The words of Wynette’s signature country song, “Stand by Your Man,” are eerily applicable to Weiner’s creepy behavior:
Sometimes it’s hard to be a woman,
Giving all your love to just one man.
You’ll have bad times
And he’ll have good times
Doing things that you don’t understand.
Certainly it should be hard for any woman (and most sane men) to understand Weiner’s salacious behavior. However, we’d modify Wynette’s refrain for Abedin and the former first lady/secretary of state:
Stand by your man,
though he may be a pervert,
and intervene to di-vert
all his de-vi-ant urges.Stand by your man,
for offices elective,
though he may be defective,
just swallow all the shame you c-a-a-a-a-a-n (hold that note!)
Stand by, yourrrrrrrrr ma-a-aaaan!
Weiner not only is a pervert, he may be a criminal as well. Isn’t it illegal to use a telecommunications device to transmit pornography – i.e., exposing one’s private parts? Doesn’t this amount to indecent exposure?
Further, one must wonder: Is New York City so debauched and debased that it will give a substantial portion of its vote to this creep? That seems to be the case with his fellow lawbreaker, former Gov. Elliot Spitzer. You will recall that Spitzer was forced to resign the governorship after the New York Times revealed he was a patron of high-priced prostitutes. (Such behavior is against the law, right?) Last week polls showed Spitzer was leading the race for NYC controller.
I’m reminded of a passage in David McCullough’s wonderful biography of John Adams. The author details the process by which Abigail Adams and Thomas Jefferson were reconciled, following years of bitter rivalry between Adams and Jefferson. He quotes a letter in which Mrs. Adams says in effect of Jefferson’s presidency, “Have you forgotten the importance of the example you set for our citizens?”
Many of our elected officials and would-be officials have forgotten the importance of the example leaders should set, not only in their administration, but also in their moral behavior.
The Greeks had a word for the government you get when this necessary example is forgotten:
Kakistocracy: government by the worst persons of a society.
I heard a particularly dense TV commentator reiterate the vacuity from the Bill Clinton era, that the scandal was less important than the perpetrator’s competence.
That’s a prescription for kakistocracy, and it’s a lie.
|
|
