I think part of the requirement of being a libertarian is that you have to be very suspect of all politicians.
Let me make this personal. I once deemed it safer to walk home alone after midnight in my not-the-safest neighborhood rather than accept a ride from one of the senators I was hanging out with. I’m always surprised that people place their hopes and dreams in the political class considering how completely corrupt and immoral the group is. I’m sure there are exceptions, but how do you know which ones are the exception, you know?
All of which is to say, we have another sex scandal on our hands! And in a delicious twist, it involves the congressman who was elected to replace Mark Foley after he was embroiled in that famous 2006 sex scandal linked to Congressional pages and IM software (not in that order).
This new scandal hasn’t gotten a lot of media coverage but ABC News has had some coverage. In a blog post that featured the image depicted above, the story mentioned lots of juicy details:
West Palm Beach Congressman Tim Mahoney (D-FL), whose predecessor resigned in the wake of a sex scandal, agreed to a $121,000 payment to a former mistress who worked on his staff and was threatening to sue him, according to current and former members of his staff who have been briefed on the settlement, which involved Mahoney and his campaign committee.
Mahoney, who is married, also promised the woman, Patricia Allen, a $50,000 a year job for two years at the agency that handles his campaign advertising, the staffers said.
The story goes on to note that Democratic leaders are aware of the affair and the settlement. There’s also this:
The affair between Mahoney and Allen began, according to the current and former staffers, in 2006 when Mahoney was campaigning for Congress against Foley, promising “a world that is safer, more moral.”
At the time, Mahoney’s campaign ads featured a picture of him with his wife, Terry, with the line, “Restoring America’s Values Begins at Home.”
The story talks about some of the ethical problems such as the hiring of Allen at taxpayer expense and the phone call he made firing her. Friends say she broke off the affair when she learned he had other extra-marital relationships going on concurrently with theirs. After she was fired, she threatened to sue the Congressman for more than $1 million.
Anyway, this is all very interesting but it’s interesting how the faith and values of the Congressman aren’t mentioned at all. As the reader who sent in the story wrote:
For ABC News to include a Campaign Flyer that lists “Faith and Family” and to never refer to the faith of a congressman accused of an affair seems a little bit negligent.
It would certainly help to know.
It’s also interesting to me the disparity in coverage between Mahoney and Foley. The two situations are different — Foley was inappropriately IMing teenage boys while Mahoney was engaging in extramarital affairs. Foley was hypocritical for sponsoring legislation aimed at protecting adolescents from predators and Mahoney is hypocritical for claiming he would remove the ethical cloud caused by Foley. But when Foley’s tawdry exploits were unveiled two years ago, it was huge news and might have played a role in devastating Republican electoral hopes that year. I really doubt that Mahoney’s sexual indiscretions and pay-offs will register. And I’m curious about why this is. Why do some sex scandals generate so much media coverage and others don’t?
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Comments (10) |
October 15, 2008, at 2:14 pm
“Friends say she broke off the affair when she learned he had other extra-marital relationships going on concurrently with theirs.”
This is the part that always amazes me in such stories: the man is cheating on his wife. He’s breaking his vows. He’s lying and deceiving. Why on earth does the (other) woman expect that he’s going to treat her any more honestly? “Oh, but he promised he’s going to get a divorce!” “Oh, but he loves me!” He’s a self-declared liar and a cheat - and you believe him?
Anyway, as Julian Critchley (a former Conservative M.P. in Britain) said at the time the Tories were hit with press exposé after press exposé of prominent politicians having affairs: “The only safe pleasure for a politician is a bag of boiled sweets”
October 15, 2008, at 2:14 pm
IMHO…When a Repub sins, it is hypocrisy that shows the lie of his earlier self-righteous grandstanding and deserves a little media payback. When a Dem sins, he is just a politician who got caught - hardly news. The difference is who the reporter thinks is “trying to force his religion on us.”
October 15, 2008, at 2:36 pm
Possibly because an adult member of Congress lining up teenage males for “action” as soon as they are legal, triggers some parental circuits even in non-parents that dalliance between (or among) consenting adults doesn’t. Not sure that aspect is a religion ghost.
October 15, 2008, at 2:40 pm
Dave,
I’m not sure what the reason is myself.
But why didn’t the Gerry Studds issue — where he was ACTUALLY having sex with male pages — generate any electoral consequences, then? He was re-elected six times.
October 15, 2008, at 4:17 pm
Easy one, Mollie. Double standard.
October 15, 2008, at 5:52 pm
“I think part of the requirement of being a libertarian is that you have to be very suspect of all politicians.”
Actually, that’s the fundamental underpinning of the American idea about government as laid out in the Constitution.
Two reasons why GOP sex scandals are bigger news than Dem sex scandals:
1. The MSM cares more (see the alleged “hypocrisy” or “self-righteous grandstanding” stuff noted above)
2. GOP voters care more
And of course #2 is a big reason for #1 these days…
October 15, 2008, at 10:35 pm
Be serious. The Foley scandal didn’t break at the tail end of a presidential campaign. Nobody cares about congressmen this year. That may be a sad reflection on either the media or the electorate, but it’s also the obvious answer.
That said, I appreciate Martha’s question about people trusting “the corrupt and immoral political class.” Many years ago, so many that I have forgotten the details, I remember hearing a Washington DC psychiatrist speaking. He (or she? It was that long ago) said something along the lines of, “I can’t tell you who my patients are, of course. But I can tell you that they include many prominent Washingtonians whose names you would recognize. And I can tell you that many of them are so desperately disturbed that I lie awake nights worrying about our country.”
October 16, 2008, at 1:04 am
I don’t see a double standard but history. I’m old enough to remember a wave of Democratic scandals that brought down any number of powerful people from Wilbur Mills on. The Republicans have been the stars of the recent set of scandals taking over from a prior generation of Democrats but unless something changes, in a few years we’ll be again seeing Lord Acton’s law playing out on the Democratic side of the aisle.
I also think Rev. Church’s observation is accurate. There’s a reason bad news is often released Friday afternoon - to try to ensure that it’s ignored because people are not paying attention. If someone’s misdeeds are exposed during a slow news time, CNN and other cable networks will run the scandal endlessly. Now they’re distracted by the economic meltdown and the political campaign and so ignore the current scandal.
October 16, 2008, at 6:41 pm
I agree with Brian L. (#2) and disagree with Jerry (#8).
MSM coverage of Washington sex scandals have focused on hypocracy, as has been discussed at length several times here at GetReligion. This led to the more scornful treatment of Republicans, since they made much about values. Democrats were considered morally questionable to start with, so if they slipped up it was not such a big deal, and besides, they could continue to win re-election from their safe left-leaning districts.
However, this is a case of sure-fire hypocrisy, where the Democratic congressman ran and won a Republican seat by touting values and morals, but the story gets no traction. I believe that it is just more evidence that the MSM is cheerieading for the Democratic Party.
October 17, 2008, at 3:47 pm
Molly (#4), Gerry Studds was so long ago I don’t recall the details. Possibly the media have become more interested in the issue since the church scandals.
Sorry to be so late in replying. My computer was down for a day, and when you miss a day at GR you miss a lot!