http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KUnO4gK_56g
Just when you thought our national political conversation could not possibly get more nonsensical or tawdry, Andrew Brightbart jumps into our cultural dumpster to pull out the rotten and moldy remnants of Congressman Anthony Weiner’s twitter sex texting.
Our national political conversation has been hijacked by the bulge in a pair of male underwear. Our economy is flat-lining, we are bogged down in Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya, tyrannical thugs in Syria are butchering their own citizens wholesale, whole European nations are going bankrupt, and mother nature just put a hurting on the heartland; but we are going to ignore all that, and ponder the mysteries of one man’s fruit of the looms.
How did we reach such a state? The immediate answer is all too obvious; right-wingers wanted a Democratic scalp to equalize the one taken from Representative Jack Ryan. That was the oh-so clever man who decided to pimp himself out on Craig’s List. Ever since his bare chested continence was tossed out of the Congress, Republicans have been looking for the big get even.
Thanks to a grubby little internet troll who has made it his business to follow Weiner 24/7, our nation was blessed with the spectacle of the Congressman’s bulging BVDs. Smelling blood, the usual suspects began to pile on. Who’s monster was that in those pants? For shame Congressman! The whole affair has been a big hit of pop culture crack cocaine to the Moron Media. Behold the next bright, shiny object for us to obsess about!
Of course, the good Congressman only fed the flames by denial. He transported himself to his fainting couch declaiming, “ oh my stars and garters, my Twitter has been hacked. I do feel faint ,and must lay down for a spell.” That performance played well until the intended recipient of the Twitter missive spilled the goods. The Congressman’s defenders found themselves with a twelve egg omelet on their faces. Weiner was forced to do the contrition shuffle.
But the world of pain for the Congressman has only begun. The man is about to be fed large amounts of crow. Weiner is about to get paid back for every sharp tongued comment he ever made in pubic; with interest. When will people like him ever learn that is the cover up that gets you every time?
It is definitely the cover up that is allowing the Moron Media and their enablers to get all holier than thou about this. It is definitely the door they can enter to get their voyeurism on. It is nauseating to watch all this hypocritical hand wringing by the usual pundit suspects. You can see the gleam in the eye and the drool forming as the pundit class gets its prurient interests on. People, relax, it’s only sex.
The only person who really needs to engage this issue, other than the Good Congressman, is the Good Congressman’s wife. Only these two adults and perhaps a trained therapist need to dig into the dark desires that drove Weiner to do this reckless behavior.
People so want to make this a morality tale, it is that, but not in the way most are spinning this. Sexual desire is a hideously tangled thing. There is the pure biology of sexual desire, the urge to reproduce that has all the complexity that 3.8 billion years of evolution can provide. Since the beginning it has been a whole lot more than the swapping of some chromosomes. Layer on top of that is the complexity of social expectations. The citizens US are a very weird mix of Puritanism and Prurience. The sexual landscape is littered with cultural land mines.
The thing about these types of land mines is that the more adventurous, or perhaps the more foolish, among us want to explore that forbidden zone. How far can we bend the rules of monogamy? What lines can we bend, sneak across, or ignore, and how long can we get away with it? The false anonymity of the web makes these explorations much more easy, and far more dangerous. In the virtual world no bodily secretions are exchanged, and no real physical contact occurs. One can fool themselves that this is perfectly safe, and only a little risky. One can believe that they are both being faithful, and fooling around at the same time. There has to be some kind of adrenaline rush to an on-line flirtation, to the voyeurism, to the breaking of social norms. The down-side is, of course, getting caught by one’s significant other.
I am not going to try to provide any kind of advice, or counseling for the Good Congressman. I am not a marriage or relationship counselor, nor do I play one on TV. How these two people work out their trust issues is none of my concern. They don’t need me, or any other person, kibitzing about what they should or should not do.
Politically there will be consequences for Congressman Weiner’s indiscretion. The Elephants want his scalp, and are willing to move heaven and earth to get it. In this effort they will be assisted by all the usual suspects that toss in their two cents when a “sex scandal” rears its head. We are about to be inundated by the bloviations of all kinds of sanctimonious twits trying to out-moralize each other. We are about to have an orgy of holier-than-thou posturing. Congressman Weiner is about to be on the receiving end of a plethora of Jeremiads aimed in his direction.
There will be no end of the people showboating their self-righteous indignation toward Anthony Weiner. The hypocrisy meter is about to peg at eleven. The worst offenders will be not the Republicans, though there is plenty of hypocrisy to be had in that camp. The worst of the worst will be those so called Progressives who will climb into high dudgeon, and get their pietistic panties in a bunch. We have already seen some of these Progressives, those of the pundit class, go in to shrill drama queen mode, and spill their guts all over the T.V. The Republic is about to endure yet another bout of operatic chest beating, combined with no perspective, and no compassion. Instead of debating serious matters of policy or governance, we are going to amuse ourselves by going over the ramifications of a middle-aged man posting his bulging tighty whities on the interwebs. It is past Memorial Day, let the silly season begin.
Here is a novel idea, how about we don’t go in for such self-indulgent and juvenile activities? How about we, for once, just this time, act like adults? The Congressman did a really stupid thing. He then lied about doing that really stupid thing. People do stupid things and lie about it all the time. As a matter of fact, nothing makes us do really stupid things quite like sex. It is a field of human endeavor covered with all manner of big, nasty rakes; none of us has escaped stepping on one of those rakes and getting smacked in face.
Sadly, I don’t think we as a nation can rise to the challenge of adult behavior. It is a certainty that our political class cannot. Weiner twisted far too many tails, and its pay back time for every ego the Congressman’s acerbic tongue ever bruised. The long knives are out for Anthony Weiner. Every hack politician, and every self-involved, sanctimonious, Media Ignoramus is going to want their pound of flesh. We the people will gawk and gape at the proceedings; indulging in copious amounts of schadenfreude. We will be massively entertained, but we will not be, in any true way, informed. We will continue to divert ourselves, while the nation slowly devolves in to the dystopia we thought would never happen.
There is a reason the political class treats us like ill-mannered children. It is because we continue to act like ill-mannered children. It is past time to stop acting like ill-mannered children. It is past time we put away childish things and act like adults. We have much more grave matters to contend with than the monster in Anthony Weiner’s pants.
Just when you thought our national political conversation could not possibly get more nonsensical or tawdry, Andrew Brightbart jumps into our cultural dumpster to pull out the rotten and moldy remnants of Congressman Anthony Weiner’s twitter sex texting.
Our national political conversation has been hijacked by the bulge in a pair of male underwear. Our economy is flat-lining, we are bogged down in Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya, tyrannical thugs in Syria are butchering their own citizens wholesale, whole European nations are going bankrupt, and mother nature just put a hurting on the heartland; but we are going to ignore all that, and ponder the mysteries of one man’s fruit of the looms.
How did we reach such a state? The immediate answer is all too obvious; right-wingers wanted a Democratic scalp to equalize the one taken from Representative Jack Ryan. That was the oh-so clever man who decided to pimp himself out on Craig’s List. Ever since his bare chested continence was tossed out of the Congress, Republicans have been looking for the big get even.
Thanks to a grubby little internet troll who has made it his business to follow Weiner 24/7, our nation was blessed with the spectacle of the Congressman’s bulging BVDs. Smelling blood, the usual suspects began to pile on. Who’s monster was that in those pants? For shame Congressman! The whole affair has been a big hit of pop culture crack cocaine to the Moron Media. Behold the next bright, shiny object for us to obsess about!
Of course, the good Congressman only fed the flames by denial. He transported himself to his fainting couch declaiming, “ oh my stars and garters, my Twitter has been hacked. I do feel faint ,and must lay down for a spell.” That performance played well until the intended recipient of the Twitter missive spilled the goods. The Congressman’s defenders found themselves with a twelve egg omelet on their faces. Weiner was forced to do the contrition shuffle.
But the world of pain for the Congressman has only begun. The man is about to be fed large amounts of crow. Weiner is about to get paid back for every sharp tongued comment he ever made in pubic; with interest. When will people like him ever learn that is the cover up that gets you every time?
It is definitely the cover up that is allowing the Moron Media and their enablers to get all holier than thou about this. It is definitely the door they can enter to get their voyeurism on. It is nauseating to watch all this hypocritical hand wringing by the usual pundit suspects. You can see the gleam in the eye and the drool forming as the pundit class gets its prurient interests on. People, relax, it’s only sex.
The only person who really needs to engage this issue, other than the Good Congressman, is the Good Congressman’s wife. Only these two adults and perhaps a trained therapist need to dig into the dark desires that drove Weiner to do this reckless behavior.
People so want to make this a morality tale, it is that, but not in the way most are spinning this. Sexual desire is a hideously tangled thing. There is the pure biology of sexual desire, the urge to reproduce that has all the complexity that 3.8 billion years of evolution can provide. Since the beginning it has been a whole lot more than the swapping of some chromosomes. Layer on top of that is the complexity of social expectations. The citizens US are a very weird mix of Puritanism and Prurience. The sexual landscape is littered with cultural land mines.
The thing about these types of land mines is that the more adventurous, or perhaps the more foolish, among us want to explore that forbidden zone. How far can we bend the rules of monogamy? What lines can we bend, sneak across, or ignore, and how long can we get away with it? The false anonymity of the web makes these explorations much more easy, and far more dangerous. In the virtual world no bodily secretions are exchanged, and no real physical contact occurs. One can fool themselves that this is perfectly safe, and only a little risky. One can believe that they are both being faithful, and fooling around at the same time. There has to be some kind of adrenaline rush to an on-line flirtation, to the voyeurism, to the breaking of social norms. The down-side is, of course, getting caught by one’s significant other.
I am not going to try to provide any kind of advice, or counseling for the Good Congressman. I am not a marriage or relationship counselor, nor do I play one on TV. How these two people work out their trust issues is none of my concern. They don’t need me, or any other person, kibitzing about what they should or should not do.
Politically there will be consequences for Congressman Weiner’s indiscretion. The Elephants want his scalp, and are willing to move heaven and earth to get it. In this effort they will be assisted by all the usual suspects that toss in their two cents when a “sex scandal” rears its head. We are about to be inundated by the bloviations of all kinds of sanctimonious twits trying to out-moralize each other. We are about to have an orgy of holier-than-thou posturing. Congressman Weiner is about to be on the receiving end of a plethora of Jeremiads aimed in his direction.
There will be no end of the people showboating their self-righteous indignation toward Anthony Weiner. The hypocrisy meter is about to peg at eleven. The worst offenders will be not the Republicans, though there is plenty of hypocrisy to be had in that camp. The worst of the worst will be those so called Progressives who will climb into high dudgeon, and get their pietistic panties in a bunch. We have already seen some of these Progressives, those of the pundit class, go in to shrill drama queen mode, and spill their guts all over the T.V. The Republic is about to endure yet another bout of operatic chest beating, combined with no perspective, and no compassion. Instead of debating serious matters of policy or governance, we are going to amuse ourselves by going over the ramifications of a middle-aged man posting his bulging tighty whities on the interwebs. It is past Memorial Day, let the silly season begin.
Here is a novel idea, how about we don’t go in for such self-indulgent and juvenile activities? How about we, for once, just this time, act like adults? The Congressman did a really stupid thing. He then lied about doing that really stupid thing. People do stupid things and lie about it all the time. As a matter of fact, nothing makes us do really stupid things quite like sex. It is a field of human endeavor covered with all manner of big, nasty rakes; none of us has escaped stepping on one of those rakes and getting smacked in face.
Sadly, I don’t think we as a nation can rise to the challenge of adult behavior. It is a certainty that our political class cannot. Weiner twisted far too many tails, and its pay back time for every ego the Congressman’s acerbic tongue ever bruised. The long knives are out for Anthony Weiner. Every hack politician, and every self-involved, sanctimonious, Media Ignoramus is going to want their pound of flesh. We the people will gawk and gape at the proceedings; indulging in copious amounts of schadenfreude. We will be massively entertained, but we will not be, in any true way, informed. We will continue to divert ourselves, while the nation slowly devolves in to the dystopia we thought would never happen.
There is a reason the political class treats us like ill-mannered children. It is because we continue to act like ill-mannered children. It is past time to stop acting like ill-mannered children. It is past time we put away childish things and act like adults. We have much more grave matters to contend with than the monster in Anthony Weiner’s pants.
1 comment:
Sadly, I don’t think we as a nation can rise to the challenge of adult behavior.
Sadly, I see no reason to think you're wrong about this. How much attention has been paid to this, rather than all the issues that actually affect our lives, probably demonstrates that as well as anything.
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