What do the mostly egocentric sexual escapades of Tiger Woods, former Presidential candidate John Edwards (D), former New York Governor Elliot Spitzer (D), former Florida Congressman Tim Mahoney (D), former Wyoming Senator Larry Craig ®, Nevada Senator John Ensign (R), South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford (R), and musician/performer Prince’s hip replacement surgery – all have in common?
Each situation offers us keen insight into the “human condition” – the weakness that can affect anyone, but seems particularly focused on celebrities and “public figures”.
As we learned during Bubba’s “I never had sexual relations with that woman” soap opera, politics, sports and celebrity – and especially Washington, D.C. – is full of powerful people and readily available sexual partners who seem attracted to them. Anyone wanting to see this at work only need spend some time on Capitol Hill or with a Washington public relations, law or lobby firm.
Do our fatheaded governors, congressmen, senators and other elected politicians have sexual affairs with staffers, lobbyists and the like? Yes, all the time – and, in addition to its official status, Washington, D.C. is the Capitol of “sneaking around” if there ever was one.
Witness the scandal involving Rep. Mahoney’s alleged sexual involvement with a staffer who later sued him for sexual harassment. Nothing out of the ordinary about this on Capitol Hill except that it was Mahoney who ran against and defeated Rep. Mark Foley, R-Fla., who was sending lewd emails to teenaged boys and congressional pages. Mahoney’s campaign against Foley was for a “safer, more moral world”. You bet.
Then there’s the airport bathroom stall “foot tapping” with Sen. Craig and an undercover vice cop; Sen. Ensign’s dalliance with a friend and staffer’s wife; and South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford’s mysterious disappearing act to Argentina to see his mistress — under the guise of walking the Appalachian trail! You couldn’t make this stuff up.
Let’s face it, however, John Edwards has to win some kind of award for his goofy romantic caper, which was almost as dumb as Gary Hart’s escapade in 1987 on the aptly named yacht, Monkey Business.
Now, on to the (real) entertainment world and persistent rumors of Prince’s need for hip replacements: The picture that flashed through my head was of the late and great James Brown doing his famous split during “I feel good” – then having a couple of his on-stage performers help him get back to his feet.
It was all part of the show, of course, but was meant to communicate that, yes, the Godfather of Soul was getting older and might not be able to do the splits much longer — at least be able to get up from them. However, the irony in the Prince hip story is that the man recently turned 50 — as did Madonna by the way — and, if that’s not part of the human condition, I don’t know what is.
But, come on, 50 is nothing – they’re just kids! As for my generation of rockers, I have always just assumed that 65-year-olds’ Mick and Keith will be getting whatever “replacement parts” necessary to keep them on the road for at least the next 20 or so years.
An insightful former boss of mine used to say that “you can’t outsmart the human factor” — and he would say it whenever someone who should have known better did something dumb or just something the rest of us probably should have anticipated. And, in the Army, they say that “ten percent never get the word” to remind themselves that the human factor can never be eliminated.
That’s why Clausewitz called it the “fog of war” — to emphasize that if there is any way to foul something up, it will happen with the first engagement of the enemy. However, it was our little green buddy Pogo who said it best: “I have seen the enemy and it is us”.
Daniel Gallington usually writes about national security.
