A Politico reporter on Tuesday badly misrepresented an anecdote about conservative commentator David French’s marriage, and made it sound as if the Iraq War veteran ruled over his wife with an iron fist.
“So when David French was in Iraq, he wouldn’t let his wife e-mail men or use Facebook,” Kevin Robillard said on social media as he linked to a National Review article titled “Avoiding Cain’s Pain.”
The reporter’s remarks, which came after news broke that French is considering a third-party bid for the White House, are not an accurate portrayal of the pundit’s relationship with his wife, Nancy.
The couple wrote in their 2011 book, Home and Away, that they agreed to a series of rules in preparation for his deployment to Iraq. The guidelines, they explained, were meant to help them cope with the emotional and physical strain of being separated.
Here’s how National Review’s Kathryn Jean Lopez characterized the mutual agreement:
Nancy and David French write honestly in their book Home and Away about the strains placed on a marriage when husband and wife are apart — and particularly when the man is in a war zone 8,000 miles away. David heartbreakingly recounts: “Men were coming home on leave to find their wives gone from their houses. Other men were getting the modern equivalent of the ‘Dear John’ letter via Facebook message or e-mail. Some guys discovered wives or girlfriends were pregnant, and still others were finding that their bank accounts had been looted by the very people they most trusted with their financial affairs.”
Before David left for Iraq, he and Nancy put together rules, in a painfully honest conversation about human frailty. There would be no drinking during the year of separation. Nancy would not “have phone conversations with men, or meaningful e-mail exchanges about politics or any other subject.” Nor would she be on Facebook, where “the ghosts of boyfriends past” could contact her. When Nancy innocently started e-mailing about faith with a man associated with a radio show she was on, she told David about it, and he asked her to end the relationship. David knew, with his “stomach clenching,” that “the most intimate conversations a person has are about life and faith” — and that “spiritual and emotional intimacy frequently leads to physical intimacy.”
Separations don’t come only in the army, of course. Business, and politics, frequently require such sacrifices. Washington, D.C., is a city where married individuals — many of them with spouses many states away — frequently find themselves at receptions where temptations can arise. Rules come in handy if we value our vows.
Robillard received some criticism Tuesday for how he characterized the David and Nancy French’s pre-deployment guidelines. The Politico reporter then defended himself on Twitter by saying, “Getting some fair criticism that this is a totally legitimate agreement for a married couple to make. I agree! Still interesting!”
He also cited an anonymous female colleague who reportedly told him she’d be a “huuuge slut” if she “slept with every guy with whom [she] emailed about politics.”
