Through the anecdotal evidence and inflamed, incoherent spewings of Broadsheet's usual posse of whiny male trolls, apparently.

Are the kind of women who get elected to office AND taken seriously (which rules out Sarah Palin) the sort who are likely to cheat, or be tempted to cheat? I suspect not, because women who in male-dominated fields have to work harder and be better than all the men to be taken seriously enough to succeed--it's the Jackie Robinson syndrome, and so they have to have clear heads and not even consider screwing up. I don't count Helen Chenoweth because she did not have her affair after running for office.

That's why the Lisa Nowak case sent shudders through so many of us: who knows how many male astronauts mess around on the side? But in the rare event that a woman screws up (and screws up spectacularly) she deeply embarrasses us and gives the Brightstars in this world plenty of feces to hurl at us, in spite of statistical evidence to the contrary.

The women who cheat often do so out of boredom and unhappiness and lack of self-esteem, not simply because they can. I'm not trying to excuse that behavior here, but a female politician can't afford to be bored, unhappy, or concerned about her sexual attractiveness, because that part of her brain is occupied, consciously and unconsciously, with a different concern, one that has to do with getting the same amount of respect her male colleagues get.

The bottom line is that we really won't know how women politicians conduct their private lives until they are common enough to no longer serve as lightning rods for judgments about women. Maybe when more women are powerful, more younger men will be attracted to power, and we will indeed see that female politicians are just as susceptible to temptation. But not until then.

to wit: The MEN who cheat often do so out of boredom and unhappiness and lack of self-esteem, not simply because they can.

in other words, their wives ain't doin' it for them...

Or in your case, are outright refusing to do it for them...

Seriously, though. Infidelity in the public eye in the past decade? Clinton? Because he could. Edwards? Because he could. Spitzer? Because he could afford it. Schwarzenegger? Testosterone. Ensign? Temptation and opportunity, most likely.

Well, all right, I see your point. You've got weepy emo Governor Thornbird, here. Enough said. Vitter? Weird fetishes. Craig? Closet gay. Hmm, maybe it's just the liberals (and moderates) who have the massive egos and all the testosterone. Maybe it's conservative men who are secretly tortured and angst-ridden and unhappy and emasculated. Maybe it's those perfectly-coiffed, submissive, nonfeminist Republican Stepford women (Brightstar's favorite kind) who are at fault.

(said tongue-in-cheek, because Jenny Sanford, whatever her politics and religion, has been kicking ass where wives of liberal cheaters have mostly faltered)

I'll be pointing and laughing the whole time.

It's so, so sweet that the author of "Rush Limbaugh Is A Big Fat Idiot" is now a U.S. Senator. Sorry for reiterating the obvious--I'm just savoring it.

("Ronaldus Magnus"? What the hell?)

The entire premise of this argument is stupid.

Most children grow up trying desperately not to be whatever it was their parents were. It's an act of conscious determination to respect your parents' choices and to want to emulate them. Every bit of Palin's behavior has been picked apart on the national stage; her children won't have much choice but to make a critical assessment of her when they get older. (Assuming they're capable of critical reflection later--Bristol apparently demonstrated this capability before her mother and her handlers shut her up.)

I worry more about her using them and then smugly proclaiming that her choices were an unselfish attempt to protect them from big bad straw liberals than about her setting a bad example for them. That's something for which, as they grow older and get a perspective on the whole thing, at least some of them might never forgive her.

Of course John King knew what buttons to push. And of course Bobby Rush took the bait. He always does.

Not surprised at Obama's response, however--very sensible. Let people get this out of their system (the sooner the better, please!) so we can get back to matters of genuine importance. I'm so glad we have an intelligent President with a level head. It's a new experience for me, so I keep marveling at it.

Ordinarily that column is one I just avoid altogether. The "nice upstanding" couples and their perfect wedding just seem so plastic and inhuman. But that particular edition gave me a good feeling.

Then again, I'm not too kindly disposed towards the typical upper-middle-class East Coaster, anyways. Maybe it's time to puncture their little self-encapsulating bubbles.

I don't read so-called "mommy bloggers." They all sound pretty much the same, their kids all look the same, and they're a circular support group that has deluded themselves into thinking that parenting gives them some sort of special insight that makes them better than the rest of us. So really, I find myself unable to care what products they hawk, although I get the feeling that parents in general probably sell out for the sake of convenience and expediency much more than they'd like us to believe. Fine. Glad I'm not one.