What indication do you have that the husband is happier with his new wife?

The fact that he left Finnamore for her is pretty good evidence, don't you think? No offense, but it's far better evidence than your generalized observation about how happy men like this "end up."

It's not even necessarily true that cheating indicates unhappiness in the current relationship.

It doesn't have to be necessarily true in this general way--the ex-husband actually talked to Finnamore about being unhappy.

Someone did a big old study on this recently... what they found was that most cheaters didn't plan to cheat, had no particular dissatisfaction with the spouse, they just ended up in a situation ...

What study was that? Even if it's true as you stated it, which seems unlikely, I don't at all believe that it's the case with most cheaters who actually leave their spouse to be with the person they cheated with, as was the case here. Again, the guy actually talked to Finnamore about his unhappiness, so why is this even in question? Sure, it's possible that he could have lied about being unhappy, but that's not very likely given that he obviously didn't want to be in the marriage anymore.

What bothered me about this interview was that Finnamore seems to think that she was purely good and her ex was purely bad, so much so that she can barely acknowledge his existence. (Maybe her book is more complex, but this interview sure isn't.) It's possible that her ex-husband really was the devil, but it's awfully unlikely, and this black-and-white attitude is undeniably self-serving on her part. It almost always takes two to make a failed marriage, even if one person cheats, but Finnamore is apparently unable to recognize this. She survived her divorce, and she was clearly wronged by her ex, but it doesn't sound like she learned anything from it.

Echoing Mike Molloy: Please put at least one complete post on the first page--just the most recent one would be fine--with the intros to other posts below it. Don't make us click through an extra page unnecessarily.

Echoing Red Leg: Please don't let your posts get lazy as they get more frequent. The blog format tends to encourage half-baked, stream-of-consciousness, tossed-off ideas, but what I like most about your columns is that they combine a casual, in-the-moment style with fully formed--and often well researched--ideas. Don't lose that.

I believe in capitalism. They should profit off of their talents if they want. How is that a left-wing ideal?

That is an inviolable, bedrock ideal of liberalism. It's just not the only one.

Regarding the NCAA, I agree with you.

King, I don't care how many times you have to repeat yourself, keep hammering on this issue whenever you get the chance, because it's a disgrace, and because it's one of the rare issues in sports that actually has a significant impact on the world outside of sports (our colleges and universities, in this case), so it really matters.

A school like the University of Michigan is actually relatively picky about their student athletes, and it's common to hear of a possible recruit there being told that they couldn't pass muster with the admissions office and best of luck to them elsewhere.

No disrespect intended, but are you sure about this, and how do you know? Because it seems awfully unlikely, at least for football and basketball programs as successful as Michigan's, and for any but the most marginal recruits.

Also, to others: King has made some excellent arguments in the past against the idea that big-time college players get "paid" with the opportunity for a free education, noting that if the degree or the education isn't considered valuable by the players themselves (despite what others think), and since it has no value as currency, then it's essentially worthless. Paying someone with something they don't want, have no intention of using, and can't trade or sell is paying them nothing at all.

When 99.9% of these athlete-students have to enter the workforce because they don't go pro in their respective sports, they'll surely value those degrees then.

Maybe they will, maybe they won't. Many of them don't. Potential value is no substitute for actual value, especially when the players don't want it and don't get to choose between the two.

The argument for paying big-time college players isn't an effort to turn everything into bottom-line economics, it's an effort to stop economic exploitation. It's always the unfairly wealthy (the NCAA, in this case) who respond to accusations of unfairness by lamenting "Now why do you have to make everything about money?"

And there are two things wrong with your payment scenario. First, big-time college basketball and football players generate a hell of a lot more revenue than minor-league baseball players do, and so should be paid accordingly. Second, why, after paying the players only 30K a year, would you deny them those other benefits you mentioned, thereby forcing them to pay for the tuition, fees, books, etc. for the education that they don't even want and aren't there to get?

... as though paying them would make them more likely to be undereducated and poor. Whether they get fairly paid and whether they get an education are two different issues; that's the point I'm trying to make. You keep conflating the two.

And should grad students get paid for research that generates revenue beyond the value of their tuition? Answer: Yes.