[Rembrandt_fan]

Sanctimonious? Nope. I don’t concern myself overmuch with the moral shortcomings of others. We all fall short at one point or another and should, as a general rule, tend our own garden and mind our own business. So no, I don’t want to see the man ‘kneeling in a soccer stadium’ et al, or otherwise further humiliated. I just want to see him out of office. If he can’t be faithful to his wife, then he can’t be trusted in any other aspect of his life, either.

But it is bigger than that. Vitter didn’t just fail his wife, he failed his constituents and his country. While supposedly representing their interests, he placed himself in a position where he could be compromised and blackmailed—presumably even by a hostile foreign power, but more likely by one of the many powerful interest groups active in the Beltway who make it their business to gather dirt on public officials. Knowledge is power, after all.

As an aside, emotional confessions occurring after being caught red-handed are usually not acts of conscience. The term we are looking for here, I think, is ‘damage control’.

[bluefish]

Your blackmail comment is actually a real concern. I will give you that. That is why the Clinton situation was so bad. We really don't know if we had already been blackmailed at one point.

As for: The term we are looking for here, I think, is ‘damage control’.

Perhaps, but the nature of the confession is head and shoulders above that of the typical Dem.

Clinton: "Listent to me real carefully. I did not have sex with that woman."

Kennedy: "The sleeping pills made me do it."

Typical Dem: "I made a mistake"

This Guy: "I sinned. I accept full responsibility."

It really is different and refreshing, don't you think?