"You know, Bart, when I was your age, I pulled a few boners." —Homer Simpson Christopher Lee stood down yesterday as the United States Representative for New York's 26th District. Yes, we all know the litany of jokes. Yes, it's another conservative professional moralist falling from grace for a moral lapse. No, we don't want to argue about whether Mr. Lee was giving a masturbatory or anal-penetration gesture in his shirtless phone picture. His resignation apparently came mere hours after Gawker broke the story. But for a moment, let us pause to look past the usual politics of these macabre episodes. In this scandal we find a much more pressing question. One curiosity that came to the fore in this last election cycle is that many politicians apparently don't know what videotape is. Or audiotape. Or a camera. And so on. That is, when presented with questions about some statement made in the past, a striking number of politicians denied saying whatever they allegedly said, and then found themselves confronted with some record demonstrating that they did, in fact, say what they allegedly said. In and of itself, the behavior seems worrisome. Either the politician is too stupid to figure out that he or she is on record, or else they think people in general are too stupid to find the record, or even think that it exists. Thus we come to Mr. Lee. Less than a month ago, according to the allegation, Rep. Chris Lee responded to a Craigslist advertisement, depicting himself as a thirty-nine year-old, divorced lobbyist. As people are well aware by this time, Mr. Lee is 46, a (now former) congressman, and married with one child. And, of course, the punch line: The woman says she cut off contact when she searched for Lee online and concluded he'd lied about his age, occupation, and marital status. Then she forwarded us the correspondence. (O'Connor) Now, then, let us get this straight. You— • lie about your age • lie about your profession • lie about your marital status • send a ridiculous, shirtless photo of yourself via electronic media —and at what point does it fail to occur to you that— • you might piss off the woman you're communicating with • have left a record that leads straight back to you • you are a celebrity, to speak nothing of being a United States Congressman —and thus could be setting yourself up for some embarrassing unpleasantness? While some have noted Lee's votes defending DADT, or patrolling abortion-related waters—which, according to Gawker, "suggests a certain comfort with publicly scrutinizing others' sex lives"—I don't think the main issue of adultery is as spectacular as the early narrative treats it. That is, it's not like Spitzer, Sanford, Haggard, or other professional moralists who fall from grace. While there is a hint of hypocrisy about it, there isn't so much of a stench. While an AG renting hookers, or a governor spending state money on an affair, or a tireless homophobic campaigner turning out to be "straight with an asterisk", presents a definitive conflict, I think the adultery question really can stay between Lee and his family. What worries me more is the sheer stupidity of the scandal. Okay, we get it. The, "I didn't know the microphone was on," excuse is tired. The, "I didn't say that, even if it's on videotape," excuse is just stupid. But this? How did he not expect this to come back to him? It seems that in the Lee scandal we see a culmination of extreme stupidity we tend to endorse by our apathy. You didn't know the microphone was on? Sure. That and the tax code is too complex, I hear. You didn't really say that? Oh, please. How stupid do you think we are? You sought to cheat on your wife by answering a personal ad from your BlackBerry, sent a shirtless photo of yourself for sex appeal, and lied about who you are when you're actually a celebrity because you don't want the woman you're trying to bed to figure out who you are? What part of this doesn't sound like a recipe for apocalyptic disaster? It's not a question of how stupid you think we are. Rather, how bloody stupid are you? Look, just scratch out that letter after his name for a moment. This guy. A person with this manner of practical outlook. One who abides by this assertion of "logic". Yes, this guy: Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! via The New York Times Seriously? This is what passes muster? This is what we're sending to Congress? I mean, Beltway scandals are a dime a dozen even with inflation. But this is a new standard. I only hope it's a hard one to beat. ____________________ Notes: O'Connor, Maureen. "Married GOP Congressman Sent Sexy Pictures to Craigslist Babe". Gawker. February 9, 2011. Gawker.com. February 10, 2011. http://gawker.com/#!5755071/married-gop-congressman-sent-sexy-pictures-to-craigslist-babe Hernandez, Raymond. "New York Congressman Resigns Over E-Mails". The New York Times. February 10, 2011; page A19. NYTimes.com. February 10, 2011. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/10/us/politics/10lee.html
I understand that senators are the more serious politicians, and that we can end up with any sort of person as representatives. I think the statistics bear this out. The Snopes website says that urban legend emails about criminals in congress don't name names, but here are the names and the crimes (and they're mostly representatives). Ask yourselves, how many people do you personally know who were even charged, never mind convicted, of these sorts of things?
I don't think you will find more intelligent people in the Senate. I think they are all equally lame. I think this speaks to how politicians are selected and elected. Money can buy you a politician...the dumber the better.
Emblematic Stupidity Well, that's the going theory, and rooted somewhat in historical perspectives. I don't contest the numbers; that's a good list you found. Indeed, the Senate is considered the "upper" chamber of our Congress, and the six-year term means it is possible, especially in the modern day, to avoid the apparent phenomenon of Representatives never being able to stop campaigning. But the Senate has long been a laughingstock of its own making. In my youth, we chided the Senate for dwelling on National Bagel Day, and other such frivolous bills. In 2009, Sen. Orrin Hatch told reporters that the College Football Playoffs Act of 2009 would likely pass the Senate if the bill made it that far. And President Obama told Rep. Joe Barton (R-TX), the bill's sponsor, that he would sign it into law if the measure reached his desk. That's right, a federal bill to do away with the BCS. And while I, too, share many football fans' frustrations at the quirks of the Bowl Championship Series, the idea that Congress should mandate the resolution of the college football national championship seems a bit absurd amid the ongoing wars, financial crisis, and other vital chaos consuming the nation. The bill died in the House Committee on Energy and Commerce, under E&C chairman Rep. Henry Waxman, of all people. Hardly redemption for the House in and of itself; I only hope to reinforce my suggestion that the Senate is a laughingstock of its own making. Unfortunately—even from my left-wing perspective—this sort of behavior only reinforces the old denunciation of American decadence. Will Congress fiddle as the nation burns? Perhaps. It's also likely that they'll take up a bill, as the infrastructure rumbles to dust, mandating the difference between a fiddle and a violin, or establishing a bracket-seeding scheme for hog-calling competitions. And the phenomenon goes beyond just Congress. As one who voted for Obama, I might have snorted derisively if he came out and said, of torture and rendition and blatant habeas corpus violations, "I don't see any evidence of a crime to investigate." But what we got was criminals bragging about pulling it off, and the excuse that we won't investigate because it happened in the past. I mean, really—they didn't even try to justify the decision. All they said was that the alleged crimes happened in the past, and we need to move forward instead of looking back. And from shoplifting to DUI to murder, there are thousands of criminals across the nation who would prefer the equality of that standard of justice. It's not just that things are going badly; they're going stupidly bad. Rep. Lee's gobcramming stupidity is emblematic of just how retarded our political system has become. Or so says me.
` "StudLee's" congressional district is just down the road from where I live in the Western Extents of the Soviet Socialist Republik of New York. He was hailed 'round these parts by some who make it their business to note such things as one of these "New Model Politicians" - a businessman elected to office, as opposed to a "career politician". This was, of course, supposed to have meant that he was breath-of-fresh-air-ish-ly free of the disreputable tendencies associated with denizens of DC. oopsie ! The other circumstance concerninng the whole business that strikes me as mighty odd is that Lee is a multi-millionaire, with an estimated net worth of as much as $30 million. With bucks like that, he couldn't hook up with an Emperor's Club gal like our ex-governor did if he wanted some side-action ? Alas... ...we may never know what was goin' on inside 'is 'ead, so to speak. Already here in SSRNY, the focus is shifting to the gaggle of degenerates raising their filthy heads to contemplate a run for his seat in the special election which we presume our beloved Prince Andrew shall soon declare. Meanwhile, enjoy as I am the Bobbette's tune that's become the epitaph for the latest dumbass to Take That Hill... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AQ0eoH4l4us Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!
Among the questions we don't actually need answers to I can only offer two defenses: (1) I needed it for the masturbation joke. (2) Unfortunately, I saw the picture when I picked up the story. And, yes, the blatant stupidity of Lee's chosen course in this intrigues me. So in communicating the story to others, I went with the principle of, "If I had to see it, so do you." I know, cruel. However, I will point out a joke that went over well last night as we were liquoring up before dinner. Start with the masturbation/anal penetration joke. Now then, it's actually true that the vastly prevailing habit among men I've known and witnessed that when making the jagoff gesture they usually make a circle of their thumb and middle finger. The subconscious point of this is to tacitly assert one has satisfactory girth about their inflamed manhood. Yet ... look at Lee's fist. Or, rather, don't. But that's where the anal penetration joke comes in. If it's a masturbatory gesture, what is he saying about his girth?
head vs. wall Gail Collins notes: Aficionados of political sex scandals have been wondering whether he was shoved out the door too fast. We've certainly seen politicians survive scandals worse than trying to score a date while married. I am represented by a congressman who was censured by the House for misdeeds that included not paying his taxes while running the tax committee. I would be absolutely thrilled if the worst thing he'd done over the past few years was misrepresenting his marital status on a BlackBerry. However, it's one thing to be a would-be adulterer and another to be an incredibly stupid would-be adulterer. In his re-election campaign, Lee bragged about his work providing students with instruction on the hazards of having personal conversations on the Internet. Yet he was working under the assumption that the best way to conduct an extramarital social life is to pretend to be a different person online, while using one's real name and photograph. Nobody wants to be represented by a person who has to be reminded of the existence of Google. Upstate New York, Collins reminds, has an interesting recent history, including disgraced former Rep. Eric Massa and defeated gubernatorial candidate Carl Palladino. Predictably, some are encouraging "Porno" Palladino to run for Lee's seat in the upcoming special election. This can only get ... well, more interesting, I guess. Just ... no more shirtless phonecam photos, please. ____________________ Notes: Collins, Gail. "Semi-Naked Came the Congressman". The New York Times. February 12, 2011; page A21. NYTimes.com. February 12, 2011. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/12/opinion/12collins.html
` Some folks 'round these parts contend that our travails could be due to the desecration of a Seneca Indian graveyard. Now, they didn't have "witch doctors", of course, but I suppose one can't expext some New Jack City poltroon to be aware of the rest of the state's history. In reality, the deplorable economy is due to our state gov't. having more guys with the proclivities of Chuck Rangel than Chris Lee in its ranks - though the latter are definitely in there as well. As for the weather - well, at least we ain't got six-foot high mounds of trash rotting away at curbside 'cos our Streets Dept. employees can't pick it up and plow snow at the same time. Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! At any rate - Tonight's Local TV news offered the conjecture that since Lee & family have been sequestered at his father's home in Florida since his "untimely demise", perhaps it was in fact said patriarch who prompted the Congressman to resign post haste in order to spare the family further embarassment. No evidence was given to support this notion, but considering that Lees' wealth is derived from the family business, it could well be as valid as the reports that House Speaker "Boner" effectively dismissed him. I wonder if one of 'em lived at the house down the road from me that had their lawn covered with ten or a dozen regular-sized Paladino campaign signs, and a great sodding Paladino mini-billboard that looked to be about a 6-by-10 footer. Seriously, though - that idea pretty much whipped by like a fart in the wind. Never mind the fact that Mr. "Mad As Hell" ain't interested in running.
Damn. Nice body. He's a butterface. . . er. . . buttisface, but that doesn't work right. Besides that, he's obviously a complete dimwit. Who the HELL thinks they can be a member of Congress and get away with anything for very long? ~String
The minor detail The chest is nice enough, but notice how he's sucking in the flab around his abs. In the end, it's probably still a pretty good body, but there's a difference between showing off one's abs and hiding even a small amount of body fat. It brings to mind an old Simpsons episode when all the men are going on a trip to the Super Bowl. As soon as the women are out of sight, they all stop sucking in their bellies, revealing just how tubby their guts have gotten. Even guys who are in relatively good shape seem to do it. In Lee's case, it's just a minor detail that makes me chuckle.
Plausible deniability. He should have put a mustache on and voila, you can say: he looks like me, but he ain't me!!!
Take a Note: Always remember what channel you're watching Head, meet Wall. You know, I've actually been avoiding the news somewhat of late. I catch a few minutes here and there about the labor fight in Wisconsin. But I'm not sitting there absorbing three hours of MSNBC, and then buring myself in my usual list of news sources online. So it was a little bit dismaying, I suppose, to finish watching a recorded episode of House, M.D., and finding that I had left the television on CNN after catching the Libya update while making coffee. I mean, I much disdain CNN, you know? But MSNBC shows prison fare on weekends, and I don't bother with FNC. So how is it that I just happened to check in as CNN updated the Chris Lee scandal? No, really. Hell, forget it. I'm just whining. Anyway, the latest murmur seems to be that Rep. Lee wasn't exclusively pursuing women for his affairs. Head, meet Wall. ____________________ Notes: Hill, Kashmir. "Christopher Lee Attempted Other Craigslist Encounters". The Not So Private Parts. February 25, 2011. Blogs.Forbes.com. February 26, 2011. http://blogs.forbes.com/kashmirhill...er-lee-attempted-other-craigslist-encounters/
` meh... Lee's already like a tossed away, forgotten old pizza crust 'round these parts. They're all set to replace him with Blondie The Wonder-Broad Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image! aka - State Assemblywoman Jane Corwin Well... ...of course, they have to hold the Special Election & all that...whenever Prince Andrew Cuomo - Governor of the Soviet Socialist Republik of New York - and the mental mendicants of our state legislature get their asses in gear and ammend SSRNY's election law to comply with Federal laws regarding military balloting so said election can be scheduled. Jane is a millionare herself, who has promised to cram her snazzy little hands right down into those deep pockets to buy - I MEAN win "Lothario" Lee's old seat. Matter of fact a "Battle of the Millionares" may well be in the offing, as local industrialist, rich dude, and ex-ex-ex-candidate for the 26th SSRNY Congressional district Jack Davis has declared that he will run yet again for the seat ! Davis ran twice as a Democrat - and lost...then switched to the GOP, lost again - this time to to Lee in the primary, and now states that he will either switch back to the Donkey Cult if they'll have him, or take the endorsement of any party willing to welcome him...and the 3 million dollars he's vowed to spend on the campaign ! Snap it up, Andy Boy ! Let the Games begin !!!
(insert title here) True 'nuff. To the other, though, the original scandal happened to break on a day I was headed out to dinner with some friends for a birthday celebration. The unanimous joke, it seems, as we all chuckled over our drinks, was that at least he was looking for a woman. So much, it seems for that. Regarding Corwin, I have to admit that, for some reason— Amherst businessman Jack Davis tells the Buffalo News he plans to run again even though Republicans have endorsed Corwin. The Democrats say they will nominate a Democrat. (Mroziak) —this paragraph from the article you linked to just slays me. I know, it's a minor detail, but the thought process on that went something like: Interesting. I wonder if he's going to split the ... er ... um ... well, who else would the Democrats nominate? Thought—or lack thereof—in motion. ____________________ Notes: Mroziak, Michael. "Corwin announces but special election will be delayed". WBFO. February 23, 2011. PublicBroadcasting.net. February 26, 2011. http://www.publicbroadcasting.net/w...nnounces.but.special.election.will.be.delayed
hee ! No doubt they meant a "real" Democrat rather than somebody like Davis, who will apparently slap any old label on himself just so long as he can get in the race. Who knows what party he'll end up embracing this time ! I'm betting on the Working Families Party myself.
