Saturday, July 21, 2007

There is sanctity


in a lover’s arms.


And our very democracy is founded on the proposition that there is space as sacred as any Eucharist in any cathedral

inside your very own body and very own mind.



And whatever consensual adults do in the privacy of their homes

is more deserving of the protections of inviolable temple rites than any sack-the- planet-and-burn-the-rubble treachery cooked up by “Traitor Dick” Cheney and his coterie of energy industry Vandals behind closed doors.

I mention these obvious facts because a woman named Wendy Vitter came out a few days ago to stand by her man, “Diaper Dave” Vitter.

Sorry, that’s Conservative Republican Senator from Louisiana “Diaper Dave” Vitter.

You all know the story.

Here is a little bit of what Wendy Vitter said:

On Monday, the senator denied ties to the New Orleans brothel. His wife then stepped to the podium and asked the media to leave her family alone.

"You know, in almost any other marriage, this would have been a private issue between a husband and a wife — very private. Obviously, it is not here," she said. "And now I'm going to speak to you as a mother and I hope you will understand. It's been terribly hard to have the media parked on our front lawn and following us every day."

"And yesterday, the media was camped at our church — at our home, and at our church every day. As David returns to work in Washington, we're going to return to our life here. I would ask you very respectfully to let us continue our summer and our lives as we had planned."

I feel sorry for Wendy Vitter: Don't know a thing about her, but really, how many times have we been witness to a wife having to stand in the shredding spotlight to save her husband’s public career from his private appetites?

She reminds me just a little of one Arianna Huffington, circa 1997: a woman who came into this world as “Arianna Stassinopoulos” and remained thus until she met and married wingnut millionaire, bisexual and utterly empty-suit, Michael Huffington.

Arianna Huffington, who now describes herself as a "former right-winger who has evolved into a compassionate and progressive populist".

Because in the life of every interesting person, there is an arc.

But that is all a matter for future.

Difficult to see. Always in motion is the future.

Back in the here-and-now, this is not about your pervy man and his triflin’ ways, Wendy.

This is about the company he keeps.

The political company he keeps.

The intolerant, braying, Holier-Than-Thou gang he runs with. Bleating Heart Conservatives who are always only too happy to save their beloved Jesusland from the sticky, smartass heathen by dropping the full weight of that shredding, million-watt spotlight into the lives of anyone that doesn’t pass their litmus test of righteousness.

Who feel perfectly at home preemptively invading women’s bodies.

Who have no problem camping out on the doorsteps of family planning clinics and shrieking like howler monkeys as women try to exercise their right to see a physician.

Who applaud when pharmacists deny women access to medicine because Sweet Baby Jebus told ‘em it would make Him cry.

Who delight in following in the footsteps of Segregationists by explicitly telling two consenting, loving adults that they may not marry before the Law because their God sez so.

Who campaign, again and again and with a straight face, as the Party of Personal Responsibility.

Who march under the banner of the Party of God, making their political hay and decimating our precious Republic with their sick, medieval, theocratic idiocy.

Who cheered as they learned their President he had illegally spied on American citizens. Had made torture a matter of national policy. Had burned an active American spy for partisan gain. Had gutted the Department of Justice like a trout. Had run the Great Writ out of town on a rail.

Who spent eight years filled up the daily methadone feedbag of the MSM with every salacious detail – some factual; most just made up out of whole cloth – of Bill Clinton’s days on Earth, and now squeal like perforated swine as they prove, every single day -- by War and by Whore -- to be in a class of hypocrisy so far beyond anything else in the American politics as to be unmeasurable by conventional instruments.

And you get sore that the spotlight is now parked on your front lawn?

Following you every day?

Camped at your church?

At your home?

Kind of horrible being on the boomy end of the artillery people like your husband spend their political lives polishing, isn’t it?

Well welcome to Liberalville, Wendy, and to your brand new bungalow at the corner of Jerry Falwell Boulevard and Newt Gingrich Avenue (formerly the Joe McCarthy Thoroughfare.)

If you get lost, remember, it’s one mile past the Rush Limbaugh on-ramp.

Then over the O’Reilly bridge.

Then a quick right down Ann Coulter Way.

16 comments:

Anonymous said...

I feel sorry for the Vitter family as you do. I am also anti-war (from the beginning as I believed Scott Ritter rather than Dick Cheney.) I am also pro-life and rather religious (Catholic) so it's hard to label me. I think you don't understand the concept of family values/Christianity if you think that Christians are perfect. The family values that conservative Christians preach is an ideal which we hope society can live up to, but knowing it is a difficult thing to do. Is it better for society to try to live up to an ideal or just throw in the towel and live low because it's an easier thing to do?

David Vitter is subject to the same problems and temptations that everyone else is. He realized that what he was doing was wrong and because he loved his family, I presume, he went to Confession (a sacrament) and went to marriage counseling in order to save his marriage. I guess he thought his family was worth saving. I think he should be commended not ridiculed.

If you honestly believe that just about any kind of sex is O.K., then why does his transgression bother you so much? So what, right? Vitter obviously didn't think what he did was right or he would not have gone to Confession well before this story broke.

The social message of Christian conservatives is really more about being selfless than selfish. For those who are more selfish, I can see how that can be a problem.

Regarding associating Vitter's transgressions with Bill Clinton's transgressions: I think what Vitter did can be classified as sin and what Clinton did can be classified as more pathological than sin as it seems more obsessive/compulsive/repetative.

As far as the diaper business frequently associated with Vitter on catty blogs: as a nurse who has taken care of paralyzed patients, it is far more likely that Larry Flynt uses diapers than Vitter. Likewise for homosexuals who are harming their sphincter muscle by engaging in anal intercourse. But why talk about reality when most people use slogans or follow talking points?

Sorry to get serious and sober with you all. Have a good day.

Anonymous said...

anon,
if you don't understand how the stakes change for an elected official who makes his bones by preying on the bigotry that masquerades as morality, if you can give such rank and utter hypocrisy a pass and chalk it up to man's continuing quest for an elusive not to say impossible perfection, then i guess you'll stand for any behavior. bush much?

and you lose further points when you make snide remarks about diapers, flynt and homosexuals in a comment you consider "serious and sober." your comment is merely the work of just another concern troll with a self-regard that would be galling if it weren't quite so ridiculous.

Anonymous said...

It seems to me that the main problem with right-wing "Christians" such as David Vitter -- aside from their utter lack of humility and the non-existent sense of humor -- is that they have forgotten, or have chosen to ignore, two essential precepts of the Christian faith (and many others): Judge not lest ye be judged, and do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

They're really the same idea at heart. For personal gain and worldly glory, Vitter chose to ignore them. I say it's only fair that he gets to experience what it's like on the receiving end of the forces he has manipulated to attack others.

--gravie

Anonymous said...

As Wendy begs for sweet anonymity, for David and herself, someone might remind her of all of David's flaying of anyone indulging in non-biblical-proscribed sex; not to mention the rip job she did on Hillary Clinton, for doing a Tammy Wynette for HER man.

Same old-same old: Wendy thinks that rightwing man-snot is holy water, whereas, joy-juice from librul jizz-hydrants like Bill Clinton, are Satan's tadpoles.

Pssst, Wendy; you can't be a repressed, anal-retentive bible zombie and still give good head. Which might be why David has joined the lineup of our christian sexual gurus who slip off to enjoy all that kinky, juicy, stuff that they want the rest of us to forego.

A big, holy, SLURP! To you and your family. The Clinton's say "hi!".

Anonymous said...

Dear Anon; having hookers put you in diapers is not obsessive/compulsive?

:o) :o) :o)

BTW, Drift's a nicer guy than me. I don't feel sorry for them at all.

How sympathetic was Wendy to Hillary?

I would say not much, since she took her to task for sticking with Bill. And you miss the entire point of this little libido-opera, which is:

This emotionally crippled, neurotic, POWERFUL man (and his wife) who has spent so much time hammering gays and other "sinners, was unable to see, or feel, the nauseating hypocrisy of publicly hounding consenting adults for their sexual activities, while HE was indulging HIS lust in ways that would bring a knowing smile to the face of Old Scratch, himself. (If he exists...)

Vitter is just one more crazed "moralist" who can pick up a bible and beat other people over the head with it, for their "sins" while HE stays the course for a pointless and murderous invasion and occupation of a country which was no threat to us.

The war in Iraq: $400 billion.

Los Angeles diocese settlement to the people who, as children, were abused by Catholic Priests:

660 million.


Seeing yet another right-wing- hypocrit outed for indulging, to the max, in HIS sexuality?

Priceless.

Kimberly said...

You know, I know non-religous people who have more stable and happy marriages (and don't cheat on each other) than religous people. My parents are religous, and unhappy. Some of my friends are in open marriages and extremely happy. Once one stops beating themselves up over wether or not something is a 'sin', life becomes a lot more fun and a lot less stressful. Screw god. My life has been a lot better without him.

Anonymous said...

Well, I went over to Google and typed in:

"Wendy Vitter's comments on Hillary"

I struck it, if not rich, pretty good. :o)

In 2000 she was asked by a Newhouse reporter if her husband was as unfaithful as Livingston, or former President Bill Clinton, would she be as forgiving as Hillary Rodham Clinton?

Give the woman her due, she's not utterly devoid of wit:

"I'm a lot more like Lorena Bobbitt than Hillary. If he does something like that, I'm walking away with one thing, and it's not alimony, trust me."

Me:

"Don't do it, Wendy! Put that boning knife down!"

And, if you guys are really concerned that this have a more or less happy ending, I'm thinking that Drift should pass the collection plate so we could all chip in to help pay for David's No-Doz tab. That's gotta be eatin' him up. :o)

BTW; Vitter is one of the loudest of the repubs pushing for "Abstinence Only" education in our schools. :o)

Anonymous said...

"The harder they come, the harder they fall, ona and all."

- Jimmy Cliff

"Instant Karma's gonna get ya..."

- John Lennon

"As ye sow, so shall ye reap."

- The Bible


Any further questions, Wendy?

Anonymous said...

Then a quick right down Ann Coulter Way.

You don't want to go down on Ann Coulter...............

Malacandra said...

Anon: "Is it better for society to try to live up to an ideal or just throw in the towel and live low because it's an easier thing to do?"

Go, try living up to your ideals. Be my guest. Teach them to your children.

But leave those of us who actually try to live different ideals, such as tolerance, alone.

Let those of us who have compassion for gays and single mothers remove stumbling blocks in their path which were laid there by your righteously indignant strivers for high ideals who then seek our forgiveness when they, without fail, fail.

Don't try to encode those ideals into our civil statures, ideals that you accept wholly on a faith which we may or may not share.

I don't know where in this code of ideals it's taught to "Judge, so that you be not judged".

I don't know where in this code of ideals it's taught to cast the first stone, whether you're without sin or not.

I don't know where in this code of ideals it's taught to proclaim your righteousness in the corners of the streets, that you may be seen of men, so that they will vote for you.

If refraining from that kind of behavior constitutes living low, then I'm throwing my lot in with those folks at the bottom rungs of society. The whores and the poor.

Come to think of it, there's precedent for that.

Anonymous said...

Anon,
I assume you skipped the "he who is without sin let him cast the first stone" part of the Scriptures. Apparently so have Wendy and David Vitter.

Understand that he only has a desk in the Senate due to the same sexual hypocrisy that brought down Livingston et al.

Unknown said...

you lose further points when you make snide remarks about diapers, flynt and homosexuals in a comment you consider "serious and sober." your comment is merely the work of just another concern troll with a self-regard that would be galling if it weren't quite so ridiculous.

I agree with dmg. I also find it telling that Anon expresses concern for the sphincter muscles of gay men, but not for those of the growing number of women (35% according to this survey) who also engage in anal sex.

Anonymous said...

Alright DG, a troll! An anonymous one, but, hey, got to start somewhere. Let's see if it responds to getting intellectually pantsed.

I can hardly wait.

Selah.
CAGary

Anonymous said...

"He realized that what he was doing was wrong and because he loved his family, I presume, he went to Confession (a sacrament) and went to marriage counseling in order to save his marriage. I guess he thought his family was worth saving."
-Sister Anon Concern Troll, Church of the Perpetual Hypocrisy


Here's a little mental exercise forya - Substitute "knappy wrapped ass" for both 'family' and 'marriage' and you'll be much closer to sobriety.

BTW - Somebody shoulda introduced Vitter to Lisa Nowak a long time ago.

and speaking of Sphincters in Space..
I propose a new, umm.. 'experiment'
for all ya'll would-be Ass-to-nauts;

The 'Feynman'

brrrrr...

Anonymous said...

I'd be a little more compassionate if Vitter had had his "Come to Jesus" moment at any time while he was cavorting in dirty diapers or, hell, even now, and demonstrated the slightest bit of empathy for those whose misery he increased.

You know, something along the lines of "Wow! I bet this is how all those other people felt, from the Clintons all the way down. I've got to make amends" or "I can no longer in good conscience go on like this and I hereby resign."

Nope, the fucker's trying to run away from it, bad conscience exposed and *now denied the sexual outlet that was keeping him halfway sane*, straight back to DC to do even more damage.

Pursue the bastard like the Furies riding the Hounds of Tindalos. Make a poster of Diaper Dave and hang it in every Democratic campaign office in the state. Get out every vote like it's a stone to pile on top of Vitter's political hopes forever.

"Mrs. Vitter, ma'am, I think you'd better turn away. You won't want to watch this." "Senator, it's easier if you kneel."

Anonymous said...

bjacques said:
"Pursue the bastard like the Furies riding the Hounds of Tindalos. Make a poster of Diaper Dave and hang it in every Democratic campaign office in the state. Get out every vote like it's a stone to pile on top of Vitter's political hopes forever."

Perfect idea!!