{"id":12688,"date":"2007-08-28T11:21:57","date_gmt":"2007-08-28T15:21:57","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com\/archives\/12688.html"},"modified":"2007-08-28T11:21:57","modified_gmt":"2007-08-28T15:21:57","slug":"its-the-hypocrisy-that-people-cant-stand","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/its-the-hypocrisy-that-people-cant-stand\/","title":{"rendered":"‘It’s the hypocrisy that people can’t stand’"},"content":{"rendered":"

When it comes to sex scandals, the past year has been less than kind to conservatives. There’s no reason to go into too many prurient details, but the list isn’t getting any smaller: former Rep. Mark Foley (engaged in explicit IM chats with congressional pages), megachurch evangelist Ted Haggard (lied about being gay), Republican Sen. David Vitter (hired prostitutes), McCain’s Florida co-chair Bob Allen (offered oral sex to an undercover cop), and now, of course, Republican Sen. Larry Craig. These are just the recent ones.<\/p>\n

I saw some far-right blog yesterday complain, pre-emptively, that Dems are going to raise a fuss about all of this, and try to argue that a few isolated examples amount to a rampant sex problem among conservatives. The same blogger argued that Dems will conveniently overlook sex scandals involving Bill Clinton, Gary Hart, Jesse Jackson, Henry Cisneros, and Barney Frank.<\/p>\n

It’s not an entirely unreasonable argument. Neither party has a monopoly on virtue or vice, and while it seems that the right is having an unlucky streak when it comes to sex scandals, I think it’s probably unfair to argue that conservatives’ problems are unique.<\/p>\n

But<\/i>, and you had to know a “but” was coming, the right shouldn’t get let off the hook too<\/i> easy, either.<\/p>\n

If we were to go back over the last few decades and do a tally on which side — left or right — had more high-profile sex scandals, I have a hunch it’d be about even. The difference, however, is that only one side claims the moral high-ground, holds itself out as the arbiter of virtue, is quick to judge moral\/sexual failings in others, and wants desperately to use the power of the state to regulate (and ban) some of the behavior they personally engage in.<\/p>\n

In all sincerity, I couldn’t care less whether Republican senators pay prostitutes or solicit sex in bathrooms. The problem here is broader than that.
\n
\nThe Politico ran this piece<\/a> last month, after the Vitter story broke, but long before the Craig revelations became public.<\/p>\n

Beyond the chortling, however, the Vitter scandal is a small piece of a much more significant development: The demoralized state of the social conservative movement on the brink of the 2008 election.<\/p>\n

“It’s the hypocrisy that people can’t stand,” said Michael Cromartie, a social conservative himself who chaired the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom under President Bush. “It’s not the fact that people are frail and given to sinful behavior. It’s when they try to pretend to be morally upright and end up being self-righteous because they preach one thing and live another.”<\/p>\n

The gulf between the professed values of conservative political leaders and the way some actually conduct their lives has sapped energy from a movement that was a powerful engine for the Republican Party over the past three decades.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

In some ways, this is rather sad. Conservatives are demoralized because their leaders keep getting caught in sex scandals? Perhaps, if they stopped trying to use sex as a culture-war weapon, these revelations wouldn’t be so damaging. Indeed, perhaps if the right would give up on demonizing gays, then men like Craig wouldn’t be forced to go into men’s rooms looking for sex partners in the first place.<\/p>\n

I don’t want the right to feel dispirited because of these scandals; I want them to give up<\/i>. Give up on using gays as a wedge issue. Give up on abstinence-only policies that don’t work. Give up on constitutional amendments regarding personal behavior. Give up on holding up the GOP up as the authority on what should and shouldn’t be allowed in bedrooms.<\/p>\n

Or don’t. Go ahead and continue to embrace hypocrisy. Keep hiding your head in your hands every time a Larry Craig gets caught. Continue to argue that it’s not at all odd that your presidential front-runner is a thrice-married adulterer.<\/p>\n

It’s up to you, my conservative friends.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When it comes to sex scandals, the past year has been less than kind to conservatives. There’s no reason to go into too many prurient details, but the list isn’t getting any smaller: former Rep. Mark Foley (engaged in explicit IM chats with congressional pages), megachurch evangelist Ted Haggard (lied about being gay), Republican Sen. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[617],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12688","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12688","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12688"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12688\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12688"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12688"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevebenen.com\/thecarpetbaggerreport\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12688"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}