In Politics, Only the Dull Need Apply
The recent controversy over U.S. Senate candidate Christine O’Donnell’s teenage dabbling with witchcraft illustrates the difficulty in getting good people to run for office.
Power Line and Patterico both proclaimed O’Donnell’s political career over as a result of the incident. If dabbling in the occult as a teenager is enough to permanently damage any potential political career, Republicans could find a shallow pool of potential future candidates. According to a 2006 Barna poll, 73% of teenagers were to one extent or another experimenting in the occult.
One could argue O’Donnell’s great offense was not the dabbling in witchcraft, but talking about it on national television. This is acceptable provided you only want political leaders who have successfully covered up all of their mistakes in preparation for a future run for political office and have lived a closed life full of dishonesty and half-truths.
Dealing with youthful indiscretions is hardly a new issue in politics. President George W. Bush made no effort to hide his rough youth, declaring, “When I was young and irresponsible, I was young and irresponsible.” He chose not to go into grueling details, and this was fine with the American people even though, for eight years, leftist scandalmongers speculated about Bush’s drug and alcohol use. Unfortunately, twenty-first century technology could make this method obsolete.
Thanks to the rise of the Internet and social media, permanent records are creating of all kinds of things a sensible person would not want to exist anywhere, such as drunk pictures on Facebook, a blog post flirting with anarchism or the occult, a tweet celebrating a sexual conquest, or an online diary written during a dark period.
This information can be hidden from the casual searcher, but not highly paid opposition researchers. Potential candidates who care about their families and reputations may forgo running for office to avoid the disclosure of embarrassing details from their past, particularly if Christine O’Donnell’s high school years are lethal.
What we will be left with in politics are a few boy scouts and girl scouts, but mostly power-hungry career politicos who live a clean and boring life out of a desire to fulfill themselves by ruling others. Get ready for the era of the sociopathic narcissist.
This is one of the finest things I’ve ever read in Pajamas Media. Thank you for a fantastic article. I have been struggling with the charges of hypocrisy lately because parts of my life don’t square perfectly with my Baptist faith. Your piece makes it easier for me to make sense of it. I hope she wins in November.
In the controversial videos, Christine has shown that she is articulate and capable of defending a highly unpopular position.
Guess what?
In the Senate, she will have to be articulate and capable of defending a highly unpopular position, namely that we should stop spending like crazy and do something about the entitlement crisis.
Seems to me the videos show her fitness for office, not the reverse.
David
I don’t care that O’Donnell had a brief flirtation with witchcraft. It is telling, however, that she made nearly two dozen appearances on Bill Maher’s “Politically Incorrect.” Was she so stupid that she didn’t realize people weren’t laughing with her, but AT her? Or is she so much of an attention whore that it didn’t matter, just as long as she got her face on TV? Probably both.
Those issues, along with the fact that she has never had a real job, is financially irresponsible, misused campaign funds, and played the victim card in an attempt to win a fat legal settlement makes her a questionable candidate. Throw in the likelihood that she is paranoid and unstable, she moves beyond questionable to downright unfit for public office.
Why won’t she appear on a major news show, to field real questions from a real journalist? It’s very easy and convenient to diss the “lamestream media” and whine about media persecution when you aren’t willing or able to answer the hard questions.
Now, she would be right at home in the House, where loonies like Alan Grayson are allowed to run rampant. But the US Senate is supposed to be the chamber where intelligent and measured judgments are made, where the bills passed by an occasionally unhinged House go to die. Do we really want far-right flakes like Christine O’Donnell in the Senate? She doesn’t represent the thinking of the majority of this country. She doesn’t even represent the majority of the people in Delaware.
Unless Delaware is overrun with former dabblers in witchcraft.
Not all “youthful indiscretions” are created equal, but resorting to the argument that Ms. O’Donnell’s are irrelevant is a distraction from some very legitimate concerns about her character.
MP51 is a liberal hack who makes allegations and then runs away. MP51 gives no facts or even reasons to back up the names and allegations hurled at O’Donnell. For which liberal senator do you work?
You can find the complaint filed by O’Donnell against her employer on the Slate site and other sites. I read it. It has “frivolous lawsuit” written all over it. It also contains some questionalble assertions on her part, which is probably why she withdrew it. You can also read about this and other problems at The Weekly Standard – a conservative publication. It looks like O’Donnell lied on her resume and job applications by claiming to have a degree that she didn’t get until 2010. She has all kinds of money and debt problems too numberous to mention here in detail. No principled conservative would lie about their background or harrass an employer with phony lawsuits or run up uncontrolled debts. How can she say that she is in favor of controlling the national debt or tort reform or honesty in Congress with a straight face? No one is asking for perfect candidates, just people who work hard, pay their bills and are straightforward. Is that too much to ask? Now she is 15 points behind and it looks like we will be stuck with a leftist Democrat in the Senate for six years. Castle (who also is not perfect) would have won and would have voted to repeal Obamacare.
Hey!! the Kennedy’s everything but fly on a broom, yet they were in office decade after decade after…..oh, they were rich..right..’er’ left..
The Weekly Standard is an establishment magazine written by inside the beltway elitists. The truth is that the elites fear O’Donnell because she is not an elite and represents a growing insurgency by the unwashed masses. Even if all the things you sited were true and your interpretation correct, she is still more fit to sit in the Senate than the traitor Castle or her democrat opponent. Since when was Castle ever a principled conservative?
No, I do not believe that Castle would have voted to repeal Obamacare or any of the porkulus/bailout measures that are running the country into bankruptcy and ruin.
I’d rather have a flawed person who at least TRIES to be a conservative, than a RINO who has no idea what it means.
Why should she be on a main stream media show?
She is running for senator in Delaware..no where else.
All the MSM wants to do is tear her down, make fun of her etc so that her opponent gets off scott free. This is not a personality contest.
So what if she rides a broom, her opponent slithers…
Good point about her opponent!
Sounds like she didn’t even practice any witchcraft…she merely was acquainted with various kids who talked about it. Big deal.
All politics is local. She needs to concentrate all of her efforts within her State, and ignore the national media. That’s the way to win!
Both Jimbo and MP51 regularly visit websites to smear O’Donnell. Take their comments in that spirit. I don’t know if they get paid to so it by the Democrats or if they do it as unpaid volunteers. It would be interesting to find out. Anyone out there good at internet tracking?
Looks like you have a problem with facts. Just for the record, I am not a Democrat nor am I paid by them. I have voted Republican/conservative and was a supporter of Reagan long before he won the Presidency. I don’t have a problem with O’Donnell’s stated political views or anything she said/did two decades ago. I have a problem with her electability and her character. Charles Krauthammer, one of America’s finest conservative commentators has voiced the same views as I have. I challenge you to read the 27 page legal brief filed by O’Donnell in 2005. I would also challenge you to check into the other facts about O’Donnell’s financial dealings and the strong evidence that she lied about her background. Please don’t whine about how corrupt the liberals are. We already know that. I just want us to have higher standards for our candidates. If we don’t, our movement is in danger of losing out in these critical times. With Castle, with all his flaws, we actually had a chance of taking over the Senate and repealing Obamacare.
What I don’t understand is, if Christine O’Donnell is such a “bad” pick to be a US Senator, how come the mainstream media didn’t say anything about Al Franken? Think about it. This is a guy who’s only experience in anything was writing jokes for Saturday Night Live, yet when he was running the mainstream media hardly said a word. Yet the Republicans never say anything about this double standard and they never point it out when asked about O’Donnell. The woman seems a lot, and I mean a lot, more impressive than Franken ever looked (or sounded, for that matter) and she seems like a much more serious candidate than Franken. And all of the insane things that Franken has said were said as an adult, NOT when he was in high school. So if you want to win, Republicans, start saying that if Franken sets the bar for what we’re looking for in a candidate for the Senate, then O’Donnell is well above it.
So, the moral of this story is:
Use less sugar and stir like hell..
We don’t mind the noise.
And consider these exclusive facts:
- 73% of teenagers were to one extent or another experimenting in the occult.
- An out-of-wedlock pregnancy is an event nearly every American family has dealt with.
Finally this jewel:
If conservatives can get out of the habit of shooting our own, we may yet avoid the day of the dullard sociopath.
Mr. Graham proceeds to tell us how we think about everything else but, like a good country Baptist preacher he fails to identify who the real culprits amongst ourselves really are/is/were.
Hence,
It looked bad.
It smelled bad.
It tasted bad.
And still we stepped in it.
Yet we’re supposed to pretend we didn’t when its squished in between our toes?
Send in the clowns..
Ready made fish bait for the Democrats and media..
Just heat for 30 seconds and serve.
Do a better job of checking people out before handing them the keys that let them roam freely through your kingdom!
That way we don’t have to waste time defending one of our own, dull or otherwise.
Troll.
Are you talking about Obama?
Not just a troll, but a stupid one. O’Donnell was elected, not selected.
Barney Frank’s boyfriend runs a gay brothel from his basement, Teddy Kennedy can effectively murder a woman and both can enjoy long careers in Washington, safe in their seats and defended by the MSM.
But let Christine O’Donnell admit to being a teenager and the media vultures will descend upon her, totally ignoring the radical leftist views of her opponent and his record of irresponsible spending.
Yup, there just might be a bit of a discrepancy in the media’s coverage of these two candidates. Hopefully, the witchcraft thing will die, but should the MSM revive it, COD could wear a pointed witch’s hat to her next speech, let the crowd collapse in laughter, approach the microphone and say “What?”
May I add, the left was up in arms because G.W. Bush had a history of having BEEN an alcoholic party boy – behavior he stopped long before he ran for office. But Obama is a self-admitted coke-head, with a long history of illegal drug use. To my knowledge, he has never even officially stated that he doesn’t still do that, and yet I hear not a peep from ANYONE on the left about Obama not being fit for office. Of course, I also remember Bill Clinton being an admitted pot user – but the cry on the left became “EVERYBODY does it!!!”
I realize it is old news that there are ridiculous double standards depending on which side of the political aisle you sit. I guess if you vote Democrat, you are tacitly approving of candidates with a history of bad, reckless or even dangerous behavior. In that case, shut the heck up about ANY history of bad behavior on the other side of the aisle. At least the right TRIES to hold their candidates to a higher standard.
Christine is an average person with average experiences from average background. She was placed in position by public process, and if she wins election, placed in office by the people that elected her.
Of course it frightens the power structure.
Obama’s dabbling in drugs, years of active participation in an anti-american church, trips to Pakistan (drug dealing?), ties to the Socialist party in Chicago – all as an adult – are nothing big, but being a goofy teenager makes on unfit for office? Is anyone who has played with a Ouija board is unfit for high office? Watch out Hilary.
Am I remembering correctly that Hillary Clinton was channeling a past first lady while she was in the White House and Bill was committing adultery in the Oval Office?
Good lord TPTB are hypocrites.
It is long past time for the adults to take over the Beltway. The whole thing is a mess. At least O’Donnell would be a reliable vote.
There is a clear double standard here.
sociopathic narcissist..
If you hadn’t noticed that day arrived in November 2008..
Why did she win the primary in Delaware? What is it that the voters there saw in her? At a minimum, you can make the case they were not happy with Castle’s politics. I think it is a mistake for right leaning pols and bloggers to cite years old examples of youthful indiscretion to publically run her down as a dullard and lightweight. I think it is more helpful when left leaners and non-tea party rightists discount her or openly deride her; not understanding they are digging the philisophical ground from under their own feet.
I do not live in Delaware and can’t affect the election, but one of the most telling aspects of her race that get my attention is that media outlets are so busy trashing her past that they practically ignore her opponent. Where is the lesser of two evil’s argument? Where is a side-by-side comparison of their views? These entities still do not get that the political landscape has changed. Perfect.
Mr. Lincoln did you used to sleep with a man in the same bed?
Mr. Lincoln did you run a store that failed financially?
Mr. Lincoln did you represent railroads when you practiced law?
Mr. Lincoln did you ever graduate from high school?
Mr. Lincoln did you ever graduate from law school?
Mr. Lincoln were you sometimes depressed who used to say: “I am now the most miserable man living, if what I feel were equally distributed to the whole human family, there would not be one cheerful face on the earth.”
You, sir, are not fit to run for office.
With Nancy Pelosi as ‘madame’ of the House of Representatives, We the People have a House of ill repute in Washington that we pay for, but get no benefit.
And with her sexual surrogate Harry Reid, in the Senate, it makes our whole legislature look like sexual deviates to the entire world.
To state the obvious: Clinton. Impeachment. The best president the US could have had, impeached by you idiots because he was a normal, horny guy.
Sorry now?
Virtual pornography will not make you a legitimate commenter.
Clinton was NOT a “normal” horny guy. He was freakin’ President! He is supposed to act a bit better when in office out of respect for the office and the people he represents!
He wasn’t impeached for his sexcapades, tawdry as they were. He was impeached for LYING about it UNDER OATH to CONGRESS! High Crimes and Misdemeanors. Even the President cannot lie to Congress, because they have the power to FIRE HIM.
“It’s the economy, Stupid.”
“It’s the lying, Dumbass.”
Wouldn’t you like to be “fired” the way Clinton was. With inflation proof pension, the best medical care for his whole family OUR money can buy, expenses, first class and better transportation, Secret Service protection for his entire family, sinecures in Media, universities, business. The love-ins as “pillar ” of the “elite” claques in New York, Washington and the Blue States, lucrative book contracts, and the lecture circuit.
HE broke the LAW :lying under oath is called perjury in mortals, and punished “pour encourager les autres”. HE, the figure-head of the LAW of the USA.
Some punishment.
Try that if you’re a soldier on the front line who kills a person trying to kill him. Life imprisonment” because those who are the representative of the nation must be held to the highest standards”.
The basis of LAW in the USA is Truthfulness Under Oath. Why the immunity to that standard for THIS President?
Did you say High Crimes and Misdemeanours. Do YOU accept that a President of the US who lies under oath IN A cOURT OF LAW, in a Country of Law, Not of Men, has simply shown disrespect to unfashionable sexual restraints. Get thee to a law school.
One law for the “popular, charming” persons in power, another for thee,me and those “unpopular” with the “elites” In a Country of Law Not of Men?
Do you now understand why WJ Clinton is always laughing, AT US? and the US CONGRESS? who bought his package while he laughed all the way to the bank.
impeached by you idiots because he was a normal, horny guy.
I dunno. I don’t think I’d call that cigar thing normal. And waving your wing-wang at a girl you never met in a hotel conference room? Really! But hey, who am I to judge?
OTOH, when one advocates and campaigns on the institution of laws and policies subjecting certain types of office craziness to federal lawsuits and does not expect those laws and policies to apply to oneself, then one is completely unfit to hold office and should be removed. Agree?
And she’s a-scared of Chris Wallace?
I suppose that the NY Times and Washington Post are still the brass ring for some wannabee journalists. Even if to get there they must write, as their first foot on the ladder of “success”, for “one of those ‘right wing’ blogs”. Hold their noses and think of being in the club of “elites”.
What a poor excuse for a get out of jail free card for the “representatives of the People” who, representing a small cadre only, have for at least the past half century acted to bring about the destruction of America and her people. ALWAYS of course “for social justice” in the service of “fairness and equality”.
The evidence is in and has been for at least 40 years. Their goals were NEVER INTENDED as the promise assumed by their words. THEY ARE POLITICIANS,in the main lawyers. Reasonably informed people are aware from continuing evidence, how much trust to place in their words and promises. Unless watched like hawks and held effectively accountable for ALL their actions that impose on the citizenry, e.g. War on Poverty, Vietnam War,UN, subprime mortages, ACORN, and of course the race and gender ploys.
Don’t these best, brightest, “intelligent” “representatives ” read English, or are they too busy buying, with other peoples’ OUR money their sinecures as royalty?
So smart, so subtle,overwhelmed with their responsibilities that e.g. “WJ Clinton, just a normal horny guy ” with the collusion of his wife AND Congress,, dismiss THE LAW, mock the Office of Presidency as something for those dull dumbos “Those People”, that they “can’t remember” they work under contract to “Those People” : their OATHS to UPHOLD and DEFEND the Constitution of the USA. But don’t ask, don’t tell, if fidelity to their oaths cannot or will not be required, all’s fair.
Those dumbos who elected us were DULL FOOLS to expect ethical, honest, honourable behaviour. Don’t they know it’s politics?
Or maybe we really do “represent the People” who followed the drums and trumpets of brilliant betters. so who are they to complain.