Stand By Your Cad

Earlier this week an ever-so-familiar story broke: a high powered public official got busted for a sexual indiscretion.

I am irked and not by the fact that Eliot Spitzer, now former governor of New York, was involved in some high priced, highly illegal prostitution ring, nor that he spent some time in office seeking to strengthen the prostitution laws he himself ignored. What confuses me is that his wife, Silda Wall Spitzer, remains steadfast and stood by him publicly at his press conference.

Silda Wall Spitzer is not alone. When Jim McGreevey, New Jersey's governor, sexual relationship with a male member of his staff become public, his wife remained stoically by his side for the world to see. In fact, she wrote a lame editorial in the New York Times earlier this week defending Wall Spitzer and herself for standing by their men.

There are countless other women who have stood by their men in similar situations (Sentaor Larry Craig's wife, Hillary Clinton, to name a few) and I want to know why. Why have these women pulled a Tammy Wynette when, if the tables were turned, most men would not stand by their women publicly?

Sure, marriage is about enduring the bad times with the good, but who says you have to do that with cameras in your face?

I cannot imagine how demoralizing, degrading and embarrassing it is to have to learn of your husband's indiscretions and to deal with them (privately). The idea of having to publicly support a man who so obnoxiously violated your marriage seems even more humiliating.

So, why do these women do it? Are they so drunk and addicted to the political power that they're willing to sacrifice their pride? Are they too scared to think of what might happen if they don't publicly support their dirtbag spouse?

Even if these women do want to work to save their marriage, what's wrong with being pissed off with their husband and letting the world know by not being present when he admits his guilt to a room full of reporters? More often than not, his career is already in flush mode at that point and the wife's somber face isn't going to save anything.

Hopefully the next time a scandal like this breaks the politician's wife will forgo Tammy's twangy tune and pull an Aretha and show some R-E-S-P-E-C-T and let the cad suffer on his own.