Poor Weiner

Well, it seems another politician has another sex scandal. Often funny and friend of Jon Stewart Congressman Anthony Weiner admitted that he sent a picture of his weiner in his undies to a woman on the Twitter. He says he meant it as a part of a joke, and that he has done other inappropriate things on the interwebs and the phone, both before and after marrying his wife. He also says he has never met any of these women in person, clearly implying that the hyper-flirtation only happened from very long distances.

I think that as far as political sex scandals go, this is really quite ethical, assuming that Congressman Weiner is not still lying. It’s really nothing compared to Eliot Spitzer and his adulterous use of hookers, or Bill Clinton and the jobs he had his interns doing while he was married. As Congressman Winkie, I mean Weiner (sorry, I had to) said, he didn’t break any laws, and he will cooperate fully with an ethics investigation insuring he didn’t break any House rules. He also didn’t make his wife stand there with him while he confessed as some Eliot Spitzers did. He mentioned that his wife understandably thinks he’s an idiot, but is not divorcing his dumb a**.

I’m comfortable making these statements about Congressman Weiner’s relative morality, assuming that he is not still lying, because, like David Letterman, he took full responsibility for his immoral actions; he made a point to state that the woman who was the recipient of his bulging photo is not responsible for this at all, and should never have been dragged into this mini-scandal. His apologies, his remorse, his shame, and his tears seemed sincere to me. Of course, he could be a good actor, or I could be an idiot who feels bad when boys (or anyone) cry and take responsibility for their actions. Conversely, as much as I love Bill Clinton for his politics, his intelligence, and the nice things he does for the world, he is a good example of a disgusting immoral sex-crazed adulterer who tried desperately not to take responsibility for his actions.

Anthony Weiner didn’t admit to his tweet until, I assume, he realized his past inappropriateness was going to be disinterred. According to the NY Times blog, he made his announcement after another bout of inappropriate internet behavior from a month ago was revealed. Nonetheless, less than two weeks of lies followed by a full confession is really rather impressive for a politician.

If you’re sensing that I hold politicians to much, much lower moral standards than I hold normal humans to, you're absolutely right. Thanks to people like Bill Clinton, Eliot Spitzer, and probably millions more, I have learned to assume that all politicians are either evil in some power-hungry way, or are whores. Perhaps the hunger for power facilitates the slutty behavior, since the slutty behavior might simply be another way to gain or use their power. I don’t know if this hunger for power is a pre-existing condition for politicians, or if it’s something that happens after a person has been in politics and the power they are inherently given morally corrupts him…or her I suppose, but we never seem to hear about female politicians being adulterous sluts. Perhaps the direction of the power-politics causality depends on the individual.

Anyway, the point of all this is that while Anthony Weiner’s wife is absolutely correct in saying her husband is dumb, and while he clearly does have some moral issues, if he is not lying, it’s really nothing compared to the real sex scandals out there, and in my mind, it does not and should not affect his ability to do his job well, and to do good things for the world. If the far-more-sexually-immoral Bill Clinton could do it, then the much-more-moral-because-he-accepts-responsibility Anthony Weiner can definitely do it. I’m glad he is not resigning.

(Note: I added the link to Jon Stewart's coverage of this scandal after I published this blog posting.)

UPDATE June 14, 2011
Here's someone else who doesn't want Anthony Weiner to resign, and who also feels bad for the remorseful virtual adulterer.

UPDATE July 14, 2011


On June 16, Anthony Weiner unfortunately resigned.

I’m Still with Coco

UPDATE May 4, 2010: Conan O'Brien had a nice interview on 60 Minutes.

As everyone except me has known for more than a week now, Conan O’Brien will be on TBS this November at 11 P.M. I only found out the other day when the TV mentioned it; I guess that’s what happens when I don’t keep up with the Twitter or Facebook fan pages or the news in general.


As the title of this blog posting clearly states, I am still with Coco, and I think I always will be Team Conan. I heart Conan; he is talented, funny, and smart.

However, I’m not a big fan of this whole TBS thing. That is not to say that I wouldn’t watch Conan on TBS; I will definitely watch Conan wherever he goes. No one seems to know whether Conan chose not to go to Fox or if Fox chose not to reap the long-term benefits of having Conan, but I do think whoever it was who passed on a Conan-Fox relationship made a huge mistake. I’ve read that Fox might have chosen against having Conan in their late-night time slots because of contracts with lucrative syndicated reruns, and I understand why it would probably be better for Fox in the short term to say “no” to Coco. However, as a broadcasting layperson, I would imagine that Conan O’Brien could do for late-night Fox what David Letterman did for late-night CBS. As far as I knew, there was no reason to watch CBS after primetime (during the times when CBS has had good TV happening during primetime) before Letterman got there, but now, CBS is a prime destination during the late-night hours (for my DVR anyway). I firmly believe that Conan would have the same effect for Fox, though the situation is slightly different in that I do occasionally watch those reruns (such as The Simpsons) that I mentioned.

Speaking of those reruns, that is precisely what Conan will be following when he is on TBS. Obviously, that will be a better lead-in than Jay Leno was when Conan was hosting The Tonight Show, but Fox primetime programming (such as House MD) would be vastly better.

Speaking of lead-ins, it’s funny that Team Leno people, such as the author of this thing from Baltimore, recognize that Jay Leno was a horrible lead-in for the late local news, but at the same time, they don’t seem to get that Leno’s horrible lead-in abilities were the obvious and direct cause of Conan’s poor ratings while he was hosting The Tonight Show. That rather dim article praises Leno for leading in the late-night ratings now that he is back not being funny on The Tonight Show (rather than not being funny in primetime), not appearing to realize that The Tonight Show now has the ratings-causing lead-ins that Leno had always enjoyed but Conan’s Tonight Show never did. That article is filled with bizarre oblivion regarding Leno’s detrimental effects on The Tonight Show’s ratings when he was in primetime. Leno is not the ratings leader because of talent, likeability, humor, guests, or any other quality-related characteristics; it is purely because of the primetime programming that serves as the lead-in for the late local news, The Tonight Show, and Late Night. If Leno’s ratings truly did result from any kind of Leno-ness, then his ratings would have would not have sunken so low when he was in primetime, but obviously, The Jay Leno Show’s ratings were painfully low.

Getting back to funny and talented people, Conan O’Brien will do well no matter where he goes. Some have suggested that he can’t compete with The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and The Colbert Report (or Colbert Nation, what the article I just linked to incorrectly called it), but that really doesn’t make sense. The latter shows re-air several times the next day and can be viewed in their entirety online. Additionally, most people have DVRs or other ways to record the TV for later viewing, so people will watch all three shows, as well as Letterman. They will also watch Leno, but only because they will not have changed the channel after Law and Order.

Some people seem to be suggesting that Conan is pulling a Leno (my words, not theirs). The NY Post claims that George Lopez, whose show (Lopez Tonight) Conan will be bumping from 11 P.M. where it currently lives to 12 A.M., was forced to be on Team Conan. This claim has been denied by representatives of George Lopez and TBS. As far as I know, Conan has not responded, however, if this claim is true, I would imagine that it was not Conan who would force George Lopez to support him. If someone really did that, it would presumably be TBS executives. Regarding the Leno-Conan brouhaha, I have argued several times that NBC executives are more to blame than Leno, though a portion of the responsibility does lie on Leno. In this case, regarding the allegedly fake Conan support, there is a good chance that Conan is free from blame. However, regarding the actual moving of George Lopez’s show to a later time, obviously Conan had to be aware of that when he made his deal, and in that sense, one could (and has) argued that he is being Leno-esque. However, there is a vast difference between George Lopez’s show being moved and Conan O’Brien’s Tonight Show being forced to either move or be taken away. The Tonight Show is a television institution, George Lopez’s show is not; the former has been on before midnight for several decades, the latter has not. No offense to George Lopez, but I, and presumably many others, were only vaguely aware that he had a late night show, but everyone knows that The Tonight Show is on, and everyone knew that Conan was the host. Conan is only causing the time-shifting of what I imagine might be a rather unpopular show to a later time; Conan is not causing a firmly established, well-known program to be jolted out of its home, nor is he forcing its host to leave. The situations are very different; Conan is not pushing a popular program into a time slot where it will become less viewed, rather, he is increasing the chances that an unpopular show will likely gain popularity by being on after Conan, that is, by providing a healthy lead-in.

Disliked Worlds Collide

Two links have been sitting in a Word document for almost a month, waiting patiently to be turned into a blog posting. Sadly, those two links were forgotten until now, and now they have lost much if not all of their relevance. However, since I’ve been known to post out-dated things, perhaps it is not too late for these links to shine in one of my joyous blog postings. If you read to the end (before and including the update), you might get a relevant and timely surprise!

If this article is not lying, and I don’t believe it is, then The Tonight Show with Jay Leno falsely portrayed the audience response to Sarah Palin when she was a guest on the show. They replaced the audience's silence and sounds of dismay with canned laughter.

It is rather unfortunate that I’m not terribly surprised that Jay Leno and his people would commit such a vile act of falsely representing an audience’s reaction to create the illusion of comedy, love, and admiration in a vacuum of such things to aid a politician. I expect two types of people above most others to be ethical: comedians and scientists. Did you think I was going to say “politicians”? Really? Why would you think such a bizarre thing? I’ve learned not to expect politicians to have ethics or souls; that way, I avoid a lot of disappointment. Anyhoo, Leno’s (or whoever’s decision it was to edit the audience – since Leno’s name is on The Tonight Show, I will hold him responsible) ethical indiscretion is, in my admittedly strange view, on par with those scientists who screwed with the climate change data a few months ago. Scientists and comedians are people we should be able to trust; when either lies, it truly is a sad day.

Fortunately, in a world of lying Lenos, there are also truth-keepers in the form of satirists. Here, Jon Stewart talks about Palin’s Leno appearance, particularly about her crazy claims that Fox News is "fair and balanced."

As if the evil editing to make Sarah Palin appear more loved or less disliked weren’t enough, The Tonight Show with Jay Leno continues to commit evil acts of duplicitous editing today. The "I’m with Coco/Conan O’Brien" Myface (Facebook) fan page posted this article a few days ago, that tells of a brave and heroic Slash wearing an "I’m with Coco" pin that made a forcibly brief appearance on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. It’s not surprising at all that Leno and his people cannot handle dissent. Somehow, if something like that were to happen on pretty much any other talk show, the host would go ahead and make jokes about it, because that’s what funny hosts do. Unfortunately, Jay Leno continues to not be the funny talk show host that I know he could be. Of course, the other talk show hosts I allude to would probably not find themselves in such situations, for most if not all of them would not have done what Leno did.

UPDATE April 11, 2010

These disliked worlds collided s’more on SNL; The Tonight Show with Jay Leno will be featured on The Sarah Palin Network.

Three Things that Irritated Me about Leno’s Oprah Appearance

Everyone seems to be upset with Jay Leno (I mean more than they were before) because when he was on Oprah on January 28, he admitted to lying. He explained that he told a white lie in 2004 when he said he would be retiring in 2009.

This lie isn’t what bothered me. I don’t think I really expected Jay to retire – I only expected him to move on from The Tonight Show. When celebrities say they’re retiring, I generally don’t believe them; I actually share Jay’s view on this, where he told Oprah that while he believes that Oprah believes she will be “retiring,” he doesn’t believe she actually will. Of course she explained to Jay that she has not said she’ll be retiring, rather she is just leaving her show, but the point Jay was making about celebrities in general is the view I share with him.

What did bother me – what drove me insane actually – was the following three things:

1) Leno, as usual and as expected played the victim; he did not take any responsibility for what he did. He refused to accept that he had anything to do with killing Conan’s dream. He blamed the network (as he should), and he blamed the low ratings of The Tonight Show with Conan O'Brien. However, he couldn’t admit that he had anything to do with Conan leaving The Tonight Show. He didn’t seem to have any awareness that Conan’s ratings were low most likely as a direct result of the low ratings of The Jay Leno Show, as well as the very existence of Jay’s 10 p.m. show. As many have stated, when Leno hosted The Tonight Show, he had dramas such as Law and Order as his lead-in before the local news – shows that, as David Letterman said, keeps people staring at their TVs for days. Conan didn’t have that; Conan had as his lead-in the low-rated Jay Leno Show whose low ratings almost caused the NBC affiliates to revolt. If NBC didn’t have to remove Jay from 10 p.m., and if Jay had chosen to leave NBC, as one would have expected him to, NBC would never have put Leno back at 11:35 p.m. either to push back The Tonight Show to 12:05 a.m. or to remove Conan from The Tonight Show. Without The Jay Leno Show, The Tonight Show with Conan O’Brien would have had better ratings and therefore would have remained on the air. In fact, even if for some other reason (such as the fact that it was a transition or the increased ratings Letterman got from his scandal) Conan’s ratings hadn’t been good enough, his Tonight Show still would have remained on the air. After all, Leno’s ratings weren’t good for his first three years on The Tonight Show, but NBC kept him on the air. Which brings me to…

2) Leno told Oprah that Conan has been removed because of Conan’s poor ratings. He also claimed that this was the first year in The Tonight Show’s 60-year history where it would lose money. However, if losing money translates to poor ratings, then Jay seems to have forgotten about his first three years on The Tonight Show, where he had poor ratings. No one watched Jay’s Tonight Show until Hugh Grant kindly granted him an interview (that was previously scheduled) after being arrested for prostitution usage. Three years of bad ratings, and NBC didn’t cancel Leno’s Tonight Show. Yet Leno seems to really believe that NBC is canceling Conan’s Tonight Show after seven months of bad ratings. It just doesn’t make sense. (Yes, I do realize NBC cancelled Leno’s 10 p.m. show after five months because of bad ratings, but that is only because of the damage he was doing to their affiliates. When Jay had bad ratings on The Tonight Show, I don’t believe it was affecting the affiliates in such a way.)

3) Jay whined to Oprah about Jimmy Kimmel’s alleged “sucker punch,” where Kimmel made a joke about the Conan-Jay brouhaha. Of course, as Jimmy explained, he thought that since Jay used to be a comedian, he could handle a joke made about him, and go with it, rather than continuing to robotically read cue cards and later rat Kimmel out to Oprah. So Jay whined about Kimmel making a timely and relevant joke about him, yet Jay felt there was nothing wrong with his own “joke” about Letterman, which, really, was a sucker punch…to Dave’s wife. Jay’s joke was in response to Dave’s relentless and hilarious Leno jokes and discussions since this began, and Jay felt that one joke in response to Letterman was sufficient. But Jay’s joke was personal, it was more hurtful to Dave’s wife than to Dave (I would think), it was not timely since the tale of Dave’s infidelity is no longer a current topic at all, and, most importantly, no one found it funny. I didn’t fid it funny, the audience responded with “Oooo”s, and Oprah made it clear that she did not find it funny, and that she felt the joke was beneath Jay. But Jay thought it was funny.

Maybe that’s the problem: Maybe Jay isn’t funny anymore because he just doesn’t know what is funny anymore.

Double Standards

Tiger Woods and his wife (Elin Nordegren) have provided a real-life alleged example demonstrating the point that I made in a previous blog posting, when the former appeared to have been scratched and beaten with a golf club by the latter before and/or after an alleged car accident, allegedly resulting from an alleged argument between them regarding Woods’ alleged adulterous affairs. The alleged domestic violence portion of all this was denied by Tiger Woods, and dropped quickly by the Florida Highway Patrol, according to this article from The Examiner.

Ironically, Chris Brown (of all people) actually made a nice point (see the Examiner link above) regarding the double standard in our society that I delineate in my discussion of Pink’s lyrics in the above-mentioned blog posting. Our society seems to be significantly less harsh on female perpetrators of domestic violence than male ones. If this situation were reversed, would an investigation of Tiger Woods’ hypothetical alleged violence toward his wife end so quickly? Would the world be so focused on Elin Nordegren’s hypothetical alleged affairs, or would the world be unwaveringly focused on the domestic violence?

Regarding Woods’ affairs, as I’ve said regarding David Letterman’s affairs, it isn’t our business. It is unquestionably wrong, but it is not our business. If Elin Nordegren did assault Woods, that is the real issue. As immoral and despicable as adultery is, assault, even for the sake of vengeance, is far more immoral and criminal. The infidelity of a celebrity is not our business, particularly when that celebrity has spent his public life protecting his and his family’s privacy. If his wife did assault him, he is a victim; if he were a woman, more people might recognize that, and perhaps the investigation into whether domestic violence occurred might have at least appeared more thorough, or might have taken longer than four days to be completed.

If the situation were reversed, the investigation would not have ended so quickly, and people wouldn’t be so focused on the wife’s hypothetical alleged affairs. The world would be making proclamations of “so what if she had affairs, that doesn’t excuse violence against her.” The same should be true in this alleged situation.

Fox News Creates Britney Controversy (EXPLICIT LANGUAGE)

(Originally written as an email on March 29, 2009)

The following contains explicit and/or suggestive language, references to illegal drugs, and may contain animated nudity. Viewer discretion is advised.

I think this is funny....You know that Britney Spears song "If U Seek Amy"? I learned yesterday from the VH1 Top 20 and from Fox News that it's meant to be "IF u see ka(y) me" --> "F * C K Me." (That’s right -- I’m censoring the explicit language even though I warned you about it.)

It's rather funny that Fox News brought my attention to this, because I certainly wouldn't have noticed and when they did bring it to my attention, I had to think about it to get it. The people on Fox News didn't notice it either until it was brought to their attention, and they also had to think about it to get it.

If it takes these presumably intelligent adults on the TV and a slowly sharp-witted linguistics major like myself so much effort and attention-bringing to get it, why would they think innocent kids will get it? They actually say on there that kids are more savvy and will get it...I feel like that's not true, I think the innocent kids and innocent teens wouldn't get it, but the slutty teenagers who are already screwing each other or the kids who are already familiar with the cursed and evil f-word might get it, maybe.

I think it's pretty stupid for them to bring so much attention to it, since they're defeating their own purpose really. Furthermore, I think it's stupid to complain about this song's cryptically and barely verbalized explicit language rather than its slutty messages -- I mean, if they're going to complain about something.

Also, if they are complaining about the slutty messages, then they should complain about countless other things too -- things that are a lot more explicit than that -- because those are a lot less cryptic. It's also funny how they don't even mention what I think is an explicit drug reference, where Britney sings, "Is she smoking up outside?" Doesn't "smoking up" refer specifically to smoking the weed? In my day it did. That seems a lot more wrong to me.

Regarding my not getting of the F-*-C-K Me thing, I did actually sense that there was something sexual in the phrase "if you seek Amy," I just couldn't figure out what it was. I definitely noticed the weird/wrong grammar of "All of the boys and all of the girls are begging to if you seek Amy."

It really is pretty funny, once you get what she's saying, particularly the whole big section where she says "If you seek Amy tonight" repeatedly.

Anyhoo, I really don’t think kids would get it, and if they do get what the word is, I think there are far worse things they could hear. Regardless, I think it’s a great song.

While on the topic of music and lyrics, but otherwise completely unrelated, I think that Katy Perry and the man from Hinder should marry each other....They both sing about still being in love with an ex when they're with someone new ("Thinking of You" and "Lips of an Angel").

I hope you're not disappointed in the lack of animated nudity...I said this "may" contain it, like the disclaimers all the fox cartoons had for a while after that whole brouhaha Janet Jackson’s booby caused.

(On April 16, 2009, I wrote another related email)

Omfg! I f'ing heard “If U Seek Amy” on the (FM/terrestrial) radio, and they f'ing bleeped the "If U Seek Amy" part!!! Holy mother-f'ing sh*t, how the f are they bleeping the cryptically encoded cursing, but not bleeping the very obvious and clear drug reference, "Is she smoking up outside"?! That is so f'ing f'd up!

So it's wrong to publicly broadcast a barely understandable curse word, but it's perfectly okay to make smoking weed sound cool? I mean, the whole song is overtly and non-cryptically about how awesome Amy is, and the song suggests that Amy smokes weed, so obviously it's really cool to smoke the marijuana. You know that's how stupid kids (and stupid adults) will think. (Yes, I am suggesting that people who think it’s cool to do drugs are stupid.)

Furthermore, how the h*ll is it okay for that Christina wannabe Lady Gaga to sing (in "Just Dance") all about being so drunk on red wine that she doesn't know where she is or how her shirt got turned inside out? So the FCC apparently thinks it's good to encourage stupid kids to smoke the weed and get drunk enough to be date raped, right? But it's not okay to creatively and cryptically spell a profane word, so cryptically in fact, that reasonably intelligent adults don't get it even when it's brought to our attention, because even then we have to really think about it to get it. Britney is essentially censoring herself; it’s excessive for the radio to further censor her. Ironically, bleeping it really just draws attention to the profanity; it draws as much attention as Fox News complaining about it does.

Grr, this makes me so angry. I should smoke weed and get drunk and then tell people to if you seek Amy, because that's what the radio told me to do, and Britney, Amy, and Wannabe Christina are cool and I want to be just like them.

F*ck!

[It should be noted: I have never, nor will I ever part-take in any illegal drug use.]

[Please see my next blog posting about Lady Gaga and why I was wrong about her regarding my statements implying that she is a wannabe Christina Aguilera.]

Comedians' Reactions to Letterman Scandal

After October 1, when David Letterman told the story of the alleged attempted extortion involving his affairs with women who worked for him, I wondered how his fellow comedians would react.

This blog from The Huffington Post and this article from the AP tell of what other comedians have been saying about Dave as of the weekend after his confession. It seems most are being easy on him or not talking about it at all. Jay Leno (The Jay Leno Show), Jimmy Fallon (Late Night), Seth Meyers (Saturday Night Live), and Craig Ferguson (The Late Late Show) have made jokes and comments about Dave’s scandal, but none of them were mean about it (towards Dave, that is; some were rightfully mean toward Robert "Joe" Halderman, the alleged blackmailer), which makes me happy.

In the week since Dave’s confession, Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert didn’t say a word about Letterman on The Daily Show and The Colbert Report, so they're with Conan O’Brien (The Tonight Show) and Jimmy Kimmel (Jimmy Kimmel Live!) in not talking about it, which also makes me happy.

I was very interested to know what Howard Stern thinks about Dave’s scandal.

If you read this article from The Examiner, you would think Howard Stern was hateful, and it almost sounds like Howard was screaming about how horrible Dave is. The article doesn’t misquote Howard, but it takes his statements out of context. If I hadn’t heard Howard myself and if I had only read that article, I would seriously hate Howard, and I’m a fan of Howard.

Since I did hear Howard talking about Dave, I can continue to love Howard (and Dave). As I expected and hoped for from Howard, he was completely honest about his thoughts about the situation. He made it clear that he likes Dave, and credits Letterman for always being supportive of him. He also said that Dave came out with this stuff in a brilliant way, and noted that he's a great communicator. But Howard felt that Dave screwing interns creates a really bad work environment where women feel they have to screw the boss to get ahead and men feel like they can't get ahead because they lack the necessary equipment. He also said if his daughters were taken advantage of as interns like that, he would cut off Dave's winkie. All these things are completely understandable, assuming that his affairs were, in fact with interns (I know Holly Hester came forward as having an affair with Dave while she was an intern), and if other interns and staff members were aware of those affairs at the time, and also assuming that Dave was abusing his position of power in the affairs, which we can't be sure of. I don't feel that Howard was mean-spirited towards Dave at all, as the Examiner article above might imply.

And finally, Dave’s reaction to himself was probably the funniest reaction of all the comedians. On the Monday after the confession, Dave spent almost the whole monologue cracking jokes about himself. He followed this hilarious monologue with another heartfelt statement apologizing to his staff and his wife for hurting them, as well as affirming that he did the right thing in confessing. Of course he ended the string of apologies with another apology to Sarah Palin, because it couldn’t hurt.

Dave has really been handling his scandal well. As both Howard Stern and Steve Martin have said, this scandal really does show us that Dave is human, and as Steve Martin noted, we really weren’t sure of that before.

I think the keep-quiet attitude and the lack of mean-spirited jokes from his fellow comedians show the reigning king of late night the respect that he still deserves, particularly since David Letterman is a victim of a felony.

Poor Dave

When I heard about the alleged extortion of David Letterman and his confession, my initial reaction was “Poor Dave.” This was followed by, “Wow, Dave’s a slut, who knew…But Poor slutty Dave.”

Obviously I’m talking about David Letterman’s recent confession of affair(s) he had with women who work for him and the blackmail involving that by Robert “Joe” Halderman, a producer of 48 Hours Mystery.

I first heard about it from my sister, because I had missed Thursday night’s Late Show containing his confession, and I had somehow not been exposed to any media most of yesterday.

I’ve been a fan of Dave’s since I was 14 or 15, and I’ve had a crush on him for most of that time (it dwindled in my early-to-mid twenties when he announced that his then-girlfriend and now-wife was pregnant). After seeing his confession on YouTube, and after reading this article from the AP, not only do I not hate him as some people now do, but my crush seems to be back. At first I thought this resulted from the reminder of his brooding self-criticism and the terrible things that have happened to him (such as the attempted kidnapping of his son and the crazy stalker) that the AP article spoke of.

But as I watched last night’s episode of The Late Show, and watched as the audience still loves him, I realized it was more than that. It was his honesty.

He could have easily played the victim – obviously he is a victim of alleged attempted extortion, but I mean he could have played the victim in ways that he is not – he could have, after explaining what happened with the attempted blackmail, proceeded to say “None of this is true; I did not have sexual relations with those women.” But he didn’t; he admitted that he had sexual relations with women who work for him. It’s not entirely surprising that his affairs would be with women who work for him, since both the woman he dated in the 1980s and his current wife were women who worked for him. (Much like the rest of the world seems to have assumed, I am assuming that there was no sexual harassment or other non-consensual behavior; if that assumption is proved untrue, that would change everything.)

As many have noted, including some blogging people on CNN, he doesn’t state when these things happened. The affairs could have, and probably did, happen before he got married in March, and perhaps even before his now-wife birthed his son. As the people on CNN say, we don’t know the nature of Dave and his now-wife’s relationship. Furthermore, even if he was cheating on her, we don’t know if she forgave him. And, as the bloggy people on CNN say, it’s really not our business.

It’s interesting that I wouldn’t hate someone who’s cheated on their significant other. Generally, I’m not a fan of cheating, and personally, I would never take part in any kind of infidelity. But we don’t’ know for sure that Dave’s actions constitute cheating, and even if they do, his honesty allows me to maintain my respect and love for him, and remain a fan, perhaps with enhanced fan-ness. His honesty doesn’t make cheating right, but it allows us as fans to maintain our love and respect for him. His confession also reminds us that his personal life, beyond what he chooses to reveal to us, is not our business.

While Dave’s celebrity status places him in the public eye, he has kept much of his personal life private. He is not an elected official who is trying to legislate morality (again, I think the bloggy people on CNN, the AP, and probably many others said something along those lines as well). He’s a comedian, and therefore, not a hypocrite for his countless jokes about politicians and other celebrities and their indiscretions, because his job is to make jokes. His personal life and his hypocrisy (if you believe he is a hypocrite) are not relevant to those jokes.

I can’t help but wonder if I would feel the same way if this were happening to a celebrity whom I don’t love. Yeah, I’m pretty sure I’m biased, but I think I would feel similarly, if not as strongly, if it were someone I hated, because the extortion involved is wrong – I mean more wrong than the potential infidelity.

Fun side note about my little Dave obsession: Before watching the blogging people on CNN, upon hearing that Dave’s affairs were with women who work for him, I immediately speculatively concluded that one of them (or perhaps the only one) must have been his assistant who’s made on-air appearances over the years. I won’t say her name here, because that wouldn’t be right, but one of the bloggers on the CNN thing confirms my suspicion, I assume speculatively. Before I knew she existed, when I was a teenager, I dreamed of having her job – so it should have been me…hahahaha, just kidding….maybe….no, no, I am kidding.