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Jewish World Review Dec. 6, 2011 / 10 Kislev, 5772 What's wrong with adultery? By Cal Thomas
http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | We live in a bipolar culture. We allow ourselves to be drenched in sexual images in movies, on television and on the Internet and then defend First Amendment protection to even the most graphic of them. Then, when a politician acts out what culture promotes, we criticize him, especially if he's conservative, branding him with the equivalent of a "scarlet letter." In our not too distant past, a feeling of shame made people go into hiding after an adulterous relationship was exposed. Now they go on television to talk about the sleazy details. They either deny it (
In a nation that channels Ado Annie's lament from the musical "Oklahoma" ("I'm just a girl who cain't say no"), saying no to anything, including adultery, gets you pegged as a fundamentalist who is attempting to impose his morality on others. How's our failure to impose anything working out for us? If we maintain that adultery is wrong, shouldn't we have an authority for that judgment? Who decides such things? So the wife (or husband) and kids get upset. Isn't it all about one's personal choice and happiness?
For politicians, it goes deeper. Here is the question I wanted to ask former Senator It's not a trick question, but one that goes to the core of an individual's values and character. What is marriage? Is it something for the convenience of the It's not just a religious concept. Ask a person who is married but does not believe in God how he or she would feel about a cheating spouse and you most likely would get the same response you would receive from one who does believe in a higher power: anger and profound disappointment. In The Ultimately, what voters must decide is this: Does a presidential candidate's personal flaws rise (or fall) to a level that inhibits his ability to do the job of president? Put another way, if you are about to have surgery, do you care if the doctor is a cad, or do you care more whether most of his patients are alive and well? With the multiple challenges Americans face and with the choices presented to us, if the country is to be made well, voters may just have to sacrifice the ideal for the pragmatic.
JWR contributor Cal Thomas is co-author with Bob Beckel, a liberal Democratic Party strategist, of "Common Ground: How to Stop the Partisan War That is Destroying America". Comment by clicking here.
© 2011, Tribune Media Services, Inc.
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