Competence Makes A Better Yardstick Morality Ploy Bluenose Gallery Is Loaded With Rogues.

Fri., Sept. 17, 1999

By Gary Crooks garyc@spokesman.com (509) 459-5026

The moral minority has been fooled again. It seems Idaho state Rep. Jeff Alltus has a marriage problem, which is a big deal if you are among the virtuecrats who believe government should have a seat at the kitchen table as families discuss divorce, abortion, sex and other private matters.

When reporters pressed him on why his wife is seeking a divorce, Alltus had the correct response, “I choose not to make comments on my personal life.” But if government were to judge what constitutes “irreconcilable differences” in divorce proceedings, as Alltus has advocated, his privacy defense wouldn’t fly.

There’s something McCarthyesque in probing the virtue of a man or a woman. A Missouri farmer recently asked Democratic presidential candidate Bill Bradley: “Are you a person of high moral standards? Are you now and have you always been?”

Bradley replied: “I think people have a right to know if I’m a crook. I don’t think they have a right to know if you’re a sinner. We all are.”

Bradley has it right. We are all sinners and we are all hypocrites. Once we accept that, we can move on to more productive debates and jettison the sanctimonious scoldings.

Nobody knows this better than the Glass House Gang of social conservatives who rue the day they ever cast stones. A quick check turns up Alltus, Idaho Rep. Helen Chenoweth (divorce, adultery), Idaho Family Forum consultant David Ripley (divorce, jailed for delinquent child support payments), impeachment honcho Rep. Henry Hyde (adultery), former Louisiana Rep. Bob Livingston (adultery), Mississippi Gov. Kirk Fordice (adultery, seeking divorce), former House Speaker Newt Gingrich (divorce, adultery, pending divorce), Indiana Rep. Dan Burton (fathered a child during an affair) and impeachment manager Rep. Bob Barr (thrice married, helped second wife get an abortion).

Two of the most effective and popular presidents of the 20th century were Franklin Roosevelt, a liberal who cheated on his wife, and Ronald Reagan, a conservative who divorced his first wife and was an indifferent father. Did it matter?

If you’re selecting candidates based on their virtue, you’re casting a blind vote. You’re also rewarding those who carry the family values banner while fooling around behind your back. Don’t be fooled again.

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