The L.A. Times:
That moment of public humiliation stayed with people -- men and women, Democrats and Republicans. At a beauty salon in Brooklyn Heights, at the Mellow Mushroom pizzeria in midtown Atlanta, at a Denver office building, at a bar in the Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, the same questions came up:The New York Times:
How could she?
Why did she?
Haven't we seen this play one too many times?
Why do we go through this ritual of public shame and repentance, with the political wife standing mutely before the TV cameras as her husband admits his sexual indiscretion?
"I find it nauseating . . . phony and awful," said Leah Schanzer, 38, a doctoral student who stopped for coffee at a Starbucks in New York City. She gave an exaggerated shudder.
"It makes it seem like she's Susie Homemaker," said her friend Leslie Heller, 47. "She shouldn't be standing there, next to him."
Silda Wall Spitzer gave up a high-powered career as a corporate lawyer to raise three daughters and support her husband as he sought elective office, yet has always had deep reservations about his political career. Time and again, she has found herself in the particular bind of encouraging him during critical junctures in his public life while still holding on to some regret that he had chosen to put himself — and their family — there in the first place....The Washington Post:
According to friends, the governor’s time in Albany exacted a psychic cost from Ms. Wall Spitzer, 50, who has not been able to fully embrace her role as first lady. “I think the whole period of his governorship hasn’t fit her,” one friend of both Spitzers said. “It strained the marriage.
When Silda Wall Spitzer stood beside her husband in ashen-faced misery the other day as the governor made his brief apology in the prostitution scandal, she uttered not a word. Yet she launched a thousand conversations.Well, the Washington Post is most overt about it: To think about Silda is to think Hillary — to think about Hillary in a negative, damaging way.
"Why is she standing there?" many women wondered. "Should she be? Would I be?"
And for many, who've seen a long line of wronged political spouses do the same, from Hillary Rodham Clinton to Dina Matos McGreevey to Suzanne Craig, the immediate answer was a resounding, "Hell, no."
"I watched her and I thought, 'Again, the wife is standing there,'" said Jessica Thorpe, a 38-year-old mother of three in Larchmont, N.Y. "And I had a visceral reaction. I just don't get it. Why does it always have to be that way in politics? What will she get out of standing there?"
The blogosphere was buzzing, too, with the same questions. "Why do they show up?" asked blogger Amy Ephron on huffingtonpost.com. She proposed her own fantasy: "I just want one of them —Hillary, Silda — to stand on the steps of the White House, the governor's mansion, and stamp their foot and say, 'And another thing, I'm keeping the house.'"
Publishing an article that is designed to involve readers in the private decisionmaking and presumed suffering of this individual we've never paid attention to before is a way to drag us back into a slew of old questions about Hillary that we've thought about for years and probably dealt with one way or another by now. Here, let me pick that scab for you.
IN THE COMMENTS: Bissage writes:
Silda Wall Spitzer is highly intelligent, personable and ambitious.
She is also a master strategist.
This “stand by her man” moment is just one of many well thought-out steps she’s taken as she makes her way to her ultimate goal.
Soon enough . . . she’ll run for Governor.
After all, she has experience.
Posts
50 comments:
The lesson is clearly that one should boff interns. Workplace sexual encounters. If you do that, you are a powerful guy, you get to keep your job, make millions and be loved around the world.
Enter into a commercial arrangement with a contractor for services, makes you a hypocritical pariah, who should be fired and locked up.
who'd have thunk it :)
Back to the scorned politico wife angle? I think one of them should leak her thoughts about chef's knives. That would cause a few powerful men to pause. One's got to sleep sometime...
The lesson clearly is keep your husband happy.
Sex may not be a priority for you but it is for him.
But the news stories are sold to women.
Lorena Bobbitt stories are also popular.
I think the wive's actions in these cases (Spitzer, Larry Craig, Vitters) shows that spouses in general want to support and help their partner, especially when they are in need, even if, in that situation they are the "aggrieved."
If you've been with someone for years and years and love them and have tied your fortunes to them, you are not likely to abandon them in one moment.
Perhaps the wives still hold out hope it might not be true or as bad as it could be?? Your mind does funny things. If you walk away from your spouse, it's also partly saying that you made a mistake when you picked this person. That's not a pleasant admission and one to be avoided. This is especially true for women. They often feel they should hold a marriage together.
I've always wondered: whose idea is it for the wife to be there? The husband's, or the wife's. The answer to that question puts a completely different spin on how to interpret what's going on.
It's possible that the wife loves the husband -- although likely furious at him -- and that's why she's there.
She fits the profile of an enabling co-narcissist to a T. The good news for her is that, with help, she can overcome her personality deficit. He is likely unchangeable and predictably headed toward suicide.
---------------------------------------
"Here, let me pick that scab for you."
Labels: Bill Clinton, Hillary, journalism, marriage, political spouse, prostitution, Spitzer< and bodily fluids (subset: dried)
Fox is reporting that Silda is urging her pig husband to "hang on" to office.
Poor woman. Classic Stockholm Syndrome as applied to a marriage.
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,336688,00.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stockholm_syndrome
I think part of the reason she is being mentioned so much, as opposed to other wifes, is because she is so fricking hot.
She is a beautiful woman.
To a pretty large extent, I imagine, the wife of a successful politician will have made her husband's career her own life’s work, as well. It would be hard to toss all those years (maybe decades) aside, even in the face of humiliation. If a political wife believes her presence may increase the slim odds of saving the career she helped build, than she may be willing to endure the humiliation of standing by her man while he admits to infidelity.
rhhardin said...
The lesson clearly is keep your husband happy.
Sex may not be a priority for you but it is for him.
That's blaming the victim. Even a nymphomaniac wouldn't be able to keep some men from straying, and most women's sexual needs aren't that extreme. The simple fact is that man, the animal, wants to copulate with as many partners as possible, and in most Western societies can't.
Wurly, I'm not predicting it from previous scandals; I'm predicting it from what I've read about his pattern of self-destructive behavior and a personality that fits. Notice he didn't admit to infidelity and his so-called apology wasn't for anything specific. All he really said was that his behavior disappointed himself.
They have three children under 18 together. She is trying to do the right thing for them and everyone else. She's obviously a highly intelligent person. Two years of quality therapy and a good divorce lawyer, and she'll put her life back together better than ever which will set a good example for her three daughters.
If his tastes were as unpleasant as has been hinted, Silda was probably happy to have him use pros. And don't you figure high price pros were more sanitary than the corner variety?
That's blaming the victim.
Is the account wrong? How come it doesn't come up as a possibility in the news narrative?
Women ought to the the first outraged over it, that they're taken as innocent still.
I wish that one of these wives would have stood there and about half way through the speech, you know, when the mook says how he disappointed his family or loves his wife, she just hauls off and bitch slaps him right into next Tuesday. Then she walks off the stage.
As to Hillary, she is the biggest moron of all. She stayed with her man even though he was a serial adulterer and embarassed her for years.
bob said...
"The simple fact is that man, the animal, wants to copulate with as many partners as possible, and in most Western societies can't."
That is simply not true. In most Western societies in 2008, an average unmarried man is free to copulate with as many partners as he desires. (e.g.: tituscopulatusmaximus)
I was watching TV last night (MSNBC, CNN, or maybe even Leno) and they did a video collage of wifes standing by their man: Spitzer, MacGrevy (sp?), Vitter, Craig, maybe one or two more. Who did they not have? Clinton.
Anybody else see that? What program was it on?
Three children calculate the chemistry.
That he would try to intentionally have risky sex and expose his wife to STDs speaks of a massive ego and a callous disregard for his spouse. Ugh.
Our children are grown, and my wife thinks Lorena Bobbitt is a hero to all women, and she promises she would not stand by her man. Very clear expectations.
PWS and Meade make good points.
The wife and the husband who find themselves in the "wronged" position often don't want to face the reality that they have made a terrible choice even when the wrongness of the choice is shoved in your face.
And as Meade says, she needs to set an example of at least one person acting as a responsible adult for their children.
I know, because I was once in that position...wronged spouse.
HOWEVER.... there is no reason that these women should subject themselves to further public humiliation standing on a platform like a potted plant alongside the jerk that they married. Once the shit hits the fan, the cat is out of the bag, the eggs are broken....pick your ridiculous analogy..... there is no point in keeping up any fake front for the public. I suppose that some people prefer the Hell that they know ,rather than the uncertainty of taking reponsibility for their own lives.
Spitzer is just lucky he is rich and married to someone who (it seems to me) is also in it for the money. Otherwise, he would find his clothing and possessions on the lawn and a goodbye don't ever come back note pinned to the seat of his car with a fillet knife. :-)
I think the obvious point has been overlooked.
This is all a part of the Spitzer's plan for Silda to run for governor of New York. It's her turn.
Why not? The template seems to be working for Hillary Clinton.
Silda Wall Spitzer is highly intelligent, personable and ambitious.
She is also a master strategist.
This “stand by her man” moment is just one of many well thought-out steps she’s taken as she makes her way to her ultimate goal.
Soon enough . . . she’ll run for Governor.
After all, she has experience.
@ NYTimes online: Spitzer Aides Say Governor Will Resign This Morning
By DANNY HAKIM and ANAHAD O'CONNOR 8 minutes ago
Gov. Eliot Spitzer, reeling from a prostitution scandal, will resign today, some of his aides said. Mr. Spitzer is scheduled to speak at 11:30 a.m.
Live Video: Spitzer News Conference at 11:30 AM ET
I told your Lorena Bobbitt was popular.
Life is so hard for women. Men have it easy. That's the story and they're sticking to it.
So much for feminism in 2008.
Michael_H beat me to it.
SHAZBOT!
Isn't it such a pity?
My daughter actually tended to look up to some of these women (prior) ... and they're such pathetic role models for her - and I've reminded her of that.
I had to have a conversation with my daughter yesterday in which I needed to reaffirm for her that, should she ever find out that her husband was engaging in unprotected anal sex with common but expensive internet whores, she shouldn't stand by him.
That woud be idiotic and dangerous. It could even kill her.
She should immediately go and get an AIDS test rather than attend news conferences, and then take him for everything he has, in a very public way, so as to maximize his humiliation, and thereby serve as a deterrent to her next male friend.
These women, Hillary ... and now Ms. Spitzer, reveal themselves as the true bimbos, unable to unlatch themselves from the truly destructive men in their lives. It's almost as if they have no identity without their scumbag husbands.
I read an article somewhere yesterday about Silda. She comes from a Baptist background and a strong loving family. She was supposed to be devastated by the break up of her first marriage, of which little is known.
I still do not understand the stand by your man attitude in public. It just, in my view, humiliates the women even more.
the wife's problem in this case is that Eliot likely has little money right now for a property settlement. He likely has large encumbering debts to his father right now, that aren't likely to be called, but provide a huge defense in a divorce.
What he has is a big upside when wealthy pop passes.
The problem is that she needs to be married to Eliot, when Pops-in-law departs.
Explain why she is humiliated, other than perhaps she miscalculated the strength of her hand in the marriage.
Making a good deal for herself is the source of respectability in women.
Perhaps she loses the appearance of having worked the deal well. A sort of incompetence that others can look down on.
In that case, the greater the humiliation the better! It sells to women.
Why so much talk about Silda standing by her man Eliot?
Silda, throwing objets d'art at her cheating husband: "So this is why we can't go on vacation! So this is why the girls have to go to SUNY-Buffalo!" Whips out rolling pin. "Pull down your pants Ell. Now you're gonna feel what it's like."
Bissage: You owe me a Coke.
Rush has an excellent Love Client Number 9 song at 12:13, one of his best.
I'm with michael_h and bissage, but I think Silda has to be wary of overdoing it. In faking sincerity it's easy to overact and give the game away. In some of those photos "standing by her man" she looks like she's imitating Christ on the Cross.
All the comments in the original post and most of them here appear to be made by people who have never been in love. By "in love" I mean head over heals completely blown away totally captivated in love, and that can make a person come all out of character.
If I had that much invested in a marriage, I too would be standing next to the person with whom I had already chosen to share the entirety of my life. It's a crisis to one's existence. It would take an admirable amount of strength to hang in through the crisis, when you consider all the options available to a woman in her position, I do admire her. I'm assuming she'll be taking it from here.
Explain why she is humiliated, other than perhaps she miscalculated the strength of her hand in the marriage.
You're joking. This has to be explained to you?
Let's assume that Silda didn't know about or condone her husband's illegal activities and his use of prostitutes.
First there is the ICK factor. Just were has his winky been? What diseases and "bodily fluids" has she been sharing without her knowledge. A long hot shower would be in order. ICK.
Second, there is the thought of: how many other people knew about this and didn't tell her. Were her friends aware and didn't tell her? Did she walk around as a clueless idiot? An object of pity? Did people think she was stupid? Did they think she knew and was OK with her husband shelling out thousands of dollars for prostitutes. What do people think of her as a sexual object. She must not be a very good sex partner if he resorts to paying for sex? Maybe they think she is a twisted sister too?
On top of all of this she gets to stand up on public television and let the rest of the world wonder these very same things?
You don't think that is humiliating? Try imagining it was you, the clueless one, and your wife has been boffing the plumber and the gardener on a regular basis. Gee.... and you never wondered why the water heater kept going on the fritz and the grass needed to be cut so often.
DBQ you don't say why it's humiliating. Just that it is.
My first instinct is that there are always two stories in these things, and one is being systematically suppressed in favor of the innocent woman meme.
But maybe she gets to realize the cost of cutting off sex, just to take a common happening, and what would be my first instinct.
The humiliation is not from that (she'd perhaps be shocked but not humiliated) but from showing the world that she didn't know how to work the marriage deal she made for herself. It's a show of incompetence as a woman.
Then that raises the question what happened to feminism, that these tender and innocent pictures of women are the first thing, and the only thing, to come up in public among serious people.
It starts as complete pap and ends as complete pap, in the media.
I noticed that Silda kept a distance between her and Eliot during the resignation and the walk out.
This comment thread cries out for Maxine! Where is she?
Angry liberal black caller to Rush, about Bill Clinton's cheating on Hillary : ``If she can't keep her home happy, how's she going to keep the country happy?''
I don't see the humiliation angle either. It's not like he was boinking the maid--he had to pay $1000/hr to do better than Silda. She should feel flattered.
Rush : ``Hillary Clinton is the second-most cheated on woman in the world.''
Updating it for the Spitzer news.
Madison Man, she hasn't commented since February 17th. Here's the last thread, and in her last comments she said: "It might shock you to know, that I am about 85% of the commenters on this blog. Just about all of the traffic Althouse gets is coming from me and my alter-egos. ... I'm sitting in a room filled with a dozen different servers that can be scrambled simultaneously. In fact, I've got so many control panels, wires, and cables coming from every which way....I even tripped over a few. Just this morning one of my cables snapped and the whole place started smoking...."
I guess that explains it!
The first and greatest reason women stand with their husband is that hubby may be a dickhead - but it is the cocksuckers in the press and the feminist community that crave the destruction of the man and his family in scandal - and any women with brains knows who the true enemy is.
You stand by the man because even with the damage he inflicts, he still has unchanged, sincere commitments to you and your kids.
The press and various other "outraged" people only want massive punishment and destruction of the man and his family and they care not one iota about the welfare of the wife and kids other than to posture about how "victimized" the family will be once they are done destroying the woman's man...
*************
Rhhardin unfortunately, but properly brings up a major cause of divorce. Women that have a loss of libido in middle age but then find their female peers applauding them for being careerists, do-gooder saviors of others and focusing 99% of the time away from the man to be the "Totally Devoted Mother". Rationalizing that if they don't want it, the man can always just wait until they are good and ready once the kids are grown or they can always just jerk off in a celibate or near-celebate house. Which the woman is doing such a wonderful job of running, bringing new money from an exhausting job with kids needs balanced, or lustre of Good Charitable works done to enhance the reputation of.
Yes, it is "blame the victim". And no one knows if Silda Wall went that way and got frigid - or remained readily available and romantic and Spitzer dissed her nevertheless. But it is now so common in American marriages and so endorsed by a certain female coterie that it is a "choice" that men must accept, and family courts so stacked against men that cheating, divorce, and proken families have become epidemic. Along with two generations of men that FEAR marriage for it's poosible consequences.
In my family, my wife's closest friend got on the "Mother Martyr" track...disinterested in sex and openly resentful that the husband she cut off was not more grateful for all the time she spent at kid's activities away from him when she was not "devoting herself" to a career as a real estate agaent away most weekends except "kid's scheduled activities". My wife told her that she would be divorced soon, and was met with bewilderment...her husband was too nice, to moral (and he was) to ever leave her before the kids were grown and they would have all the time in the world again for the romance and sex that they had "before she had bigger responsibilities".
Sure enough, he cheated, she was arrested for sending him to the emergency room for stitches from something she threw at him, they divorced, the kids began failing in school. He moved to another state after she got custody and screwed with his visits. Now she is bitter and works as a store manager...since he took a job that deliberately gives her no health insurance and low income...just to screw her back..
Two good people derailed by what society tells are the priorities modern women should have and a court system that favors those choices..
****************
Titus I think part of the reason she is being mentioned so much, as opposed to other wifes, is because she is so fricking hot.
She is a beautiful woman.
An utterly hot and now sexually unavailable (if true) shiksa Spitzer won and once had is far more tormenting and inducing a greater need to roam than a plumb Jewish wife. Who whines a bit and wants her fair share of money and baubles but who does her wifely duties with vigor, if resignation.
Time to step back from the Spitzer marriage for a moment and ask the question whose answer we all presume to know, but actually do not. Did Eliot Spitzer actually cheat on Silda Spitzer?
Silda hasn't accused him of cheating; we are applying our standards to the events with the hooker.
Possibly she knew of his dalliances, maybe even going so far as to accept them, provided they were kept private. Maybe the marriage was broken.
Maybe she had her own private affairs. Maybe they were just tired of each other. Maybe she no longer had any interest in sex, and they didn't want to divorce. They reached an accomodation.
It was stupid, yes. In fact, if stupid ever goes to $200 per barrel, I want drilling rights for Eliot Spitzer's head.
But until she says he cheated, we really don't know for sure that he did.
Cedarford said...
The first and greatest reason women stand with their husband is that hubby may be a dickhead - but it is the cocksuckers in the press and the feminist community that crave the destruction of the man and his family in scandal - and any women with brains knows who the true enemy is.
Cedarford,
The guy is a PUBLIC figure. He gets caught. His destruction was caused by his own personal weakness. It was also caused by his self righteous persection of people. Unlike Bill Clinton, who made a point of going out of his way to make friends, this putz made enemies, even out of people who would support him.
I have not seen any feminists coming out to destroy this guy and do not ascribe to a vast feminist conspiracy.
There is also a big difference between cheating on your spouse and doing it with prostitutes.
I agree with Cedarford.
Except it's media frenzy for audience, and audience eating it up, driving the thing.
Somebody has to stop and say, No, feminism is something other than this.
Love client number nine on Rush here back in the affair as entertainment mode; but anyway refusing vitriol at least. What is none of our business remains none of our business.
Whoa, DBQ We see her being humiliated. The questions are why she’s still there & did she want to fight on, fight on.
And
Will Eliot have to give up his Drivers’ license as part of his plea bargain?
Was his naughty lady liaison here legally?
Toby said it more compassionately than I’m gonna, but I find compassion hard when it involves Eliot The Avenger, or as J. Podheretz calls him “simply an Appetite in human form”.
If the news reports about Silda wanting to fight on, fight on is true, then she realized that, with Eliot as ex-Gov Eliot, she was gonna be just another smart Harvard grad & thus she fooled herself into thinking that he could continue as Gov despite “this unfortunate incident”. So, a cost/benefit analysis as I suggested on an earlier post may be the correct one for perhaps-last-to-find-out Silda’s “stand by your man” shtick.
Oh well, as Leno said: Hillary is now only the second maddest wife in NYS.
The questions are why she’s still there & did she want to fight on, fight on.
Yes, that is exactly my question. It isn't like she and the other political wives are going to be impoverished like many women feel they will be if they are on their own.
So, a cost/benefit analysis as I suggested on an earlier post may be the correct one for perhaps-last-to-find-out Silda’s “stand by your man” shtick.
LOL.. that is precisely what I did when I was in a similar situation 15 years ago. Actually crunched the numbers and then began humming the song.....Got along without ya before I met ya.... boom boom.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JU8W_K5hhbc
Best and most productive financial analysis I have ever done.
I go with Occam's Razor: either Silda Spitzer is a power and/or money whore or is genuinely stupid and believes the bullshit lies of her husband. Ironically, she's just taking after another high publicity whore; Hillary, who stuck around for the power.
I had a parody of "Love Potion #9" running in my head already by Monday afternoon. So, it seems, did millions of other folks. And there was an old Beatles song that had "#9" in it ...not played much..I think it was "Revolution #9" with some guy at the end saying "#9? #9? #9??"
****************
Middle Class Guy - I UNDERSTAND all the arguments justifying the wolfpack. PUBLIC figure, celebrity with no panties on is of critical public interest, 1st Amendment Right to hound the wife, public's right to know EVERYTHING..Every purient, salacious bit of detail no matter how hurtful it is to the person's spouse, kids, parents, friends....No matter who else might be dragged in and smeared in the process for the greater profits and glory of the media.
The fact remains that the Wolfpack wants to drag prominent figures down as trophies and destroy them as much as possible - with UTTERLY no concern for how it affects the family of the prominent person they target - whether a DESERVED target, or otherwise.
It is no surprise that the spouse choses to stand with their mate, and not the media, as the lesser of two evils.
It is no surprise that the spouse choses to stand with their mate, and not the media, as the lesser of two evils
Some one who is unfaithful and basically screws you over is no longer your mate. And who knows, like others have said, maybe she was part of the problem or at the least aware of the bad behaviours and quietly complicit.
There are plenty of other options than 'stand by your man' or join the media feeding frenzy. If she doesn't hate him after all of this stuff she still doesn't have to stand up there like a ventriliquist's dummy with his hand up her... you know what. She could just not appear on the stage and try to keep the tattered remnants of her private life and personal pride off the public stage.
If she wants to stand beside her lawbreaking cheating husband, that's her choice. Just like women or men (it isn't always the man who is the oath breaker)stay with abusive spouses and continue to be used as a door mat or punching bag.
I personally just don't get it. /shrug
Funny thing about that Amy Ephron column. That is exactly what a former Maryland governor's wife did. Back in the late 1960's or early 1970's the governor was messing around on the side and she found out about it. She threw him out of the governor's mansion and stayed there and he lived in the Maryland Inn across the street. When he had a special event, he borrowed the mansion from her for the event and then went back to his hotel room. Went on for the latter half of his term of office.
Post a Comment