In this great FOX News editorial today, Concerned Women of America’s Penny Nance writes a brilliant piece reminding readers and especially women, that character does count when electing the next leader of the free world:

“Politics and the concept of original sin, or massa damnata, are two topics the main stream media rarely discuss side by side, but perhaps they should, considering all the political fallout over Herman Cain’s alleged sexual impropriety, not to mention Newt Gingrich’s past scandals involving two ex-wives.

Of course, these are not just Republican issues. Bill Clinton and John Edwards shamed themselves, their families, and I would argue us as a nation with their selfish behavior.

The question before citizens is, “Do we have a right to hold elected officials to a high moral standard?”  Herman Cain’s attorney and spokesman, Lin Wood, disputes the public’s obligation to criticize elected officials in his recent statement:

“This is not an accusation of harassment in the workplace — this is not an accusation of an assault — which are subject matters of legitimate inquiry to a political candidate.  Rather, this appears to be an accusation of private, alleged consensual conduct between adults — a subject matter which is not a proper subject of inquiry by the media or the public.  No individual, whether a private citizen, a candidate for public office or a public official, should be questioned about his or her private sexual life.  The public’s right to know and the media’s right to report has boundaries and most certainly those boundaries end outside of one’s bedroom door.”

Setting aside the allegations of sexual harassment, is Wood correct in asserting that the public has no right to question a candidate’s marital fidelity?  The left would certainly have us believe so.

Collapse of Character

During his time as president, Bill Clinton advanced the notion of public versus private morality after having a sexual liaison with a 21-year-old intern in the Oval Office.  Ever the “champions of women,” liberal feminists backed the man instead of the woman, arguing Clinton’s behavior was no one’s business, and they dismissed anyone who objected to such an obvious abuse of power (which ruined a young girl’s bright future) as puritanical.

If sexual choices have no bearing on one’s life outside of the bedroom, then we need to stop screening our intelligence community for areas in which they could be blackmailed and employers need to stop screening potential employees’ Facebook pages for embarrassing info.

The Greeks would have agreed with Mr. Wood that adultery is a private affair, but then, they also applied that view to murder and rape.  In other words, it was private in that the family was permitted to avenge themselves up to and including the murder of the adulterer.  In the Greek world, adultery was a private matter with sometimes stark public consequences.  That said, while Cain’s alleged affair was a private matter, it became public when he did.

Will Conservative Voters Accept Gingrich's History, If They Reject Cain's?

However, in 1790, George Washington wrote in a letter to his nephew, Steptoe Washington, that, “A good moral character is the first essential in a man.”  John Adams, Thomas Jefferson — and even randy ol’ Ben Franklin, who wrote, “Search others for their virtues, thy self for thy vices” — made no distinctions between moral integrity in the public or private sector.”

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2011/12/02/when-picking-president-still-believe-that-character-counts/#ixzz1fOZKUYpO

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Filed under: Featured, Inside The KC, Politics by Sonja Eddings Brown, Dec 2, 2011