Bill Clinton, Anthony Weiner, John Ensign, and now Herman Cain. This is only a small number of the politicians who have been accused of sexual-related wrongdoings.
Clinton “didn’t have sexual relations with that women,” Weiner tweeted pictures of his, well, wiener, and Ensign had an affair.
Most recently, Herman Cain is being accused of sexual harassment. Two women have accused the Republican presidential candidate of sexual assault while he was running the show at the National Restaurant Association.
The Cain campaign is currently doing damage control. Initially Cain denied knowledge of a settlement reached with his accusers. On Monday, he seemed to walk this back and contradicted himself. On Tuesday, The New York Times reported one of the women received a severance pay of $35,000, her salary at the time.
At what point does the public stop forgiving leaders with shocking transgressions like these? Former President Bill Clinton left office with an approval rating of 66 percent, according to Gallup, even though he was impeached. Yet, the public essentially deserted Rep. Anthony Weiner, D-NY, when he admitted to tweeting pictures of his downstairs to various women. Then-Sen. John Ensign, R-Nev., also resigned as a result of the bad press.
This fair-weathered approach is not confined to politics. Remember when singer Chris Brown was accused of beating then-girlfriend Rhianna? Well, his career is still alive and kicking. In fact, Brown has a show in town this weekend. Though serious allegations were brought against him, he survived to tell the tale.
If we want to look past pop culture, let’s peer into the sports world. Many professional baseball players were caught up in the steroid debate, perhaps most surprisingly former pitcher Roger Clemens. For the most part though, these players weren’t spurned from the public eye like former track and field Olympian Marion Jones.
It came to light that she used performance-enhancing drugs and officials stripped away her Olympic medals.
Why is an Olympian like Jones shamed while Clinton was not? Each represents the U.S. on an international stage. Our best guess is that we hold Olympians to a higher ethical standard than our presidents, which is an unfortunate assumption.
The American public seems fickle in accepting apologies from national figures. Only time will tell whether Cain will fall along the spectrum. The man ascended in national polls and became a prolific candidate over the past several months. Now he knows what it’s like to be in the hot seat.
So far, it doesn’t look like Cain is ready for prime time.
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