Will Her Face Determine His Fortune?
AS the election of 2008 approaches with its cast of contenders who bring unprecedented diversity to the quest for the White House, the voting public has been called on to ponder several questions: Is America ready for a woman to be president? What about a black man? A Mormon? Now, with the possible candidacy of Fred D. Thompson, the grandfatherly actor and former Republican senator from Tennessee, whose second wife is almost a quarter-century his junior, comes a less palatable inquiry that is spurring debate in Internet chat rooms, on cable television and on talk radio: Is America ready for a president with a trophy wife? The question may seem sexist, even crass, but serious people ‚Äö√Ñ√Æ as well as Mr. Thompson’s supporters ‚Äö√Ñ√Æ have been wrestling with the public reaction to Jeri Kehn Thompson, whose youthfulness, permanent tan and bleached blond hair present a contrast to the 64-year-old man who hopes to win the hearts of the conservative core of the Republican party. Will the so-called values voters accept this union?
OK…how ‘bout once and for all we stop using the term “values voters” and just call these folks what they truly are- “(&^%$#@ hypocrites”? And how in the world can “serious people” possibly entertain for even a nanosecond that Fred Thompson’s wife (and I detest the term “trophy wife”; it’s demeaning and insulting) has ANY bearing on his qualifications to be President.
Don’t get it into your pointy li’l haid for even a moment that I’m defending or, worse, supporting Fred Thompson. I detest the man’s politics, and even though he did a bang-up job on Law & Order, he’s a neoConservative of the worst sort. What I am defending is Thompson’s right to marry and raise a family with whomever he sees fit to do so. By all means, Thompson’s marriage is a happy one, and Thompson is a faithful husband and father. Why should it make ANY difference that there is a significant difference in age between Thompson and his wife? Maybe the “values voters (&^%$#@ hypocrites” are jealous because Thompson is probably getting more nookie than they are ? Yeah, good, God-fearing Christian men are jealous, and the women feel threatened….
Look, I detest Fred Thompson for his Neanderthal stances on so many issues: immigration, Iraq, terrorism, stem cell research, abortion, ad nauseum, ad infinitum. The man appeals to the same pointy-headed, intolerant demographic that Our Glorious and Benevolent Leader © does. Of course, Thompson actually possesses a functional intellect and the ability to speak in complete sentences, which makes him infinitely more dangerous. There are so many reasons to oppose Fred Thompson; his wife and family shouldn’t even be CLOSE to being fair game for pundits and other such “serious people”.
“Serious people” don’t obsess about a candidate’s marital situation. “Serious people” don’t spend their time engaging in what can only be describe as petty jealousy. “Serious people” don’t engage in whispering campaigns against the wife of a candidate. Clearly, these “serious people” are anything but. In fact, they’re little more than small-minded trolls with far more time on their hands than decency and common sense.
“You have a situation where a candidate happens to have an attractive wife, therefore it’s open season for smutty thoughts and lowbrow humor, and no concern for the fact that this is a wife and mother, a professional woman?” said Mark Corallo, a former Justice Department official who is a consultant and the chief media adviser to the Thompson campaign. “One picture on the Internet and all of a sudden she’s reduced to being a bimbo?”
On a morning cable news show last month, Joe Scarborough, the commentator and former Republican congressman from Florida, compared Mrs. Thompson to a stripper. The comment came after a segment on the use of stripper poles in exercise routines, but it still stung. It is hard to imagine a man, however handsome, suffering similar insult.
There’s absolutely no reason that Scarborough, or anyone else, can justify this sort of pointless mean-spiritedness. Jeri Kehn Thompson is not running for President. Fred Thompson currently isn’t, but thats likely to change before too much longer. So Thompson married a hot- and significantly younger- woman. Can it be that the issue here is simple jealousy? It’s not as if Thompson is trolling junior high school playgrounds looking for sexual partners; the man has a wife and family…and isn’t that one of the main issues for Red Meat Conservatives, those “values voters (&^%$#@ hypocrites” that Republicans devote so much time, energy, and pandering to court?
I see nothing wrong with devoting my time and energy to deconstructing and working to bring down Fred Thompson’s candidacy. His family, however, should be- and by all that is good and decent MUST BE- off limits. Or do the “serious people” really have so little to occupy themselves that they’re reduced to this sort of pettiness?
