A few days ago, the news broke that Edward Flynn, the local police chief, had been having an affair with Jessica McBride - a journalist who wrote a very favorable article about him shortly after he came to town. Flynn has only been on the job for about 18 months, but he has made a very favorable impression on the city, and the public, the mayor and other officials have thrown their support behind him.
The story came up at a family get-together over the weekend, and the crowd was very supportive. The general consensus was that this impropriety had nothing to do with his ability to be the chief of police. I heard someone say "What's good for the goose is good for the gander," and while I'm not completely sure what that means, I'm thinking that's not much of a justification. Apparently Flynn's wife is still living in Massachusetts while their kids finish high school, and someone implied that this was partially her fault because she didn't move out here with her husband.
I turned to my brother-in-law, one of the handful of liberals in attendance, and joked that this conversation went a little differently back in 1998. Of course, there's a world of difference in the positions: a police chief's job is relatively straightforward, there are fairly objective ways to measure success, and the job can be done without sinking too far into politics. Contrast that with being President.
Maybe we've gotten a bit more forgiving in the last decade or so, or we've just grown so jaded to the idea of government officials and their affairs. Or maybe we're OK with this because the journalist is attractive.
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