POLITICS- Guilty Pleasures

Tonight’s ABC television news had a segment on the candidates’ guilty pleasures. No, it isn’t what I was thinking either. They asked the politicians what their guiltiest pleasures were. The results were so predictably banal that it was unintentionally funny.

Joe Biden’s guilty pleasure was ice cream. No mention was made of plagiarism or padding his academic resume, so I guess he doesn’t feel guilty about that stuff.

Fred Thompson confessed to “a cigar of questionable origin”, at least being honest enough to tacitly admit that he thinks nothing of breaking federal law when it suits him. Guess his conscience is clear about all the white collar criminals he defended as an attorney or helping to cause the Savings and Loan crisis by lobbying for passage of the St Germain Depository Institutions Act of 1982 when he was a paid lobbyist.

Hillary Clinton said that chocolate, especially the dark kind, was her Achilles heel. Plans for world domination and a socialist utopia, again, nothing she’s ashamed of. (I cant find a link for that but it’s really self evident, isn’t it?)

Mayor Rudy Giuliani said that his guiltiest pleasures were cigars AND chocolate. Better to steal your rivals’ guilt than to admit to any of the stuff Rudy has done. After suggesting Bernard Kerik for Head of Homeland Security, hurrying the cleanup after the bombings, and putting his anti-terrorism headquarters in the World Trade Center complex after the first bombing attempt, Giuliani is running on a platform of being the best to keep us safe! Obviously the man doesn’t know that the word guilt means.

Mitt Romney also admitted to a love of chocolate, “M&Ms, Hershey bars, Reese’s peanut butter cups, Nutella” especially “Nutella and peanut butter on toast” Hating atheists and flip-flopping on abortion, OTOH, is cool with him.

Christopher Dodd came the closest to honesty by saying, “I love a good wine, probably too much.” (I don’t have a snarky remark for this. It’s Chris Dodd, for pity’s sake, who cares?)

And finally John Edwards decided that “sleeping late” was his guiltiest pleasure. Guess it isn’t reading the National Enquirer.

Barack Obama said that he no longer sneaks a cigarette, so his new guilty pleasure is Sportscenter. My heavens, saying you sneak a cig is almost as politically incorrect as saying you might like wine a little too much. So Obama gets a pass. Plus, I can’t really find anything that he ought to be guilty for. Just like Chris Dodd.

And perhaps there’s a lesson to be learned right there. Maybe the guys who will tell the truth about the little things are more likely to tell the truth about the big things.

Oh, and predictions for the Iowa caucus (predicting that voters haven’t learned their lesson about electing folks with no foreign policy experience):

Obama and Huckabee