Dallas Adult Entertainment: Joan Smith: Men like Ted Kennedy got …
So did other political leaders of their generation, from François Mitterrand to Willy Brandt. Bill Clinton must sometimes have wished he had been born 30 years earlier, and to the kind of inherited wealth that used to buy immunity. It goes without saying that one of his biggest supporters, as his lies about Monica Lewinsky began to unravel, was Ted Kennedy.
Generations of elite men took it for granted that power bestowed sexual privileges. Silvio Berlusconi is still doing it, allegedly paying for sex at sleazy parties, but he’s turned himself into a laughing stock and his wife certainly isn’t suffering in silence. I’m not arguing for puritanism in politics, for senators and MPs sticking to their wives (or husbands or civil partners – this is the modern world, after all) like glue. But there is now a rejection of double standards, a critique of a generation of politicians who paraded trophy wives while groping female reporters and waitresses, and – in the case of the priapic JFK – ordering in prostitutes by the bus load.
See the full article from “Independent”