corrente

For the juicy bits, see "Prurient turmoil," back here. Juan Cole says this, and I think he has it exactly right:

[Illinois Democratic candidate for Senator Barack] Obama has taken the high road, and is refusing to attack Jack Ryan on the sex clubs issue.

The lesson for the Republicans of all this is that the wages of Puritanism are hypocrisy. Henry Hyde, Newt Gingrich, and many other Republicans who tried to nail Clinton had also tried to nail women not their spouses and were no better than Clinton morally. In fact, no one is better morally than anyone else as a matter of ontology or being. Some deeds are better than others, and some people achieve better deeds more often than others. Some people are capable of higher ethical standards than others. But human beings are not in the nature of the case morally perfect beings. Since that is so, it is crazy for the American public to want its politicians to be saints (they aren't), and the desire merely produces hypocrisy, which in turn corrodes ideals and the moral order.

I therefore agree with Jack Ryan that the visits to [sex] clubs should not in themselves disqualify him from public office. Why should we care where he takes his wife? Note that business travelers who stay in nice hotels are known to rent enormous amounts of porn. The travelers, the hotels, and the cable companies involved are all heavily Republican. What is the difference between watching it on celluloid and watching it at a club in Paris?
(via Informed Comment)

Yes, payback is a bitch, isn't it?

But we should defeat Jack Ryan because we need to take back the Senate from the Republicans, not because he goes tosec clubs. Even though it's so delicious that he does. Same with Bush. What do I care what Bush does with goats?