Re: "There's only one standard of morality in this country - If a conservative does it, he's gone."

I recall one of my college history professors noting that with respect to various Marxist "liberation" movements, that the only remaining Puritans to be found in the Twentieth Century were to be found on the Left. The Bennett flap seems to be a case in point. The hatchet job on Bennett is premised on the notion that gambling is a, gasp, sin and Bennett as a religious, "moralizing" person shouldn't be committing sins.

Well, get over it. Bennett is a Catholic and the Catholic tradition is surprisingly tolerant of vices. Catholics may in good conscience drink, dance, gamble and have rambunctious sex within a sacramental marriage. Mark Shea nails the moral dimension:

C.S. Lewis once remarked that he didn't offer advice to people about sins to which he himself was not tempted. I try to do the same thing. I've never felt the urge to gamble and I therefore don't know what constitutes too much vs. just enough gambling. It seems to be somehow to be a bigger deal to Puritans than to Catholics and America, being a nation of apostate puritans, has its undies in a bunch over it, especially Democrats, who are the most apostate puritans of all. Me: I don't much care as long as it was his own money and he didn't bankrupt his fambly. Next story, please.

I'll concur, with this qualification: I don't get gambling at all. How many times do you have to prove the laws of probability and that house rules favor the house. Bennett's claim, as reported in this article that he has mostly broken even, is nonsense. Based on everyone who who tells me that they "broke even" when they get back from Vegas, I'd have to believe that Las Vegas is about to turn out the lights, if they were being truthful. Now, I can accept the argument that gamblers are purchasing entertainment, but they shouldn't delude themselves that they are doing anything other than pumping money into the casino coffers.

I, therefore, believe that Bennett has a problem. Further, even if his conduct is not per se sinful because he manages to gamble only his excess "entertainment" money, I have to believe that he is not following the course of moderation which is the beating heart of the Aristotelian ethos that is at the core of Christianity. Bennett's moral obligation is not only to avoid sin, but the "near occasion of sin" as well, and I think he probably is pretty shaky on that point. But notice that that critique is a far cry from the asserted absolutistist straw man that the libertine element wants to hold up as the image of orthodox morality.

As for the more cogent political point, I think Jonah Goldberg nails the political point. Like it or not, Bennett's personal behavior is personal until he runs for office. After that, go after him with a righteous fury. As for the implicit Clinton comparison, as an attorney who has made substantial sums off the laws that Bill Clinton's wing of the Democrat Party promoted after the Thomas Hearings, let me point out that sex with subordinates is not a private affair. However consensual the activity may have been, or appeared, at the time, I have seen numerous companies taken to the cleaners when the subordinate - usually female - was cast off and only then realized that she had been coerced into sex. Putting your company at risk of that kind of liability is a firing offense.

Update: Forget the above. Mark Cameron offers a salient reason for publicly vilifying Bennett.