So, I follow Yglesias; sometimes he has some interesting insights, and sometimes he is out to lunch. As far as I'm concerned, if you want to look at Anthony Weiner's character, you should look at his, well, character. Let's see: recently married, pregnant wife, sexting like a horn dog. Which he has apparently done for _years_. I'd say his character is reasonably clear. And wanting.
Now, he isn't my congressman, so it is up to his constituents whether he should resign. I don't know if I would call for his resignation over this. He has been an effective politician. I even agree with him on some issues (although he tends to be shrill and whiny). But the idea that we should divorce his political career from his character is incomprehensible. Why can't we ask how he feels on regulating sexting? On internet privacy issues? Why should I trust him to make decisions about things that affect me, when his character is so clearly at odds with mine?
"The kind of character that matters for a public official isn't the same as the kind that matters to be a good husband and father" seems logically loose to me. I _don't_ want a public official to neglect his family out of hard work any more than I want to neglect my own family out of hard work. And hard work isn't the issue here; being a hyper-sexting horn dog gets normal people in big trouble, sometimes with severe consequences. What if one of the recipients was a 15 year old? Maybe if we paid more attention to character and voted fewer boorish jackanapes into office (and there's a lot of them), our political system wouldn't be in such a mess.
This kind of hypocritical apologism is really not helpful.
One way to see this through an extreme case is perhaps just to observe that the demands of being President of the United States are straightforwardly incompatible with being a model husband and father. The hours, the travel, and the stress just don’t make it add up. But it can’t be the case that all Presidents of the United States lack the requisite character to be President of the United States. It has to be the case that the kind of character that matters for a public official isn’t the same as the kind of character that matters to be a good husband and father. After all, you want a responsible public official to neglect his family and friends (“hard-working”), to display a certain kind of ruthlessness and cunning (“negotiation”), to be a bit of a phony in certain situations (“diplomacy”), and all kinds of other things that don’t carry over straightforwardly from personal life to public affairs.
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