New York Times article on McCain and Lobbyist

First thing this morning I read my NYT in my inbox as I do every morning. There on Page One is the story that McCain was possibly having an affair with an attractive lobbyist back in 1999. As the story goes, McCain aides were very concerned, had several meetings to confront McCain about the appearance of the too cozy relationship. Yada, yada, yada.


It appears they perhaps got too cozy and he was probably smitten with her a bit, loved the attention etc., after all he was 62 and she was 40 and very attractive. But it does not appear that there IS evidence of any "affair". It appears that there was the appearance of an affair. The more important angle to the story would be that she was a lobbyist whose client was a party in upcoming or ongoing proposed legislation. THAT is the story. Her client was pouring tens of thousands into McCain's campaign when he was on a committee that would decide about legislation affecting her client.
This whole romantic angle is only possible because she was a female lobbyist. Had she been male then we would have been talking about too much access to the Senator etc. But since she's female the angle is romance.
It feels rather slime-ball to me; the timing is suspect and the whole thing feels like a witch hunt. I don't support or condone McCain's extreme rightwing positions at all; yet I can't help feeling the guy is being unfairly targeted on this one.
Can we be Democrats and not feel knee-jerk glee whenever a Republican is in hot water? I feel disheartened when I see people jumping on the bandwagon, obviously not having carefully read the article but just join in the savaging of a person because he happens to be of the opposite political party. Yuck.

But as one commenter on HuffPo noted Americans will get way more upset about "a blowjob" than they would about a thousand crooked deals. Who cares if McCain had an affair; the real story is about the lobbyist influence. Forget the sex angle. It's a non-issue to grown-ups.