Kerik

Bernard Kerik, the former New York police commissioner who was nominated to be Homeland Security chief, has withdrawn from consideration. Kerik strikes me as a guy who did his job at a time (9/11 and after) when doing his job got him a lot of publicity. Fine. He deserves our thanks. But responding appropriately in a crisis does not make him any more capable of running a huge government agency than many others. It was a mistake for President Bush to nominate him for the position... it smacked of a public relations ploy.

But now it turns out that Kerik dropped out either (a) because he had a "nanny problem," i.e., an illegal immigrant working in his home without benefit of Social Security employer payments; or else (b) he had numerous extramarital affairs that were going to embarrass him and the President. Problem (a) is a disqualifier -- illegal immigration is potentially the major problem a Secretary of Homeland Security will have to deal with in the next four years. But problem (b) is the one that sticks in my craw. I'm sorry, but my gut tells me that I can't think one way about Bill Clinton and think another way about someone else who just happens to be on my President's side. Adultery is bad bad bad, capital B-A-D. If you can't trust someone not to lie to his wife, what makes you think you can trust him with anything else? (Not to mention the blackmail problem... do we really want someone at that level who could be subject to blackmail about his personal life?)

I hate to say it, but the fact that a significant number of high-profile conservative leaders, including Newt Gingrich, Rush Limbaugh, Rudy Guiliani, and now Kerik, are guys who can't keep their zippers up, who have been through multiple messy divorces, etc., makes me a little squeemish about the party that otherwise has my allegiance. (Just like Bill Bennett's gambling made me question his "virtue.") Hypocrisy is hypocrisy, whether it's on our side or theirs.