Colin Goh and Woo Yen Yen

The following was published in the Sunday Times on 23 March 2008:

Sunday Times 23 March 2008
It’s Easy to be Sleazy
by Colin Goh

Sometimes the political coverage here in America’s newspapers can make FHM look like my old church bulletin.

Just over the past few years, I’ve read, inter alia, about how New Jersey Governor Jim McGreevey confessed to having a gay relationship with his security adviser; how Idaho Senator Larry Craig was arrested after allegedly soliciting sex by playing footsie with an undercover policeman in an airport toilet; how Republican Congressman Mark Foley sent kinky emails and IM messages to his teenage pages; and the latest bombshell: how New York Governor Eliot Spitzer had trysts with really expensive call girls.

Then just a few days back, Spitzer’s replacement, David Paterson, confessed to “several” extra-marital affairs, and worse, McGreevey returned to the headlines with revelations that he, his now ex-wife, and his driver used to engage in “threesomes”. And hanging over all of them, the Buaya-in-Chief himself, former President Bill “I-did-not-have-sexual-relations-with-that-woman” Clinton.

“Piang eh,” I said to the Wife. “I knew politicians played dirty, but this is ridiculous.”

“What’s also ridiculous is how after the scandal is blown open,” she replied huffily, “they always have this press conference where they make their poor wives stand next to them to ‘show their support in this trying time for the family’ or donno what nonsense.”

“You mean you wouldn’t stand next to me and support me at my press conference if I was discovered to have, I donno, an erotic cupcake habit?” I asked, hypothetically. (Very hypothetically.)

“You mean you’d hold a press conference to admit you have an erotic cupcake habit?” she answered, her look of disgust shortly becoming one of suspicion.

“Just… saying only, lah,” I smiled, not particularly convincingly judging by her reaction. (Note to self: better lie low about cupcakes over the next few weeks.)

The Spitzer scandal has certainly set many tongues wagging, from op-ed columns to talk shows and the blogosphere, over a whole range of issues, including: whether men are just inherently horndogs; why should we care about personal indiscretions as long as they don’t prevent the guys from doing their job; how come the Europeans would have just shrugged all of this off; why their spouses should just dump them immediately; why their spouses should give them another chance; hypocrisy and hubris; yadda yadda yadda.

But to me, what’s most puzzling about these scandals is why would such powerful, influential men (and they seem to be always men) with so much to lose, still indulge in such high-risk behaviour? I mean, is the urge to engage in such activities so overpowering that they can’t wait till they’re out of office? Or is it some form of death wish, a secret longing to bring the charade that is their life to an end?

Conservative New York Times columnist David Brooks suggests that high-achieving men often snap under what he calls the ‘rank-link imbalance’ – they suddenly realize how lonely they’ve become, after having spent so many years clawing their way to power. This “boo-hoo-hoo, nobody understands the real me” epiphany is felt even more acutely when contrasted with their mighty public personae. And so they do dumb things to restore some level of intimacy. Why dumb things? Because in the process of climbing up the greasy pole of success, they’ve lost touch with ordinary people, and also notions of common sense.

Maybe. But it could just be that high achievers are risk takers, and that attitude applies even to their social lives. Or maybe powerful men simply like being powerful, and nothing is ever enough to satisfy their need to dominate; having a secret double life is just possessing another level of power over others.

And when I think about it: this sordid stuff isn’t confined to the high muckamucks either. I’m sure all of us know regular joes who’ve led secret existences too – those ‘entertaining-the-client’ trips to the KTV ‘launge’, late night porn-surfing, the second families in Bintan, secret photos of the maid, erotic cupcakes… (okay, maybe not that last one). And for the rest of us, maybe it’s not that we’re wired more correctly, it’s just that our fear of shame trumps our temptation.

“I mean, how do you know I won’t be another Eliot Spitzer and you’ll kena stand next to me at some rostrum in the future?” I asked the Wife.

“I know what you make as a writer, dear,” she patted my cheek and smiled consolingly. “You can’t afford call girls.” Heng ah!

And maybe that’s what entitles us to heap scorn on leaders who fall below our own standards: we know how easy it is to be sleazy, so we put them in office and pay them the big bucks to be better than us.

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