by James Wolcott

When I read the flirty e-mails and instant messages from Congressman Mark Foley to assorted cuddle buns of the male denomination, I was embarrassed, truly embarrassed—not only for Mr. Foley, but for myself, as an American. This is the best we can do? This is what it’s come to?

.. From Bill Clinton seeking body warmth in Lewinsky’s pillowy embrace to Foley batting his eyelashes online, to poor old jowly chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee Wilbur Mills making a ripe fool of himself with stripper “Fanne Fox, the Argentine Firecracker,” the high-profile Washington sex scandal is marked by desperate lunging, not lusty abandon. A hot flash of male menopause, it’s more of a cry for help and a prelude to rehab than a yelp of pleasure. Washington should steal a tabloid page from its closest and horniest ally, Great Britain. When it comes to whipping up a political sex scandal into a donnybrook, the Brits have us beat—they really know how to make the bedsheets billow. British sex scandals, like ours, are often rooted in a dolor of middle-aged malaise, but they’re also animated by spite, spicy details, vanity, revenge, bitter comedy, and bawdy excess—the complete Jacobean pantry. (more…)