So, the big gossipy news around Chicago today involves Illinois GOP Senate candidate Jack Ryan's now-unsealed divorce papers. For those who haven't been following the story, Ryan is the ex-husband of actress Jeri Ryan (Star Trek: Voyager, Boston Public), and there have been whispers for a long time regarding the reasons for their divorce. I won't go too deeply into the allegations here (you can read them for yourself all over the Web) but let's just say Ryan is accused of doing exactly the sort of national-morality-sullying things Republicans constantly accuse us damned loose-moralled Liberals of doing. From CNN:

Several Chicago media organizations had sued for release of documents relating to the Ryans' divorce, saying the public interest outweighed their concerns about privacy and the possible effect on their now 9-year-old son. Friday, a judge in Los Angeles, where their divorce was litigated, agreed to unseal portions of more than 360 pages of documents, although large parts remained blacked out.

Both Ryans had objected to the release of details in the documents, but they opted not to appeal the ruling.

Jeri Ryan said her then-husband took her on three "surprise trips" in the spring of 1998 to New Orleans, New York and Paris, during which he took her to sex clubs. She said she refused to go in the first and went into the second at his insistence. "It was a bizarre club with cages, whips and other apparatus hanging from the ceiling," she said in the court document, adding that her husband "wanted me to have sex with him there, with another couple watching. I refused."

She said on arriving at the third club, in Paris, "people were having sex everywhere. I cried. I was physically ill. [He] became very upset with me and said it was not a 'turn on' for me to cry." In his legal response to her allegations, Jack Ryan said while he did arrange "romantic getaways" for the couple, they "did not include the type of activities she describes."

Let me say for the record that I don't think it's anyone's business - except Jack and Jeri's - what they did in their bedroom, in a sex club, wherever. I don't believe that consensual private 'kinks' necessarily make one a bad politician, and I'm sure we'd be shocked at what that many straitlaced politicos do when the shades are drawn. Regardless of either party's claims, being a politician has never been the same thing as being a moral role model - in fact, I think the two are virtually oxymoronic. But if the accusations in these divorce papers are true, then Ryan deserves all the opprobrium he gets, not the least for his sheer hypocrisy. When a candidate or political party harps about the low morals of the opposition, they shouldn't be surprised to find their own behavior under a microscope.

Jack Ryan has been riding a high horse for some time about "family values" and "morality," and has not only strongly opposed same-sex marriage in Illinois, but even civil unions and domestic partnership registries in the interest of "preserving the traditional family." He'd like to deny Illinois same-sex families the full legal protections his own family enjoys, because he considers gays and lesbians "immoral." I suppose he believed that separating his private peccadilloes from his home life by arranging out-of-town "romantic getaways" gave him reason to claim clean-hands moral superiority. From NBC5 Chicago:

Republican U.S. Senate hopeful Jack Ryan began publicly trying to salvage his candidacy Tuesday, defending his character and calling the uproar over allegations that he urged his then-wife to have sex in front of others "a new low for politics." Calls for Ryan to exit the race came almost immediately after the revelations, contained in court documents stemming from his divorce from former "Star Trek: Voyager" and "Boston Public" actress Jeri Lynn Ryan, were made public late Monday.

"I think this is a new low for politics," Ryan said Tuesday morning during an appearance on Chicago's WLS-AM. "It seems to me it's just a new standard, and I don't think it's healthy for our democracy." Ryan said he was fit for high public office, noting that the court documents reveal no violations of earthly or higher laws.

"There's no breaking of any laws. There's no breaking of any marriage laws. There's no breaking of the Ten Commandments anywhere. And so I think if that's the worst people can say about me in the heat of a difficult dispute I think it speaks very well about my character."

Spare us, Jack, please. It's not a 'new standard' or a 'new low in politics' - it's precisely same fingerpointing conservatives have been engaged in for years; only now, the finger is pointed at you. Good luck in November...if you're still in the race at that point.

[excerpts from the Ryan divorce papers on NBC5]
[view the Jack Ryan thread on Daily Kos]

From the Jack Ryan 2004 campaign site, on "The Defense of Marriage" with a little snarky commentary:

"I believe that marriage can only be defined as that union between one man and one woman [and lots of whips and chains and people watching!].

I am opposed to same-sex marriages, civil unions, and registries ... Homosexuals...should not be entitled to special rights based on their sexual behavior. [er...no, only heterosexuals are entitled to special rights based on their sexual behavior? Civil unions and domestic partner registries are not a 'special right,' but rather, second-class political concessions settled for when barred the option to marry.]

The breakdown of the family over the past 35 years is one of the root causes of some of our society’s most intractable social problems-criminal activity, illegitimacy, and the cyclical nature of poverty." [Doctor, heal thyself.]

Blah, blah, blah...

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