Sex is one of the thorniest topics in America- even decades after Playboy and the Kinsey Report, we still can’t talk about it in a basic and straightforward way. Easily one of the most common ways that a politician or person in power has a fall from grace is because of marital indiscretion- witness South Carolina’s governor Sanford or the non-political but highly applicable situation of Tiger Woods. In both situations, as it is in many others, things were humming along smoothly until for one reason or another the world found out that the man was having some kind of affair.

Bill Clinton got accosted and raked over coals for months over the Monica Lewinsky scandal- though it seems to have fallen away from his public persona- it didn’t even have much of an effect on his presidency, other than to distract from everything else that had been going on at the time.
Nike, Pepsi and EA Sports all are sticking with Tiger, at least in the public relations- style stick with your man approach. Woods is taking a break from golf- he can. He’s a billionaire who doesn’t need to work another day in his life. He doesn’t have a job that he needs to punch in and out of. Governors and presidents, different story. The point is, though, that something purely in the personal life sphere brings people down- if they let it.

Whatever Clinton did or did not do, he was always out in front of the story. Even if he was lying, at least he was making a statement. Sanford just bailed for a week and didn’t tell anyone where he was. Then he came out all apologetic, definitely not on the offensive. Tiger- even worse. He made a simple statement talking in vague terms about transgressions and not living up to what his family deserves from him. He is certainly walking on the razor’s edge- a Gillette razor, for now.

Woods got in a car accident and is losing his entire career. Sanford took an ill-timed trip to Argentina and he is losing his wife and facing a slew of ethics violation assertions. And Clinton, well, he just soldiered on. So what is the message here?

Is it that you need to have your PR plan ready for when you get caught in your marital infidelities? Or is it that you need to be more like the Bush father-son crew, never giving off even a whiff of indiscretion within their marriages.

Is it better to live clean or to just live and be ready with the PR game when the ship hits the iceberg? Of course, the answer to that is an individual decision and it’s not rally a fair question- but the message is clear from these few lessons- when something scandalous comes to the surface, you have to issue a statement about it immediately, be out in front of it and on top of it, and no matter what it is, there is always an opportunity for forgiveness and moving on- for even as judgment and a sex-talk aversion are part of the Evangelical consciousness- so is forgiveness.

Photo Credit: Keith Allison (via Flickr under CCL)