New York State Gov. Eliot Spitzer is joined by his wife Silda as he makes a statement to reporters during a news conference following a report that he was involved in a prostitution ring

It is time to do away with the wronged wife standing mute next to her man, as he publicly humiliates her and confesses to cheating on her. 

Let him stand alone and apologize. 

She is not a potted plant.  She is not an object, an accessory to his political career.  She is a flesh and blood human being who was disrespected once during her husband’s cheating, and now is victimized a second time by being made to stand silently by him.

I watched Dana McGreevey speak movingly on Larry King Live last night of why she made that choice.  She loved her husband.  She was not in on all the closed door meetings leading up to the press conference.  She was asked to appear at his side, and she did, because she continued to want the best for him and for the marriage.

I get that, and my heart goes out to Dana McGreevey.  As a personal choice, I respect her decision. 

But political spouses have a vital public role too, and they know their appearances and choices matter enormously, which is why they carefully choose what causes they’ll support and what they’ll wear to state dinners.  

What political wives choose to do about their marriages once their husband is caught in a sex scandal is a private matter. 

But appearing right next to their husband days after he’s been caught with his pants down is a public humiliation, unworthy of women in public life in 2008. 

I’m sick of watching the Stepford Wife gaze, sick of explaining to my daughter that women deserve better.

A doormat is not a role model.

- Lisa Bloom, “In Session” Anchor/360° Contributor

Read more Lisa Bloom blogs on “In Session”

Bill Clinton, David Vitter, Gary Hart, Jim McGreevey, Larry Craig, and now Eliot Spitzer.  A partial list of recent high profile politicians embroiled in sex scandals.

Name a prominent female politician caught in a sex scandal.  (Being a victim of a husband’s philandering doesn’t count.)

I’ll wait.

- Lisa Bloom, “In Session” Anchor/360° Contributor

Read more Lisa Bloom blogs on “In Session”

Lisa Bloom is a frequent contributor to the AC360 Blog.

It is not the least bit surprising that Roger Clemens may now be investigated by the Justice Department. His sworn deposition testimony and his statement under oath to the House Oversight Committee always seemed to me to be a setup, a slow pitch, for this obvious end result: legal action against him. If they can’t get him for the steroids, they can try to get him for perjury.

Martha Stewart.

Scooter Libby.

Why on earth would Clemens, represented by competent counsel who surely advised against it, fall into this trap? Why do prominent people testify under oath when they don’t have to, knowing this will give hostile authorities new ammunition? Must be a combination of ego and denial that scientists have not yet cracked.

- Lisa Bloom, “In Session” Anchor/360° Contributor

Read more Lisa Bloom blogs on “In Session”

A jury in Ohio, as I write, is faced with the agonizing decision of whether to recommend the death penalty for convicted double murderer Bobby Cutts, Jr.

The single most determining factor, proved by study after study, as to whether an American murderer is sentenced to death or life imprisonment is surely something that will never be breathed aloud during those deliberations: Race. An African-American defendant who kills a white victim is far more likely to be sentenced to death than other murderers.

Racial bias in administration of the death penalty has led to its ban in New Jersey and a moratorium in Maryland. The U.S. General Accounting Office and Amnesty International have expressed grave concerns about the significantly enhanced likelihood of African-American defendants, or killers of white victims, receiving death sentences.

This case presents both to an all-white jury.

–Lisa Bloom, In Session anchor
http://insession.blogs.cnn.com/

If I hear one more commentator say that Barack Obama “transcends race,” I may do violence to my TV.

Isn’t the only implication of this statement that being African-American is a lowly status, which must be overcome?  Isn’t that why we never hear of white candidates transcending their race — because no one sees anything for Clinton or McCain to rise above?
 
“Transcend,” according to Merriam Webster, means “1 a: to rise above or go beyond the limits of b: to triumph over the negative or restrictive aspects of: overcome.”

There’s only one possible interpretation when someone says Obama transcends race:  that being African-American is a limiting, restrictive, negative state of being that he must break out of to have any shot at success.  It’s like calling African-Americans “articulate” — the back-handed compliment that implies that it’s such a surprise when they can form sentences!

As my biracial teenagers point out to me, Obama’s little-discussed biracial status may explain why he seems equally comfortable with both blacks and whites.  Those who grow up with family of two or more races are uniquely positioned to truly connect with people of different colors, without squeamishness or stereotypes.  Obama’s approach to others is not based on the color of their skin; isn’t it time for pundits’ approach to him to transcend racial bias?

- Lisa Bloom, “In Session” Anchor/360° Contributor

Read more Lisa Bloom blogs on “In Session”

Program note:  “Uncovering America: Race, Gender and Politics” airs Friday on 360° at 10p ET

Bobby Cutts Jr., surprising everyone, took the stand Monday and testified that his killing of his nine-months-pregnant girlfriend, Jessie Davis, was an accident

According to his tearful testimony, he pointed his finger in her face, and she bit it. Cutts tried to leave, but Davis grabbed his arm and told him he couldn’t. Pulling his arm away, he says, he threw his elbow back, it landed on Davis’ throat, and she fell, hard, to her death.

Bobby Cutts Jr. says it was a terrrible accident.

That bleach spot investigators found on Davis’ floor? Cutts, a former police officer, says he tried to revive her with the bleach, not cover up forensic evidence.

He loaded Davis’ body in the back of his truck and dumped it in a park, he testified. Watch the testimony

This sounds a lot like Joran van der Sloot’s recently broadcast statements. He claimed that he was fondling Natalee Holloway on an Aruban beach when she shivered and stopped breathing in his arms. Like Cutts, he didn’t call the police or get her to a hospital. Instead, he says, he enlisted a friend to dispose of her body, dumping her in the sea.

Are young women really so fragile that we spontaneously drop dead from a bump or a kiss? Are these men so morally bankrupt that their only reaction to a medical crisis is to hide a body?

Cutts’ and van der Sloot’s stories are absurdly implausible, and van der Sloot himself now says he was lying. Yet the “I didn’t do anything wrong, but then I panicked and disposed of the body” defense has worked in a recent high-profile American case.

Billionaire Robert Durst convinced a Texas jury that he shot his elderly neighbor in self-defense, and then chopped up the body and dumped it in Galveston Bay. Acquitted. The jury said it had to separate the killing and the cover-up.

Still, Cutts’ tearful testimony is unlikely to help him. Upended furniture and the disarray of Davis’ home indicate a struggle far greater than one elbow strike that hit the mark. The more he spoke yesterday, the less we liked him. He didn’t intend to leave his 2-year-old son alone for two days, he says, but he did. Cutts had the right to remain silent, but not the ability.

The case should go to the jury late Tuesday afternoon.

- Lisa Bloom, “In Session” Anchor/360° ContributorRead more Lisa Bloom blogs on “In Session”

The multimillionaire movie star paid no taxes – none at all, didn’t even file returns – from 1999-2004. Now on trial for tax fraud, his lawyers concede he must pay millions of dollars in back taxes, penalties and fees, but they claim no fraud took place because he was open in his refusal to pay.

Wesley Snipes makes a point.

Huh?

The jury is out as I write. He could face up to 16 years in prison if convicted, and his lawyers say even if acquitted, he’ll have to work for the next 20 years to repay his civil debt to the IRS. Read about the trial

Reminds me of Michael Vick. A man at the top of his game, who had it all, and who threw it all away for illegal behavior that is incomprehensible to most of us. He risked losing his high-flying NFL career over . . . dog fighting?

Wesley Snipes. Riding high as a worldwide film star, who risked his reputation, wealth and freedom to . . . join a merry band of tax avoiders? Guys who claim the IRS has no jurisdiction over wages earned in the U.S.?

Huh?

- Lisa Bloom, ‘In Session’ anchor/360° contributor

Check out more Lisa Bloom blogs on “In Session”

Bill Clinton has been criticized for comparing Barack Obama to Jesse Jackson.

Much of Saturday night’s coverage of Obama’s sweeping South Carolina primary victory focused on race, in part because he won 78% of the African-American vote. I watched the coverage and became increasingly disturbed at the seemingly endless discussion of race, and in the case of Hillary Clinton’s second place finish, gender.

Bill Clinton is hardly a racist, and it’s deeply insulting to suggest that he is.

There’s nothing wrong with saying that Barack Obama’s real viability as a presidential candidate is historic. But the comparison to Jesse Jackson, who’d held no political office when he ran in 1984 and 1988, and who had no chance of winning the nomination, much less the presidency, is less apt.

Obama and Jackson are both African-Americans who had the courage to aim high, but that’s about all they have in common. To compare them is to see only race in each man’s candidacy.

Caroline and Edward Kennedy feel a better comparison is to John Kennedy, and I do, too.

Obama and Kennedy both rallied and inspired young and disaffected voters. Both are progressives with compelling messages of hope. If we can see past skin color, we see comparisons differently.

What of the fact that 78% of the African-American voters in South Carolina supported Obama — does that mean they “voted their race”? This, to me, would be disturbing, implying that Obama’s position on issues, character and leadership, have nothing to do with black votes. But I don’t believe they supported Obama “because of” Obama’s race, any more than the overwhelmingly white Iowa voters chose Obama because of race.

To suggest that South Carolina blacks voted solely on race is insulting to African-Americans, suggesting that they do not research candidates or care about the issues like everyone else.

The “because of race” reasoning assumes that Obama is not the best candidate for the job. If he is, the argument is turned on its head. Perhaps only one-quarter of South Carolina whites voted for Obama because his race stood in their way of picking the best candidate for the job, whereas African-American voters were not blinded by Obama’s heritage.

The same reasoning could apply to Hillary Clinton. If she is the best candidate for the job, her higher numbers among women could reflect that women do not see her gender as an impediment, whereas men do.

In other words, instead of focusing on African-American support for Obama and female support for Clinton, why not analyze why their numbers are lower among whites and men? Because whites and men, even now in 2008 America, are considered the norm, and nonwhites and women are still considered “other,” with our “otherness” leaping out to analysts louder than anything else we do, and in the eyes of most analysts, our “otherness” is our defining characteristic, entirely driving how we think and vote.

Simone de Beauvoir wrote in 1949:

In the midst of an abstract discussion it is vexing to hear a man say: ‘You think thus and so because you are a woman’; but I know that my only defence is to reply: ‘I think thus and so because it is true,’ thereby removing my subjective self from the argument. It would be out of the question to reply: ‘And you think the contrary because you are a man’, for it is understood that the fact of being a man is no peculiarity.

Both Obama and Clinton candidacies are historic, and yes, that is worth mentioning in the coverage. And we would be remiss if we did not talk about the race and gender divides in voting, especially when they are pronounced.

But this election for most voters is about the issues: the economy, Iraq, health care. Our coverage is shallow — literally skin-deep — if we focus obsessively on Obama’s race and Clinton’s gender.

If we are to become a color-blind and gender-neutral people, let’s stop treating all the white males in the race as normal people, devoid of gender and race, and Obama and Clinton as the black man and the woman. And let’s stop dividing up voters solely on the basis of race and gender. Some of us “others” have a lot more going on than the color or the shape of our skin.

We may want out of this war, we may want experience, we may want health care for everyone, we may want a Supreme Court that will continue to protect abortion rights. And even if we vote for one of our own — as white males have for centuries — let’s reject the knee-jerk assumption that the only reason is race or gender.

- Lisa Bloom, ‘In Session’ Anchor/360° Contributor