Three things immediately come to mind about the Dominique Strauss-Kahn Affair. The first is the question of who’s handling the guy’s public relations. Whoever they are they really knows their business. Between placements in high profile and usually qualify pubs, and feeds to the tabs, the media campaign to exonerate DSK and denigrate his accuser is one of the best I’ve ever seen. If I ever have the money and the need, I will definitely look up these professionals.
The next thing that comes to mind here is the matter of credibility. More specifically, why has the accuser’s credibility suddenly been diminished more than DSK’s — even given the quality of the media campaign to make this happen?
Right after this affair came to light, we learned that DSK had been accused of questionable sexual gambits with women several times over the years, Indeed, this very day, there’s news that a young French woman might be suing him over such an encounter that allegedly occurred in 2002 and was covered up at the time.
This, one might suppose, makes DSK’s own credibility vis-a-vis almost any accuser supported by forensics suspect. Yet here we are, reading about things that make the present accuser’s own version of events appear to lack credibility.
What are the credibility-killers here that have so far been made public? It’s said she may have lied in her immigration application to get into this country.
True? False? I don’t know. What I do know is that with literally millions of people seeking to legally migrate to these shores to escape either horrific violence or lives of grinding poverty, I would lie on an immigration application if I were in that sort of situation and I thought it would help me get into the U.S. Wouldn’t you? And do such lies (if they actually occurred) really make someone less believable in other matters?
It’s also been reported that this accuser may have fudged on her taxes. Hmm, someone who misrepresents something in order to pay less tax. Have you ever heard the like?
O.K. It’s wrong. But something that makes someone unreliable in other realms?
Gosh, I hope not, inasmuch as it would disqualify 90 percent of self-employed Americans from ever being believed about anything. And by the by, 100 percent of all Frenchmen — France being long known as the land of three sets of books: the official books, the books you show the taxman when he asks to see the real books, and the real books.
And there’s that supposedly damning thing that makes this accuser seem really less credible. She is reported to have said on the phone that she saw a possibility of profiting financially from her encounter with DSK.
Can you imagine that? Here she is, living in New York, and considering how to benefit financially from an encounter with a rich guy who she claims came on to her in an unwanted and injurious way. In New York, mind you, the slip-and-trip-and-sue capital of America, with a branch of the local bar that actually specializes in suing over injuries caused by defective vending machines. And this woman might sue in New York over an alleged rape. Imagine that.
What really bothers me in this wretchedly sordid affair, however, doesn’t involve its reportage or even its legality Nor even the idiotic view of many French commentators that his whole alleged business with a hotel maid has been blown up by a vulgar American public too sexually unsophisticated to appreciate the absolute right of an Important Man to practice some updated and attenuated version of the old doit du seigneur.
No. What greatly bothers me, and should greatly bother everyone else, is DSK’s lack of public responsibility.
RHIP. Rank has its privileges. With these privileges, however, comes responsibilities One can’t simply do something at critical times that might affect his or her ability to perform the duties that wealth, power, and position have bestowed. It;s not allowed. And claims that privacy must be respected, that judgment withheld, that personal quirks ought be overlooked, are simply irrelevant and indeed stupid.
There’s a worldwide financial crisis being played out today. DSK was a highly skilled and well respected strategist whose abilities could have been very useful in meeting this crisis. But because he opted for a quick diddle with a hotel maid, consensual or otherwise, he is not, and will not, be in place to perform the services he was entrusted to perform..
How do I view DSK’s behavior at a time when the world is in financial crisis that his experience and reputation and abilities should have put him to place to help alleviate? I view him like a general unable to help direct a critical battle because he got too drunk the night before.
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