Greetings, loyal minions. Your Maximum Leader sees quite a number of scandals in the news of late.

Let us begin with the scandal involving King Carl Gustav XVI of Sweden and strip clubs. First off, this hardly counts as a scandal. Perhaps your Maximum Leader should refer to it as a “scandal.” Apparently the King is “accused” of going to strip clubs. Your Maximum Leader was going to write that the king was accused of “going to strip clubs and having nekkid or nearly nekkid girls dance for him” but then your Maximum Leader thought “what else does one do at a strip club.”

(NB: To define terms: nude is the artistic state of being without clothes; naked is the “regular/day-to-day” condition of being without clothes; nekkid is the state of having no clothes also involving “action.”)

Your Maximum Leader doesn’t get the “scandal” of going to a strip club. Okay, it is a little unseemly to have the King of Sweden getting the crown jewels polished (presumably through his Highness’ tailored trousers) by some girl with daddy issues. But then again… He is the King of Sweden, not the King of Puritan-ville. One supposes that it is possible to be upset with the king if he was using some of his “allowance” from the taxpayers of Sweden to “tip” the women in question. Then again, if a King can’t get a lap dance “on the house” from time to time then monarchy is truly dead. Even in Sweden.

Frankly, your Maximum Leader is fully supporting King Carl Gustav on this one. Lay off the King for pete’s sake. Your Maximum Leader can’t imagine Queen Silvia getting worked up about this. She is German afterall…

In domestic scandal…

There is Congressman Wiener. He lied about his account being hacked and sending a photo of his junk (in underwear) to a girl using Twitter. Additionally, he will not resign from Congress. Your Maximum Leader is of two minds on this. Being of the political stripe he is, your Maximum Leader is confident that if Congressman Wiener were a Republican he would be hounded out of Congress by the media and his caucus-mates. So on some level, your Maximum Leader thinks that he should go. To be clear, the reason he should go is (at this point) not the photo, but the lying about the photo and the repeated lying about the photo.

Of course, Congressman Wiener is a Democrat and to the best of his knowlege he’s never been a big advocate for “pro-family” or “traditional values.” As best your Maximum Leader can tell, the Democrat party doesn’t have much truck for “pro-family” or “traditional values” politicians. So Wiener’s not crossed any party taboos by doing what he’s done. One would like to assume that lying would be a problem to Democrat voters and elected politicians. But your Maximum Leader long ago learned that to most Democrats there is “lying” and “lying about sex.” Democrats say they don’t approve of “lying” but “lying about sex” is a different kettle of fish altogether. Frankly anyone should be allowed to lie about sex (according to Democrats).

Your Maximum Leader has always wondered about lying about sex and Democrats. At some level your Maximum Leader doesn’t think of himself as a puritanical person. Hypothetically, if a candidate was single and it somehow came up that the single candidate planned on playing the field and dating and having sex with people while in office it wouldn’t be a problem. Indeed, the candidate’s honesty would be refreshing. But if a candidate were married (and even married but not a vocal “pro-family” person) but were cheating on his spouse or sending racy photos of himself to people that becomes a general honesty issue. Your Maximum Leader does have issues with people being dishonest. He does believe that if you are dishonest in some areas you are more likely to be dishonest in others. So, if you cheat on your marital oath; you are likely to be willing to cheat on your oath of office….

Your Maximum Leader would like to see Congressman Wiener leave Congress, but that is as much a partisan view as anything else. We’ll see what happens…

Then there is John Edwards. As you surely know, former Senator Edwards was indicted recently. He is accused (and being prosecuted) for violating campaign finance laws and using illegal donations to hide his extramarital affair and love-child.

Now… Allow your Maximum Leader to be clear… Your Maximum Leader, for many years now, has really really really loathed John Edwards. If Edwards burst into flame, your Maximum Leader wouldn’t piss on him to douse the flames (even if your Maximum Leader had an uncomfortably full bladder). John Edwards isn’t worth a bucket of warm spit. John Edwards isn’t worth the powder and shot needed to blow him up. John Edwards is a lousy and dishonorable person.

Okay… Now that those comments are out of the way…

Your Maximum Leader will wager you that John Edwards is acquitted of all the counts against him. Your Maximum Leader would like to see Edwards convicted and go to jail; but it isn’t going to happen. From what your Maximum Leader can tell… These donations never went into the Edwards campaign. The payments used to keep the mistress and love-child out of the news were not written from campaign accounts. It seems hard to convict someone for getting illegal campaign contributions if the contributions never went to the campaign. Of course, as rich as Edwards is (from his years of ambulance chasing), one is surprised that he didn’t just have some sort of personal slush fund that he could make these payments from.

Anyhooo…

Your Maximum Leader thinks Edwards will get off on these charges. It looks like an overzealous prosecution by the US Department of Justice.

Overzealous prosecution by the US Department of Justice… Words your Maximum Leader rarely types in that order… Hummmm….

Carry on.