The XX Factor: What women really think.

The Good News: No Pathetic Press Conference for Stabenow

The good news is, Michigan Sen. Debbie Stabenow did not hold a news conference to say she was sticking by her hubby of five years after he confessed to police that he'd been with a prostitute. On the contrary, after the news came out, Stabenow didn't show up at a previously schedule press availability; instead, she put out a compact, two-sentence statement calling her mate's behavior "very disturbing and serious.''

The bad news, beyond the obvious: The hooker was arrested, but the john wasn't? What kind of nonsense is that, that he gets off with only a ticket for driving with a suspended license? Post-9/11, cops are seriously staking out the hotel rooms of prostitutes-in-training? And post-this latest spate of sex scandals, readers still see this sort of story in a partisan light? Most shocking to me were the comments appended to the story in today's Detroit Free Press -- from Democrats saying hey, at least he's not a toe-tapper like that Republican hypocrite Larry Craig. And from Republicans and even some Obama supporters laughing it up that this somehow shows the moral superiority of their team: "Obama is getting more and more supers to rally behind him,'' one poster said. "But the ones Billary have sewn up are the adulterers and their spouses.'' Jeez, can't we at least admit that human failings are bipartisan?  Though the Free Press story notes portentously that Hillary Clinton once attended a fundraiser for the former employer of this doofus, I don't see how voters could possibly conclude that this has anything to do with anything.