Only weeks ago, in sharp contrast to the somber reality of the moment, it appeared Anthony Weiner and Elliot Spitzer would transcend their corresponding peccadilloes (sexting and wearing dress socks while whoring) to become, respectively, Mayor and Comptroller of the Big Apple.  Dyspeptic at the prospect, The New York Observer described the dyadic revivication as the Boxer Rebellion.  Yet out on the West Coast, Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA) was slinging arrows at a different sex-crazed Jewish pol, namely San Diego Mayor Bob Filner.  Boxer demanded that Filner resign in the wake of multiple accusations of harassment, writing, “The latest revelations regarding your behavior toward women… have shaken me to my core.”  Soon thereafter, it became de rigueur for media types and local businesses to foment anti-Filner sentiment; even Hooters announced that Filner would henceforth be barred at the door.  That Hooters is the furthest thing from a bastion of women’s rights has already been highlighted by several lawsuits, perhaps none more pointed than a federal complaint brought by assistant manager Jarman Gray who contended a female “visiting training manager” told his waitresses, “If you need the extra money, go right ahead and suck a dick or fuck a customer is the money is right.”  Nonetheless, momentum has heavily shifted away from Filner – who is being sued by his own city – as a formal recall is under way.

Because I’m the last guy who wants to reanimate that whole Tupac-versus-Biggie debate, I’ll decline to surmise which story, East or West, brings more heft.   What is undeniable is the feckless attempt (think: Whiz Khalifa) offered by Middle America to join the fray.  To wit: Rep. Steve Cohen (D-TN) was caught tweeting then deleting “ilu” to a 23-year-old blonde during President Obama’s State of the Union address.  He later disclosed that young model was not in fact an object of affection, but rather his illegitimate daughter.  He recounted a romantic liaison with Frank Sinatra, Jr.’s ex-wife nearly a quarter century ago, and his more recent discovery of his progeny, one Victoria Brink.  Saying he was “proud to be her dad,” the Congressman even took Brink to last year’s White House Christmas (Kwanzaa?) Party.   Subsequently, a Springer-esque paternity test prompted a crestfallen Cohen to lament he was “stunned and dismayed” to discover Victoria’s biological father to be Texas oilman John Brink.

Admittedly, the story had the most zing when it seemed Cohen harbored a young paramour, but it got only weirder, if less salacious, in its intermediate stage.  The final truth proved both vacuous and pathetic.  In the end, Cohen was seen more as a patsy than a villain (think: Manti Te’o), especially when measured against those libidinous kikes Barney Frank and Dominique Strauss-Kahn.  Yet the irony in all this is that Cohen’s district lies only a stone’s throw form the Mississippi state line, across which the question of whether the girl you are fracking is or is not your daughter remains wholly immaterial.