David Vitter, the Gift That Keeps on Giving

BEVERLY HILLS, Calif. — A former New Orleans prostitute who will be featured in Larry Flynt's Hustler magazine appeared at his office Tuesday to accuse Sen. David Vitter of having a sexual relationship with her in 1999. Wendy Ellis told reporters that Vitter visited her two to three times a week for sexual relations between July and November 1999.

"Abstinence education is a public health strategy focused on risk avoidance that aims to help young people avoid exposure to harm. These programs have been shown to effectively reduce the risks of out-of-wedlock pregnancy and sexually transmitted diseases by teaching teenagers that saving sex until marriage and remaining faithful afterwards is the best choice for health and happiness." from Sen. Vitter's letter of June 21, 2007, to Sen. Max Baucus, Chairman of the Senate Committe on Finance.

Dear Senator Vitter,

Not to worry, David. Noted political commentator and sex impresario Larry Flynt has accurately doped out your situation. While your Republican colleague Larry Craig was quickly and mercilessly shown the door because of his wide stance and restless leg syndrome, your situation is very different. You're a freshman senator from a state with a Democratic governor. Craig, by contrast, represents the reddest of red states, Idaho. Moral censure of Senator Craig, therefore, is appropriate because his replacement will be named by a Republican governor. In a senate where the margins are so razor thin, where there are Republicans, Democrats and Joseph Lieberman, there has to be a limit to all this tiresome moralizing, right, Senator McConnell?
Personally, I would hate to see you go, David. Whenever the American political scene gets a little too dreary, out clatters another skeleton from your voluminous closet.

Maybe you don't personally make all those best choices for health and happiness, but you're faithful in your own way. The latest ho to blow the whistle on you, who apparently just passed a lie detector test and appeared on the Dan Abrams Show with that rascal Larry Flynt, uses the name Wendy. That's so...sweet, because that's your wife's name. Maybe it was a cry for help, or you were just being sentimental. However, I have to raise a delicate question, which you may know the answer to better than I, given your extensive work in the Abstinence Program. It Depends (I'm sorry about the lousy pun) on the precautions you took, but the ho says you were dropping by "to do your business" (sure, cold and mercantile, but what do you expect from a ho?, Senator) two to three times a week for four months. So if she's telling the truth, you were unfaithful to Wendy with Wendy perhaps as many as 50 times. Might there be an element of...risk there, Senator, of the kind you want the nation's youth to avoid? Could you unwittingly have been bringing a little of Wendy Ellis home to Wendy Vitter?

My guess is that Wendy Ellis, as opposed to Wendy Vitter, is not an adherent of the Abstinence Program, and paid no attention to your sound advice about monogamy. I guess what I'm saying, Senator, is that it's unlikely you were her only john, although, in fairness to you, I would wager that you were her most distinguished john - not only a United States Senator, but a major proponent of the Abstinence Education Program, Section 510 of the Social Security Act, which your almost unbelievably sanctimonious letter to Senator Baucus describes as "critical in supporting communities who wish to promote good and healthy choices for our nation's adolescents."

When I was one of the nation's adolescents fumbling around in the back seat of a 1965 Mercury Comet, I didn't have an Abstinence Program to steer me right. I'm not absolutely certain it would have done the trick, tell the truth. There is only so much that education can do when confronted by the forces of nature. I sense you know what I mean. Maybe this latest embarrassment will blow over soon. This gal could be an opportunist, despite the passing grade on Flynt's lie detector test. She's going to do a spread in Hustler, of course, and she'll be paid. That looks better for you, as you fend off another round of sordid accusations. I'd say your chances of keeping your seat are excellent, unless too many more revelations hit the airwaves. What might finally do you in is if Larry can get enough gals together to do a Girls of Senator Vitter issue. That probably wouldn't help a lot with Wendy #1, either. Anyway, go back and read your June 21 letter one more time. If it can stop a horny nineteen year old boy from making a serious mistake, it just might work for you.