Who Cares about Gavin Newsom?

Within the Bay Area the recent scandal involving Gavin Newsom has been receiving a lot of attention from the media. For those of you who don't know, Newsom - the mayor of San Francisco - had been having an affair with his campaign manager's wife for over a year. It was the headline story on many daily papers, has been on the evening news, and provided fodder for local conservative talk radio. Quite frankly, I was bored with it before it began.

As an elected official, I disagree with most of what Newsom proposes (though not all). I would not be likely to vote for him anyway when he is up for re-election in November. However, his personal ethics (or lack thereof) don't necessarily influence his professional ethics. If this had been a situation of the mayor laundering funds, things would be different. How, then, could we trust him with our money? Yet, it's not. Furthermore, there a probably many doctors, grocers, bankers, etc... out there who have done immoral things, but we still give them our business. Why? Because most of their personal choices don't affect their professional decisions.

I may not like Gavin Newsom's politics, but I don't care at all about his personal flings.