An Edwards family portrait

By now it’s made the rounds: the love-child admission heard round the world. John Edwards has admitted to fathering Frances Quinn, the daughter of former campaign worker Rielle Hunter.

SHOCKING.

I mean really. Did we not already know this? Did we not scoff and roll our eyes every single time John Edwards denied a) having an affair, b) showing up in a hotel room in LA holding a baby and c) actually owning up to being that baby’s father. Yeah, we did.

This story interests me for several reasons, the first being that he’s from North Carolina. I live right outside of Raleigh, the state’s capitol. John Edwards is from Raleigh, raised his first set of children there, and had I been attending public instead of private high school, I might have known his child Wade, the son who died in a horrific car accident. Down South, as you probably have already surmised, we don’t talk about this cheating stuff. Sure, it happens. All the damn time. But we don’t go around getting caught (and by we, I mean other people). And we sure as hell don’t go around cheating on our cancer-stricken wives, no matter how reportedly bitchy they were on the campaign trail.

This scandal is bringing undue attention to our fair state. Oprah has been to Chapel Hill to interview Elizabeth Edwards at their “sprawling farm,” which is just a bunch of nouveau riche buildings strung together on a cleared-out tobacco field. The guys from ABC News have been down here several times, first at Southern Village in Chapel Hill where Edwards’ headquarters were based, and then at their old home between Raleigh and Chapel Hill. (It should be noted here that when people refer to this area, it is known as the Triangle. Raleigh, Durham and Chapel Hill are separate cities. No one calls Raleigh “Raleigh-Durham.” That’s the airport. Not the town.)

I will fully admit here that I think John Edwards is a tacky son of a bitch who got too big for his britches and decided that his supposed good looks entitled him to sleeping around. After his wife was diagnosed with cancer. After he lost a child and had two other children. But this is beside my actual point.

How, someone please tell me, did he get saddled with being a baby daddy? This is 2010. That child is two years old. Even in 2008, there was birth control. Hell, birth control has mostly been around since the beginning of  time, whichever way you look at it, and I’m not going into methods here. What I am going into is the fact that IF you’re going to screw around, don’t be stupid. Don’t be so stupid as to bring a child into your scandalous affair for him or her to grow up forever labeled as “That Jackass Politician’s Love Child.” The number of stories in the press right now about celebrities having children out of wedlock is astounding. And I’m not judging that necessarily; if you’re in a committed relationship, have no plans to marry, but decide you want a child, go for it. Your life is your life. But when you already are in a committed relationship, one which exists in the public eye, one which you tout as strong and hold up as a model for your constituents, cheating is unacceptable.

I was having this same discussion with a friend of mine this morning and she said to me, “Yes, Elizabeth. I agree with you. But he’s human. People make mistakes.” Very true. I make mistakes every day. But I’m not running for President. I am not my state’s senator. I do not hold press conferences with my husband by my side to say that I’ve been married 40 years and we are happier than ever. I do not cheat.

There are those of you out there who will read the title of this post and think that I’m flippant and perhaps a little on the tasteless side, and let me point out that those are lyrics from a 90′s song. Just so you know. But those words never rang so true as they did this morning, when that rat fink liar confessed to lying for years, denying his third daughter and undoubtedly lying to his wife and children. He now has a living breathing reminder, living out in California, being photographed by paparazzi, that he cheated. That he went back on his word and stepped out on his family. And that little girl’s face will always remind people of this scandal.

She doesn’t deserve that and neither does his family.