A quick note on Ryan Lizza's (quite good) meditation on why Mark Warner dropped out. While weighing the evidence on whether Warner was deterred by a potential scandal, Lizza writes:
Was there a skeleton? My own experience with Warner suggests that he was, at the very least, wary of the modern-day vetting process for presidential candidates. When I first interviewed him in a hotel suite in Las Vegas back in June, he turned serious at the end of our chat and made a point of reminding me about the enormous responsibility that a journalist has when writing about a public figure. That same day, he summoned another national reporter to his suite to complain about a profile this person had written months earlier.
One night in New Hampshire, after a few drinks at a pool hall in a college town, the conversation turned to the political troubles of another potential '08 contender. I told a story that had been making the rounds about how this politician once spit on his wife. Warner's huge jaw dropped and his face blanched. The table fell silent. "I guess that's not that funny to you, is it?" I muttered. He shook his head.
Lizza takes that as evidence that Warner feared rumors about the sexual or marital proclivities of candidates. I'm not sure that's a plausible read. I don't know the whole story, but a man spitting on his wife isn't very funny. It's abusive. And possibly scary. That Warner's face went white may be evidence that he took the domineering, violent undertones of the tale seriously, not that he feared a similar instance in his past arising. Like most everything else in Lizza's story, this anecdote makes me like Mark Warner much more.
Incidentally, what happens now to the $10 million Warner raised? And isn't he a good prospect for donating the money to 2006 efforts, considering that the presidential run funders had offered cash for has now evaporated?
