P.S. You can keep the money I gave you

Dear John,

Ha, ha, that’s funny. “Dear John.”

Except it’s not.

So, John, dude.

Dude.

Ya fucked up. What else is new, huh?

I guess I have to say that, having had one marriage in which I was under a microscope, and everyone in my little community knew every detail and so therefore thought they knew me, and knew him, and also therefore thought they knew the story of our marriage, I am firmly in the “your marriage is none of my business” camp. Because no one outside of a marriage can ever really understand that marriage. And they certainly cannot judge that marriage.

But hold on. There are, as Pee Wee would say, a couple of big buts.

Big but #1 – Did Gary Hart teach you nothing? He certainly taught Bill Clinton nothing, and so Clinton was doomed to repeat Hart’s history. And now you, having not learned from Clinton, are doomed to repeat Clinton’s history. And holy cow, dude, that is some tired-ass mamajamma history. No one’s history is more tired than Bill Clinton’s. So, you know, that is making me doubt your taste a little bit. Well, that, and the dad jeans.

Big but #2 – You got 30% of the Democratic vote in Iowa! You were on television in, like, 157 debates! Have you figured out yet that the only candidate in the Democratic primary that gets to sneak around town unnoticed is Mike Gravel? In your big mea culpa statement, you pled guilty to narcissism and being egocentric, how exactly does that jive with your assumption that wearing a t-shirt to the Beverly Hills Hilton constitutes an effective disguise from the paparazzi?

Big but #3 – Dude, it’s so obvs not all out. Your timeline is wonky. Your statement disavowing all knowledge of monies paid to the other woman is not believable. You agree to a paternity test at exactly the same time the other woman changes her mind and decides NOT to have one. And lastly, your alleged baby daddy beard is a paid political operative with a criminal history. Really, the only thing missing is your DNA on the baby’s diaper.

Stop trying to mitigate. There is no mitigating. It just makes you look like a bigger weasel. Accept it all, even the bits that you feel are unfair. Take all the abuse, and take it like a man. Don’t quibble the details. You are so, so past the details.

Then go home and grow a beard and work on something worthwhile for a couple of years. I don’t know, start a soup kitchen or an employment agency. Get your hair cut at Super Cuts for twelve dollars. Suffer. Do something for that second America that I think you really do care about. I hear Habitat for Humanity can always use a hand, and hanging out with President Carter wouldn’t hurt, either. He might be able to teach you how to lust in your heart, and keep your little mill worker in your pants.

Whatever happens, don’t write any books. Seriously. That is the last thing you, and most especially we, need.

You’ve admitted that you fucked around because you thought you were special, and you thought the world revolved around you. That’s a big step. That’s a hard thing to face up to. Don’t throw it away. Embrace the humiliation, and learn something.

And then in eight years or so, come back, and tell us what you learned. By then, you will have so little to lose, that you might actually possess something valuable. Something we need. Hey, you never know, right?

Good luck, John. I mean it. Goodbye.