America's Next Top Spouse

Another one of THOSE articles (Salon). But this one's more fun.

"Presidential candidates, all too regularly, are people whose entire lives have been clipped and trimmed and buffed to meet polling specifications. But their spouses, their children, their siblings! If we're lucky, these dapper power brokers are surrounded by far less perfect and conventional characters: blissfully untamed bohemians, wack-jobs or deliciously unreconstructed nogoodniks. When a candidate has a partner with texture, with flair -- with an arrest record -- there is the chance that she or he will leaven the weighty wonk of the endless campaign season. These rogue spouses have the potential to entertain us through the made-to-order claptrap of the debates, cheer us when we can't bear to hear the word "Rasmussen" again.
Most important, the weirdest and most wonderful of them remind us that behind their mates' pearly veneers and ill-tailored pantsuits lie the beating hearts of actual live human beings who once -- possibly many moons ago, maybe at Shirley MacLaine's house -- abandoned their talking points and just plain fell in love.
Sadly, compelling stump marriages have historically been rare. Far too many contenders seem to have selected their better halves from the Political Helpmate Bin made available to eighth-grade boys who already know they want to be president. I often wondered if these guys were spirited away during gym class and presented with a kick line of apple-cheeked, god-fearing, pearl-wearing, cookie-baking girls willing to sacrifice independent thought, sensuality and their postgraduate education in service to the highest office.
But in recent decades, these cookie-cutter expectations have begun to change. (Thank you, Jesus, and Hugh and Dorothy Rodham for producing a child so desperately ill-suited for her wifely destiny.) In a post-Hillary universe, as the second wave and children of the second wave grow up and form more egalitarian partnerships, there are more brassy, opinionated, loud, difficult, plum-crazy partners on the arms of their front-running partners. Just consider that Clinton was the first first lady ever to have earned a postgraduate degree. But in recent years, the primary fields have been lousy with lawyers and doctors and professors.

In the 2004 election, the spousal uprising hit another peak with the rocking Dr. Judith Steinberg Dean, who caused much consternation by refusing to give up her job as a doctor and join her husband, Howard, on the campaign trail. Apparently, she felt that helping sick people might be a more vital commitment than addressing every bridge club in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.
And then -- and I confess, my heart skips a beat just thinking about her -- there was Teresa. Oh, Teresa. I still dream about you, in your scarves, with your abiding love for your long-dead husband, and at least one son who had become a Buddhist blacksmith of medieval armor and no longer spoke to you, and your tendency to tell reporters to "shove it." You crazy old super-smart coot who was fluent in five languages, come back! Just don't bring the husband with you! Sigh.
Political spouses: When they are good they are very, very good, and when they are bad they are awesome!
Of course, everyone loves to blame these colorful birds for the troubles their ill-fated partners encounter on the electoral market. But that's face-saving hogwash. Terrible Teresa and Dr. Dean Medicine Woman didn't sink their husbands' candidacies; the boys took care of that just fine on their own. No, in addition to thrilling and entertaining us with their inappropriate behavior or unseemly show of intellect, nettlesome spouses also serve as a release valve for all the blame that frustrated campaigns and the media like to throw at anyone but the actual ham-fisted, saluting, yelping, straying, triangulating candidates. Realistically, no out-of-control spouse is actually going to sink a winning campaign. Unless, of course, he or she is a Vicodin-popping, intern-diddling, tongue-pierced, vegan puppy-killer! Bwahahahaha!"

Here come the amusing lines:

"I'm not saying these spouses are dull, but...

• Richardson, a graduate of Wheaton College, is committed to standard first lady causes like "Read Across America," "Big Brothers/Big Sisters" and improving the childhood immunization record in her state, and she was instrumental in the establishment of New Mexico's Office of Domestic Violence czar. She also brokered a deal in which Disney donated 20,000 Baby Einstein videos to low-income New Mexico families. These are all wonderful choices, but they do not put Richardson in hot contention in the race to be most scintillating political partner.
• But alas, when asked by Time if she would expect to have a say in presidential politics, she answered succinctly, "No."
• Carol, 71, totally has a MySpace page.

"Edging closer to scintillating:

• Edwards is possibly the single biggest hard-ass on the entire 2008 presidential landscape.
• After the end of his first marriage, Chris Dodd dated Bianca Jagger and Carrie Fisher, so there is a good chance, based on historical precedent, laws of attraction, etc., that Jackie is eccentric.
• In 1994, she made a series of bravura confessions: that she had had a longtime addiction to painkillers like Vicodin and Percocet, some of which, most unfortunately, she had stolen from the charity organization that she had founded. Also ill-timed was the revelation from a colleague who claimed that Cindy had asked him to lie about her drug use when she was in the midst of the adoption process.

Then there's the fun ones...

• "Now, the wood nymph has a MySpace page on which she has included the complete lyrics to "Stairway to Heaven." She recently scored major points for talking straight back to uptight interrogator Nora O'Donnell; when asked about her tongue piercing, Elizabeth shot back, completely reasonably, "I'm 30 years old. I've had it for 10 years. I don't see it as being a problem. I do still wear pearls.
• Judi Giuliani, wife of Rudy Giuliani: Judi is Giuliani's third wife, the woman he left second wife Donna Hanover for in a televised news conference. She sits at the front row of fashion shows, had a secret marriage she only came forward with when her husband announced his nomination, which was around the same time the couple announced that she would sit in on cabinet meetings were he elected. It has been reported that while her husband was still mayor of New York, if aides referred to her as "Judi" instead of "Judith," she would bawl them out. She buys extra seats on planes for her Louis Vuitton handbag. She has inspired an open rift between the candidate and his children: Andrew, who helpfully explained to reporters that he is estranged from his dad because "a problem exists between me and his wife," and Caroline, a Harvard student who demonstrated the froideur earlier this year by admitting on her MySpace page that she was supporting Barack Obama. But it is the fact that Judi Giuliani once held a job in which she demonstrated medical equipment on puppy dogs who often died after or during the demonstrations that really kicks her up a notch and puts her head and shoulders above the rest of the pack."