Rudy May Be a Scoundrel but...

I am not a fan of Rudy. He has acted both immorally and irresponsibly. He has been less than transparent in his public and private lives. Though to be fair, transparency and adultery are difficult to reconcile unless you’re referring to the opacity of a negligee.

In reading all the Rudy stories* that have broken since the revelation that his girlfriend/mistress, now wife, was schlepped from trysting place to trysting place by publicly paid guards and police, I have a concern. The civilian bloggers disproportionately compare him to Mussolini or make Mafia references. The public comments almost invariably drop in an Italian word or reference. I don’t want to go too PC here but this strikes me as NOT ok.

Going for ethnic stereotypes is no more permissible with Italians than it would be with Jews, Hispanics or Blacks. There is the implication by connection that he is as he is because of his ethnicity and this further implies that others of his group may also be so blessed or cursed (and it doesn’t matter is if it is a good or bad stereotype. The assumptions are insulting).

So call him a crook or a cheat. Reject him as a bully if you wish, or love him for being tough and a testosterone besotted real man. All of this is about Rudy and not the vowel at the end of his name.

*Full disclosure: Do not take my claim of reading “all the Rudy stories” literally. Were I to have done so, I would still be reading and not writing. Let’s leave it at: I read a fair sampling of Rudy stories and comments.