SALON

Monday, Apr 16, 2012 7:17 PM UTC

Secret Service scandal: GOP gets ahead of the facts

We don't know what happened in Colombia, but GOP congressmen are already talking about unlikely sexual blackmail

By

Topics: Love and Sex, Sex,

Secret Service scandal: GOP gets ahead of the facts (Credit: iStockphoto/johnnyscriv)

Secret Service agents, with their impenetrable black sunglasses and unwavering stoicism, seem anonymous, sexless beings. They are rigorously trained to sacrifice all, including their lives, in the name of their president. And yet even they, in their nun-like devotion, are vulnerable to the lure of easy sex.

At least, that’s the narrative playing out in the news today surrounding allegations of misconduct involving Secret Service agents and a prostitute — possibly prostitutes, plural — in Cartagena, Colombia, ahead of the president’s visit there. The media has been whipped into a frenzy — finally, another sex scandal! — while officials have been quick to offer condemnation, some claiming that the incident could put national security at risk.

Now, before getting all hot and bothered, let’s look at the actual evidence that’s available: This happened before the president arrived in the country. The agents in question are not members of the presidential protective division. Officials have said that some of the agents under investigation “may merely have been attending a party and violating curfew,” according to ABC News. Still, Republican congressmen Peter King (N.Y.) and Darrell Issa (Calif.) have claimed that the incident could leave the agents vulnerable to blackmail.

Dan Emmett, a two-decade Secret Service veteran, disagrees. “I spent six years in the CIA after I left the Secret Service and am well familiar with sexual blackmail espionage,” he told ABC. “It is a tactic, but I just don’t see that here. The Secret Service is not an intelligence organization, it’s law enforcement.” He also noted that prostitution is legal in parts of Colombia and that “this is not a criminal conduct type of situation, it’s strictly personal conduct.” (That’s an important distinction — although it might not spare the agents their jobs: Paul Morrissey, the Secret Service’s assistant director, told CNN that the agency has a “zero tolerance policy on personal misconduct.”)

Rep. Peter King, who was briefed on the investigation, says a “significant number” of the agents involved brought women back to their hotel on the night in question and that the women are “presumed” to be prostitutes. But it hasn’t been confirmed. It’s alleged that one of those women refused to leave the agents’ room the next morning until she was given money, but we have no clue whether there was negotiation over her services before she came to the room, or why there was an alleged disagreement over, or delay in, payment. Based on news reports, it could be that Secret Service agents had a massive orgy with Colombian prostitutes — or that one agent had a date that ended with a disagreement over money. We just don’t know.

No matter: The American public loves a good sex scandal, especially one involving politicians or law enforcement — and with this story, we have have bit of both. We never tire of seeing authority figures felled by their sexual appetites, do we? Stories like this function as an allegory for our own repressed desires, our terror of the power of sex, and fear of losing control. I have but one question: How long before the porn parody is made?

Tracy Clark-Flory

Tracy Clark-Flory is a staff writer at Salon. Follow @tracyclarkflory on Twitter and Facebook. More Tracy Clark-Flory.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
    Credit: AP/LM Otero

  • Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center in Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
    Credit: AP/Matt Rourke

  • A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
    Credit: AP/Jenny Aicher

  • Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
    Credit: AP/Molly Riley

  • Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
    Credit: AP/J. Scott Applewhite

  • Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
    Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster

  • O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
    Credit: AP/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Jeff Scheid

  • Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
    Credit: AP/NASA/Chris Hadfield

  • When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
    Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin

  • A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
    Credit: AP/The Duluth News-Tribune/Clint Austin

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments

 33 Comments

Comment Preview

Your name will appear as username

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href=""> <b> <em> <strong> <i> <blockquote>

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

vote
Journalists file suit against Manning's trial secrecy: Plaintiffs including Glenn Greenwald and Julian Assange demand press, public access to trial and documents
121 points122 points | comment
vote
Report: Nearly a quarter of Americans struggle to afford food
109 points110 points | 10 comments
vote
Kaitlyn Hunt refuses plea offer, will go to court over high school relationship - The 18-year-old rejected a deal that would have labeled her a sex offender and placed her under house arrest
64 points65 points | 15 comments
vote
Kaitlyn Hunt refuses plea offer, will go to court over high school relationship - The 18-year-old rejected a deal that would have labeled her a sex offender and placed her under house arrest
65 points66 points | 72 comments
vote
Journalists file suit against Manning trial secrecy: Plaintiffs including Glenn Greenwald and Julian Assange demand press, public access to trial and documents
61 points62 points | 3 comments

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: Chekhov's story mirrors Russia's own

Recommendations