Florida man usually gets arrested in a swamp, outside a strip mall or while trying to wrestle an alligator in cargo shorts.
Washington man gets a cable-news contract, a lawyer, a statement about “mistakes in judgment” and maybe a pension.
That brings us to Eric Swalwell, the California Democrat who spent years hollering about Donald Trump as though he were the last upright man in public life — a sort of high-speed moral patrol car with better hair and worse timing. Swalwell was one of Trump’s loudest accusers during impeachment and after Jan. 6, casting himself as a national lecturer on decency, truth and fitness for office.
And now? He has resigned from Congress after multiple women accused him of sexual misconduct, including allegations that are now under investigation. Swalwell denies the allegations and says the most serious claims are false.
Which is where satire stops needing a writer and starts doing the work itself.
Because if Bill Clinton was the grand piano player in the hotel lounge of Democratic scandal, Swalwell looks like the guy in the corner trying to do the same act on a broken keyboard. Clinton, of course, remains the Sinatra of shamelessness — all appetite, smirk and survival. Monica Lewinsky turned the Clinton presidency into the most infamous workplace-ethics seminar in American history, and yet Democrats spent years explaining that perjury, degradation, and serial boundary failure were really just unfortunate turbulence on the flight path to progress.
The amazing thing is not that politicians behave badly. That has been true since the first toga got lifted in Rome. The amazing thing is the performance afterward.
First comes the sermon. Then comes the scandal. Then comes the denial. Then comes the lawyer. Then comes the statement about family, faith, healing, privacy and the strange discovery that due process is suddenly sacred after years of calling everyone else a monster by lunchtime.
Swalwell’s problem is not merely that he has been accused of ugly conduct and that the accusations exploded a career that was once headed toward higher office. It is that he built his brand on moral accusation. He was one of those sleek television prosecutors who always seemed to be one microphone away from indicting half the republic. That is why this story lands with such a hard and satisfying thud. The self-appointed referee has been marched off the field by his own rulebook.
And naturally, Washington being Washington, the pension question floats in right behind the scandal like a seagull after a shrimp boat.
Regular Americans are told to save more, retire later, lower expectations and stop dreaming of luxury items such as steak, a paid-off roof or a homeowner’s insurance premium that does not resemble ransom money. But in Congress, even disgrace can come with a benefits package. Under current law, losing a congressional pension generally requires a qualifying criminal conviction, which is why new proposals are surfacing again now that Swalwell’s case has blown up.
And that is the joke that should make every taxpayer in Florida snort coffee through his nose.
A drywall man in Spring Hill misses work for two weeks, and he is in financial trouble. A waitress in Brooksville gets her hours cut, and she is one car repair away from panic. A roofer in Ocala tweaks a knee and starts doing math that would make a prison accountant cry.
But a politician can spend years preening on television, collapse in scandal, resign in disgrace and still have the public told to keep calm while the retirement machinery hums softly in the background.
That is not public service. That is a racket with lapel pins.
To be fair, Republicans have fielded their own parade of clowns, goats and trench-coat Casanovas. Washington corruption is the one truly bipartisan infrastructure project. But Democrats in particular have perfected the nasal, chin-up art of moral vanity. They market themselves as the enlightened guardians of women, ethics and civilized behavior — right up until one of their own detonates, at which point everybody starts speaking in the soft legal tones of a hostage negotiator.
Bill Clinton taught them the playbook. Smile. Deny. Outlast. Rebrand. Collect applause from people who would have demanded public flaying had the accused worn a red tie.
Swalwell did not invent that tradition. He merely updated it for the age of social media outrage and televised sanctimony.
So here is a modest reform proposal from the sweaty republic: If a politician is convicted of serious wrongdoing tied to abuse of office or sexual predation, taxpayers should not be on the hook for the golden-years thank-you package. No pension palace. No silk-cushion exit. No reward for turning public life into a sleazy farce.
Let disgraced politicians retire the old-fashioned American way — worried, overcaffeinated and staring at a bill they cannot quite believe.
In Florida, we know a con when we see one.
Washington just wears better suits.
Larry D. Clifton is a native Floridian, a graduate of Eckerd College and the author of the science fiction thriller “Martin’s Secret,” available at Barnes & Noble.
