Bennett, One Last Time: Eugene makes a point worth noting: that Bennett isn't a hypocrite if he really believes, say, that drugs are bad and gambling is not. But my problem is not with Bennett gambling or possibly being a hypocrite. My problem is with him being a nanny. My problem is with anyone who advances a moral argument against a transaction between consenting adults, whether a business transaction, a sexual transaction, or a social transaction. Clinton (you brought it up!) is a good example of both the sexual and social transactions: his affairs in the context of his marriage. Bluntly put, I have no problem with his dalliances. That falls under his social agreement with Hillary. If she's willing to excuse it, if she's in the relationship for something other than sexual exclusivity, so be it. My interest in Clinton-Lewinsky (other than it being just great Page Six stuff) was that their relationship had a direct bearing on a sexual harassment case that the Supreme Court had cleared to proceed. (Whether the court was right to do so is another matter.) And Clinton himself supported the law that allowed a plaintiff in a sexual harassment case to call in testimony from the accused party's other, er, conquests. When he perjured and obstructed, specifically to undermine that law, he committed a crime that rose to the level of impeachment.

Bennett, on the other hand, is guilty of nothing more than looking foolish for preaching self-control and practicing excess. And, while I don't find gambling sinful in any way, shape, manner, or form, dumping eight million clams into the slots is excess any way you slice it.