Silent Partner: A Memoir of My Marriage by Dina Matos McGreevey

Author:Dina Matos McGreevey [Matos McGreevey, Dina]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Itzy, kickass.to
ISBN: 9781401395681
Publisher: Hyperion
Published: 2007-05-11T04:00:00+00:00

14. THE OTHER MAN

DESPITE THEIR ROLES AS representatives of the public, political figures lead lives that are to some degree insulated. They often have people to buffer them from the experiences of ordinary citizens—people to make their reservations for them, to pay bills on their behalf, to stand in lines for them, to drive them any- and everywhere, and even to fill their gas tanks. But they’re insulated in other, more profound, ways too. The fishbowl may be transparent from the outside—so many people can see in, after all—but those inside can’t always see out quite as clearly. That’s why political figures routinely misread their constituents, and perhaps it’s one of the reasons Jim misread the implications of his actions.

It was ironic that, despite his enormous sensitivity to managing his image, Jim could be remarkably nearsighted when it came to anticipating how some of his decisions would be perceived. There was toxic fallout from several of the choices he made—his selection for state police superintendent, a costly state-sponsored trip to Ireland, a trip to a union convention in Puerto Rico underwritten by a union leader with alleged mob ties. But worst of all was his move to make Golan Cipel his “special counsel on homeland security.”

Jim appointed Golan Cipel to his administration in January 2002, shortly after commencing the affair that, by Jim’s own admission, began while I was in the hospital awaiting the birth of our daughter. It was unconscionable. I guess that people engaged in adulterous affairs think they’re less obvious than they invariably are, especially in the beginning. Jim was no exception. When the news of Golan’s appointment broke in January, the affair was still very new, which may have been why Jim was not in the best position to see how bizarrely inappropriate the appointment was or how instantly it would raise questions about their relationship.

Newspaper accounts from February 2002—Jim’s second month in office—suggest that the press not only knew that the emperor wasn’t wearing any clothes but had an excellent idea of whom he wasn’t wearing them with. Reporters could stoop to the worst sort of smarmy innuendo to make known what they believed was going on but couldn’t yet prove. The Bergen Record, for example, vigilant but often shrill in its reporting, hinted at the affair in a page-one story appearing February 21, 2002, entitled MCGREEVEY PICKS ISRAELI AS ADVISER ON SECURITY; CALLS EX–CAMPAIGN AIDE A “SUPER-BRIGHT INDIVIDUAL.” Further down, the item read, “Democrats close to the administration say McGreevey and Cipel have struck up a close friendship and frequently travel together.” Given that peculiar subhead (it’s not generally big news that an appointee is considered bright by the person making the appointment), plus the paper’s characterization of Jim and Golan’s “friendship,” any reader over the age of twelve would have instantly understood that the paper was suggesting that “super-bright individual” was Jim’s term of endearment for Golan. Jim might as well have referred to him as “darling.”

If the Record wanted to expose Jim’s adulterous affair with Golan, they should have done so directly, without stooping to innuendo.

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