ABSTRACT
Over the last several decades, following a string of cases involving high-ranking American politicians, the public disclosure of sexual indiscretions has become something of a rhetorical genre unto itself. The most infamous of such cases, perhaps, dates to 1998, when, via televised address to the nation, President Bill Clinton confessed to having had an inappropriate physical relationship with former White House intern, Monica Lewinsky. Since Clinton’s confession, however, numerous other public figures have, amid allegations and accusations, publicly acknowledged and repented for extramarital affairs and similar improper liaisons. In 2008, for instance, New York Governor Eliot Spitzer admitted to his involvement as a client of an illegal prostitution ring in a public letter of resignation. Later that year, in response to scrutiny from the press, former North Carolina Senator and presidential candidate John Edwards released a statement affirming reports of a 2006 adulterous relationship between himself and a former campaign worker. In 2009, South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford, too, in a series of press conferences and Associated Press interviews, remorsefully disclosed details of his own extramarital relationship with an Argentine journalist.
