You have to wonder how many lies Arnold Schwarzenegger has told and whether he can keep them all straight.
California's former first couple's marriage is disintegrating in full view, the result of Schwarzenegger's transgression more than a decade ago in which he fathered a son by one of his household employees.
Amazingly, the woman remained on his domestic staff and payroll through January, according to the Los Angeles Times, which first disclosed the sordid tale.
We'll learn far more in the coming days about this episode and others. It will be fodder for Internet gossip sites and print and television tabloids. I feel sympathy for Maria Shriver and her children, and question whether Schwarzenegger is embarrassed, or if he is beyond embarrassment. This past weekend, he was seen yukking it up over lunch and cigars at a Beverly Hills restaurant with his old pal, Sylvester Stallone, not at all humbled.
Voters knew that Schwarzenegger was a lout when they elected him in the 2003 recall, as the Los Angeles Times had detailed how he had groped and fondled women over the years, leaving them angry, humiliated and distraught.
In such reporting efforts, reporters pursue leads that don't pan out, or can't be nailed down sufficiently to print. Such was the case with this project. But plenty was known. Here is one passage:
Now, as she walked along 19th Street, Schwarzenegger conveyed a sense of urgency: "Come close, it's very important."
As she drew nearer to his car to hear what he had to say, she recounted, Schwarzenegger "grabbed and squeezed" her left breast.
"If I was a man," she said she told him, "I would bust your jaw."
As tears welled in her eyes, she said, Schwarzenegger laughed. "He thought it was hilarious."
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