Kelly McParland: Why some politicos survive sex scandals and others don’t

Howard Kurtz, the media pundit for the Daily Beast, offers nine reasons who some sleezoid politicians manage to survive sex scandals, while others are ruined forever.
His list includes personality, spouses, degree of hypocrisy, level of denial, geographical location, timing, money and more.
A sample:

Personality Matters: Bill Clinton used his political charm to outmaneuver his enemies over the Monica Lewinsky mess, and it didn’t hurt that the country was peaceful and prosperous on his watch. Pundits who had pronounced him toast were astounded that he left office with high approval ratings.
Hypocrisy Matters: Eliot Spitzer resigned as New York governor two days after the onetime prosecutor who had gone after moral turpitude was found to have patronized high-priced hookers—an illegal habit. His background helped seal his fate.
Spouses Matter: Mark Sanford served out his term as South Carolina governor after admitting he had slipped away to Argentina to visit his soul mate, but his wife Jenny’s decision to dump him ended his political career. Hillary, as everyone remembers, stood by her cheating man.

See all nine here

The list is related, of course, to the personal self-destruction of the incalculably stupid Rep. Anthony Weiner, who would appear to have violated far too many of the nine criteria to survive. He especially made the mistake of being from New York, where the tabloids are feasting on him like starved buzzards.
Having pondered the matter, however, raises a few thoughts. For instance:
Of all the men (there are no women sleezoids, apparently) mentioned, only Bill Clinton really got away with it. Clinton managed not only to survive, but to win re-election and attain the near bullet-proof retirement status of lovable rogue. All the others — John Edwards, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Dominique Strauss-Kahn, Eliot Spitzer, Mark Sanford, Newt Gingrich, John Ensign — have paid a price in one form or another.
Schwarzenegger didn’t get caught in office, so can’t be defeated, but would seem indelibly besmirched by his activities. Strauss-Kahn may avoid a return to jail (especially if he manages somehow to get back to France, where assaulting women isn’t viewed as a political liability, if the woman is low enough in the social order) but has already lost his bank job, and would appear finished as a presidential wannabe.
What may be more interesting than the similarities is the differences. Eliot Spitzer’s wife stood by him, just like Hillary Clinton did with Bill, but he  was chewed up and spit out anyway. (Now he’s a successful pundit, and told Kurtz his fellow cads deserve no sympathy). Schwarzenegger has all the political charm of Bill Clinton, but doesn’t seem likely to replicate his astonishing survival.

The late Den. Edward Kennedy isn’t mentioned, but probably should be, as he comes closest to having equalled Clinton’s talent at survival. He survived the scandal resulting from the death of  Mary Jo Kopechne, followed by umpteen later embarrassments involving sex or booze, yet ran for  his party’s presidential nomination and was lauded in old age as a lion of the Senate.

Which raises the question: what is it about some Democratic politicians that lets them get away with this stuff, but not others?
National Post