Sheriff Isham Shouldn't Lose His Job Over His Affair

Last night, I talked about Marion County, Oregon Sheriff Russ Isham being forced to resign- all because he covered up an extramarital affair. In addition, Isham has to give up law his enforcement credentials, meaning that he can't be a police officer in the state of Oregon.

Isn't that a little harsh a judgment to give a man who likes to have a woman on the side? While I still think that Isham should have manned up sooner about the tryst, I'm not going to say that he was wrong for cheating on the wife- that's for him, the wife, and probably the Deity to work out (and I don't think the Deity will be as harsh on Isham as the Oregon Attorney General has been). Sure, law enforcement officers are supposed to be pillars of the community, but we do have some rotten to the core apples who need to relinquish their badges. Isham, however, doesn't come across to me as one of them. He's human. He has needs, and perhaps the wife wasn't meeting those needs. Or perhaps she was, and he needed a bit more excitement. I don't know about what goes on in Sheriff Isham's private life, and I don't give a rat's ass about what he does either, as long as no one gets hurt. It's time for us- the general public- to stop worrying about whether the sheriff or police chief is cheating on their spouses/significant others, and worry about how they're performing their jobs. Their jobs, as I see it, are hard enough already without us bitching at every wrong move- save for, perhaps a brutality case- they make.

(C) 2009 by Darren W. Alexander. All Rights Reserved.