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The confession manual for a politician’s mistress

Tory Maguire

by Tory Maguire

17 Mar 06:00am

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Filed under: John Edwards, Media, Men And Women, Michelle Chantelois, Mike Rann, Politics, Rielle Hunter

40 comments

There must be a handbook given out to women who have had, or claim to have had, an affair with a high-profile politician. I imagine it’s called something like The truth will set you free! Seriously, you’re fabulous and, like, totally emotionally evolved!!

Rielle Hunter in GQ and Michelle Chantelois at the AdelaideNow studio

It’s full of sage advice such as “stop being so utterly selfless and think of yourself for once you amazing selfless woman,” and “you could have saved him if only he knew what was good for him,” and “don’t forget your clothes flew off all by themselves.”

And I imagine at least two women interviewed this week have a well-worn copy on their bedside tables - Michelle Chantelois and Rielle Hunter.

Michelle Chantelois is the woman who says she had a relationship with South Australian premier Mike Rann (he has consistently denied any sexual relationship with her). She was interviewed on Monday by the Advertiser’s Kelly Nestor in a brilliant online video, which you can watch in segments here.

Rielle Hunter is the mother of John Edwards’s “love child” Quinn. You’ll remember Edwards attempt to win the Democratic presidential nomination spectacularly exploded at the same time Barack Obama’s fortunes soared. Hunter has done a very long, very entertaining interview with GQ, which you can read here. The whole story is so weird you couldn’t make it up.

In spite of being in very different circumstances both women spent most of the interviews sprouting very similar self-help gobbledy-gook about “closure”, “moving on”, “truth”, “empowerment” and helping these men who are struggling with confronting the issues.

They might live on opposite sides of the world - but they clearly graduated from the same emotional finishing school with honours in self-absorption.

Here’s some highlights:

Hunter: [On the first time they met, after her first words to Edwards were “you’re so hot”.] I said I could help him. Which I really believed I could. And quite frankly—well, depending on your perspective, I really have ... Yeah. So I said, “I can help you.” And he said, “I want your help. I need your help.” ... I could help him see who he is instead of what he’s not. The person standing in front of me was not the person they were selling, or his public persona. He was completely opposite from his public persona ... I used to make a joke that I could have helped save the world, but I had to sleep with him. You know? It was kind of like that.

Chantelois: [On what she’s doing now, aside from a whole heap of public commentary on next Saturday’s SA Election] I’ve got goals that I’ve set out for myself, goals for personal growth in certain areas. Probably the last month I’ve been doing a little bit of studying, just to occupy my mind as well, and I’m just taking the time to let things settle, and to calm down in my life before I can go out there and begin working, and creating a normal life again. So I’m just happy to sit back at the moment, and relax and absorb it all.

Hunter: [On reconciling being involved in infidelity] Before I met Johnny, I had a lot of judgment about infidelity. Now I have a much deeper and greater understanding and acceptance of people’s processes. It’s hard and complicated for a lot of people to pull the Band-Aid off, so to speak. So I did have problems with it. Many. But once again, the force field of our love overrode any issues that would arise from my belief systems about, you know, “It should be going different than it is. He should be behaving differently than he is.”

Chantelois: [On how her kids dealt with her public confession] I’ve always asked them for permission to make sure they’re OK with what I was going to begin doing at a public level. And I made sure they understood it, and they were my number one priority, and for as long as I had their support I continued on. And they were my strength, they were my rock.

Hunter: [On Edwards’s wife Elizabeth] Oh, my God, I have such compassion for her. I really do. I mean, especially when you have terminal cancer… I watched my father die of cancer. It’s heart-wrenching to me. But it’s also sad to me, her unwillingness to take responsibility for her part in the marriage. And her unwillingness to face the truth. We’re all slaves to our unconscious, but she really believes that it’s everyone else’s fault. And that’s heart-wrenching to me, too.

Chantelois: For Mike Rann I actually feel very sorry for him because I know that I’ve dealt with the issue, I’ve confronted it. He hasn’t, he’s not dealing with it, he hasn’t confronted it. He’s going to struggle with his marriage.

Hunter: I feel comfortable talking now, because Johnny went public and made a statement admitting paternity. I didn’t feel like I could ever speak until he did that. Because had I spoken, I would have emasculated him. And I could not emasculate him. Also, it is not my desire to teach my daughter that when Mommy’s upset with Daddy, you take matters into your own hands and fix Daddy’s mistakes. Which I view as one of the biggest problems in all female-and-male relationships.

Chantelois: I was the voice for my family. I was the person who was giving my family the freedom to move forward.

Hunter: He in fact did say to me the first night, “Falling in love with you could really fuck up my plans for becoming President.” And of course I said, “If you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans.”

Chantelois: Enough damage has been done. My family has been through enough as it is, and I stopped the lies.

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40 comments

Show oldest | newest first

    • BTS says:

      06:00am | 17/03/10

      Michelle Chantelois - South Australia’s answer to Lara Bingle.  Now if someone will buy her a Mini Moke she will be ‘stoked’.

      Reply

    • Lorraine says:

      03:57pm | 17/03/10

      Women in our society are taught to “seek closure”, “move on’ “transform ourselves” whenever something goes awry in our lives. It is part of the s#*t we are brought up with.
      Men never mention ” closure, “moving on,  or “transformation.
      Michelle is just using all the stuff she was trained to use.
      This is what happens to women in Western culture. We always take the blame and then have to go through the bulldust of moving on, retraining and transforming ourselves.
      It is called “womanspeak”. It really means “I am mad as hell and still wondering why I have to take the blame for something we both did”.

    • Phil says:

      07:24am | 17/03/10

      Tory disagree with the theme of the article.

      Whilst I am sure that in many cases women are the instigaters of affairs, in public life, you make a decision to serve. You judge others and hence will ultimately be judged yourself.

      If you are either swept off your feet by the first dizzy blonde who offers to inspect your goods then simply you wil fail in other decision making areas. If you are the one preying on them then again you are not fit for office as you will obviously feel the need to abuse your position as time goes on.

      Also the problem with living a lie is that you need to remember who you have lied to. This may explain all the media spin and manipulation that goes on.

      Sure Fraser lost his duds, but in general the ALP machine are a bunch of randy buggers unable to control themselves.

      You see life gives you a series of choices. You are given a free will to make your own decisions, and people will ultimately judge you on them, as you may also face the wrath of the people who you purport to represent.

      Reply

    • BTS says:

      08:02am | 17/03/10

      ‘Sure Fraser lost his duds, but in general the ALP machine are a bunch of randy buggers unable to control themselves.’

      Do you have evidence of this or just showing your party colours?

    • matt says:

      09:05am | 17/03/10

      Does the name Senator Bob Woods mean anything to you? He was the Howard Government Minister who schtupped his adviser (who was blond, arguably dizzy and actually, at the end of it all, quite nice)?

      Or John Gorton, the Liberal PM who had enthusiastic late night horizontal policy discussions with his secratary on the green leather of the Prime Ministerial divan?

      It’s arguable that the repressed high Anglicans of the Liberals are far bigger “randy buggers”, than the ALP. Although Hawkey probably counts for about an 11 on a scale of 1-10 in pantsing, so we’ll call it even.

      The point is, everyone’s fallible - so don’t let your lamentable partisanship and undying affection for right wing chair sniffers pollute a discussion that you’re obviouosly having a bit of a struggle with..

    • Phil says:

      02:52pm | 17/03/10

      Lets see.

      Milton couldnt keep his hands off little boys.

      Gareth was sleeping with the enemy with Cheryl Kernot.

      Hawke was a serial womaniser, till he ultimately settled down. Having said that I doubt getting his rocks off ever meant Hawkie neglected his duties. He is one of the great Aussie PM’s who I have never voted for.

      Rann,  Della, Pants down Brown, just to name but a few.

      Hey I know that libs are the same, it was more a tongue in cheek argument.

      My main point is that if your weak in this area, you are likely to weak in others.

    • Old Clive says:

      07:25am | 17/03/10

      These are two of the latest, if we were to know the truth there would be a lot more, what our pollies do in private guides them on their ethics,{ if any of them have them} in parliament, which means that a lot of them aren’t lily white. Don’t go back to yesteryear either, we are supposed to believe everything the media tells us when the truth is entirely different. It is absolutely amazing how the truth can be averted.

      Reply

    • DG says:

      11:28am | 17/03/10

      What people believe and what they do are often very different things. We need look no further than the self reporting Christians who have sex before marriage and who use contraception or the footballers who preach the ills of drink driving only to lose their licence weeks later.

      If a politician goes around telling everyone to be nice, good for them. I really don’t care what they do at home - so long as the message they sell and the policies that they implement in office are consistent with my reasons for voting for them. If they don’t believe the claptrap they are selling, that’s up to them. So long as the product is as advertised.

    • Tom says:

      07:32am | 17/03/10

      A brilliant article. I loved the part of the interview where Kelly Nestor asked Chantelois whether she actually felt sorry for the wife at the time it was (allegedly) happening. A gem, a moment of truth.

      Whether it be be Tiger Woods, Shane Warne etc celebrity is an aphrodisiac. What a hoot watching these groupies pretend “they are not that kind of girl”.

      Reply

    • matt says:

      09:23am | 17/03/10

      Umm except for the fact that at the time of the ALLEGED affair, Rann wasn’t married.

      So even if he did bonk the silly woman, he wasn’t cheating on anyone. She might have been, but she’s a consenting adult…

      Given that there was nothing wrong (at least in the Rann household) with a bit of rumpy pumpy going on, then Rann’s denial has a fair bit of credibility.

      If he had bonked her, then it would have been very easy for him to say “well, I fell in love, she told me the marriage was over, etc, etc” and all would be forgiven.

      That fact that he’s been so adamant that nothing happened (when it would be so easy to have admitted it and got away with it) means his denial is almost certainly true.

    • Paul says:

      01:00pm | 17/03/10

      matt 10:23am

      You are a ‘true believer’.  You’ve even written alleged in capitals.

      I don’t think Mike Rann even believes himself anymore.

    • Lorraine says:

      12:19pm | 18/03/10

      Tom, There was no wife at the time! Rann was a single man.

    • Barbara Flowers says:

      07:30am | 17/03/10

      Why do these stories get so much air-time? Could it be because they’re written about women who are sexually attractive to the male journalists who write about them? I understand your take is different Tory, but without the continuous beat-up neither woman would have the iconic (ironic use of) status giving them so much coverage.  Do male sexual partners EVER get this level of attention from the press - setting aside the English soccer player David Beckham of course, whose recent injury was yesterday a headline in our national ABC news. What the press decide to concentrate upon for the day is an ongoing mystery.

      Reply

    • Eric says:

      07:47am | 17/03/10

      Tiger Woods, Matthew Johns ... usually male sexual escapades get much more coverage, and in a more negative way, than female ones.

    • BTS says:

      08:19am | 17/03/10

      Bill Clinton, Eliot Spitzer, Brendon Fevola, Silvio Berlusconi , John Della Bosca, JFK, Wood Allen, Hugh Grant… the men get cruicified, the women get Dollars from the trash magazines.

    • Barbara says:

      08:23am | 17/03/10

      But in the instances you cite Eric the male is the important public figure, not the lover in the shadows - and that was my point, that neither woman has much news interest in and of herself

    • Barbara says:

      08:24am | 17/03/10

      BTS - the point I’m making is not about men or women who are already public figures

    • Rob says:

      09:40am | 17/03/10

      Eric, you aren’t seeing the commont thread.  These two had the temerity to be bonking LEFT wing pollies, heroes of the revolution, stander upperers for teh common person etc thus these women must be bad. 

      Had they been bonking Right wingers, sports stars, anyone the Left is not enamored of, then it would remain all the man’s fault.

      Pathetic Tory, simply pathetic.  Your bias is a light on the hill, but not in the way of your hero…

    • BTS says:

      09:47am | 17/03/10

      Barbara,

      I wasn’t arguing against you, nor for you, merely making a point (although I accept that bloggers here on The Punch are groomed to believe that every alternative opinion is a personal attack.)

      There will always be a woman who wants to sleep her way to a bit of fame and or fortune.  It helps her empower herself.  She feels a little bit important for once in her life.

    • Barbara says:

      12:26pm | 17/03/10

      Actually BTS - I think your observation is a continuance of my own view - that being female and nubile is a good way of attracting and prolonging press interest. The whole ‘celebrity’ thing is a form of concupiscence, and also voyeurism.  Hence the David Beckham ‘news’ yesterday.  An injury to the England cricket or rugby captains, both sports which have much greater relevance to an Australian reader, would not attract ABC news headlines. I think that is entirely to do with the marketing of Beckham as a sex god.  Nubile women get this treatment much more readily, probably because the management and ownership of newspapers, TV etc is generally male.  I don’t mean this comment in any way as anti-male, rather, as an objective reading of how press attention seems to be afforded.  You might have an idea of why men like Tiger Woods are pilloried in this context.  Perhaps it’s just tall poppy syndrome and envy.

    • Tom says:

      03:11pm | 17/03/10

      Barbara, the owners of the media are interested in making a buck. Some of their readers get attracted by attractive females. On the other hand, the Women’s Weekly has attractive women. Does that make their readers lesbians? No? ... Yes? ... Huh, Barbara?

      As for blokes, most of us wish we could see Tiger Woods playing golf again and Michael Clarke hitting centuries.

      Enough of your long winded “pop psyco-babble” Barbara. You don’t really understand blokes and blokes don’t really understand women. Leave it at that.

    • cats says:

      10:05pm | 17/03/10

      Actually i reckon the men and women get pretty equal negative media coverage. Look at Lara Bingle and Brendan Fevola. Both got very negative press. Tiger Woods and his mistresses.. Tiger got pretty bad coverage in the US where as here the girls got a lot more bad press than he did. Matthew Johns and that 19 year old girl he gang banged. They both got negative press.

    • Roxy says:

      07:32am | 17/03/10

      Well, anyone who would call a child Quinn has to have rocks in her head!  I thought Quinn was a boy until I got to the end of the “story”. 

      Reply

    • Allan says:

      01:10pm | 17/03/10

      The same goes with Clint. That’s a really bad boys name.

    • The Watcher says:

      08:30am | 17/03/10

      The truth is, the left wing loons are self proclaimed moral arbitors who give their own a pass, but I wonder what would happen if a conservative did it? Jeez the double standards from these retards is incomprehensible.

      Reply

    • LG says:

      01:01pm | 17/03/10

      Mr Watcher.
      So.
      Left wing loons are self proclaimed moral arbitors?
      Maybe.
      When they can find their shoes under their kaftan or lay off the bong long enough for coherent speech. Anyway I’m sure these free lovers are being discrimanatory with their handing out of passes and that the refined right would never engage in double standards.

    • Mazzy says:

      08:46am | 17/03/10

      Last year the courts stopped the printing of the name of a politician who had had a homosexual affair and was being blackmailed. The polies career could have been destroyed. Yet this woman claims she has had an affair and is paid for her story. For all we know she had an affair with a cleaner but told her former hubby it was the premier. This woman is as vile as the blackmailer.

      Reply

    • Zeta says:

      09:04am | 17/03/10

      Damn they sound like Hallmark cards. ‘If you want to make God laugh, tell him your plans?’ WTF does that even mean. Here is John Edwards, he’s being honest and up front with the fact that affairs tend to balls up one’s presidential ambitions, and the best he gets from his lover is ‘tell God your plans?’

      What I don’t get is why they have to go to the media. What I like in a mistress is a sense of propriety. Whatever happened to honour and loyalty between lovers? I’m so glad that apart from being devilishly handsome in an alternative kind of way I’m not famous or important. Because when I break up with a woman the worst I get is ‘You never gave me an orgasm!’ or ‘I’m going to tell everyone on Facebook about that time you wanted to switch gender roles!’

      Reply

    • dancan says:

      09:46am | 17/03/10

      IT seems to be the new cash cow, previously these women would marry into money, or brake up a relationship and then marry into money.  With pre-nups now common place this plan obviously doesn’t work so the next best thing?  Get into the sack with the guy and then do a sell all to some trash TV show or magazine.  The game is the same just the rules have changed.  Guys…well the less said the better, still stupid and still thinking with their d*cks.

      Reply

    • Miles says:

      09:47am | 17/03/10

      I actually think the media is more to blame here for simply giving these attention-seekers the time of day.  It’s obvious they both just want money, so finish with them already.

      Reply

    • Peter says:

      09:58am | 17/03/10

      How can what this woman did by turning up to a public event attended by the premier, with a view to embarrassing him not be described as “stalking”. If that were a man who did that, he’d probably be thrown in jail..

      Reply

    • CarlT says:

      10:12am | 17/03/10

      From the first day I heard the name Michelle Chantelois I formed the view that there was more of the story that either Miss Chantelois or Premier Mike Rann were sharing with us.
      I have seen Miss Chantelois interviewed a couple of times and I found her to be believable (the body language did not suggest that she was telling anything other than the truth).
      From a male point of view, the fact that she was gorgeous did not hurt either. Forgive me, I am male and I have an interest in good-looking women. I can understand why Premier Rann might have been drawn to Miss Chantelois.
      Whatever may be the truth of the Rann/Chantelois situation, I believe that it is none of our business.
      The private romantic/sexual lives of people, even public figures, should be the business of nobody other than the individuals involved.

      Reply

    • Mouth Shut says:

      01:11pm | 17/03/10

      Who got heaps of money from TV and magazines?                              Wouldn’t things be pumped up a little to make things juicier?                    Why is the male always the liar,especialy in female eyes?                        Judge the man on keeping the state on a good footing ,not on the stories of a loose lipped woman..

      Reply

    • Paul Horn says:

      01:43pm | 17/03/10

      You know Ms Maguire the sexual worm has truly turned. Here was an grasping celebrity gouging adulteress and nothing more and yet she parades it around like she has just received a Gold Medal. Why is it that none of you press hypocrites have ever bothered to interview the real victim in all of this - her damned husband? Why has he been completely forgotten or ignored? You can bet your life that had her partner been another woman and an attractive one to boot the press would have hounded her to the ends of the Earth. 

      Why have there been no tearful outpourings of grief to her husband and children. I have heard none!! In fact the only hollow apologies have come from Rann!!! She cares nothing for the people who were once closest to her. How could any woman with an inkling of respect for her ex and her children do what she has done? Even worse how could the dirty filthy perverted press pursue this stench with the vigour of an Olympic Athlete going for Gold? 

      One dirty womens magazine even went so far as to interview her mother for Chrissake who poured scorn on her ex husband for taking her away from the States. He is the victim for Gods sake!! Why did’nt they interview him obviously because 1. He wasn’t a woman and 2. He was not an attractive woman. 

      It seems that if you are a woman and attractive to boot the highest status you can achieve is to get involved in a sex scandal or produce a sex tape and presto the gutter press will do everything in their power to elevate you to celebrity starhood for nothing more than your genital prowess. Just look at the army of other females who have achieved notoriety for exactly the same indiscretion. Go girls hey.

      At a time when we are castigating men for so called “immoral” behaviour or not respecting women we are at the same time lauding women for every sexual infidelity they are capable of indulging in. This is truly bizarro world. Just look at the anti male hatred vomited on the TV - Cougar Town, Sex and the City etc etc etc. All glorifying female promiscuity when at the same time outrightly condeming any male twat who wishes to partake in a little philandering of his own.

      I think its time to join the Taliban and start plotting the annihilation of this filthy society. The western world offers nothing for any self respecting male anymore except the prospect of its utter destruction!!!!

      Just what values are our stupid stupid troops putting their lives on the line for - the glorification of female promiscuity!!!  Sick to the extreme!

      I can’t understand why Ms Maguire if you had an inkling of morality or decency you are not berating the dirty filthy profession of which you are a part. Instread you choose to pick on a couple of useless women that have prospered because of your professions deterrmination to change the sexual agenda to one which is unsuited and degenerate to the human condition!!

      Reply

    • Eric says:

      03:34pm | 17/03/10

      Brilliant comment, Paul!

    • Zaf says:

      01:52pm | 17/03/10

      Chantelois makes my skin crawl, she lacks the dignity to take the full responsibility for her own actions.  She may be making money from this, but what is she teaching her children about what a woman is?  (Apparently someone who can blame someone else for all her own bad decisions.)  I doubt it’s worth it.

      But here’s the thing.  How is it fair for society to encourage (even train) women to see themselves as victims (or at best done badly by) in sexual situations which don’t end in wedding bells, and then be disappointed in her when a well socialised woman does just that?

      Reply

    • Redhead says:

      02:05pm | 17/03/10

      i just feel sorry for the kids involved with these nutty women

      Reply

    • Steve says:

      06:46pm | 17/03/10

      There is a report in the Adelaide paper today that one of her sons is up for assault from last Dec.

    • Radical Chick says:

      04:40pm | 17/03/10

      Hell hath no fury….
      Sorry for the kids…wish them all the best….really dunno why we ought to be reading about these people….it is like…let’s learn more about the bogan mentality. What’s the point???

      Reply

    • Jools says:

      07:18am | 20/03/10

      Why is Chantelois being painted as the “other woman”?  Rann was single, SHE cheated on her partner and has tried to play the game on a moral high ground as some sort of victim.  How about you just keep it in your pants people?  If you are in a relationship and are becoming a little too attracted/emotionally involved/your pants are at risk of *oops* falling off then take a long hard look at your relationship.  Either fix it and cut away the temptation or end it then wait out an appropriate period of time before having a crack at a new ‘relationship’. 

      And for all you would-be mistresses (what is the male equivalent????) how about you apply the sisterhood/brotherhood rule .... if it ain’t yours leave it alone!

      Reply
 
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