David Letterman Knows the Truth: A Funny Man Gets to Sleep with His Staff
You know what happens when you try to blackmail David Letterman with the old news that he's slept with some women on his staff? He writes you a fake $2-million check and then you get arrested. That is because he is awesome. Here is an amusing video of Anderson Cooper looking very serious about this news. Oh my God, someone slept with someone at work? That has never ever happened in New York City before!
Man. If there is a God, there is no sex tape or photos of his spendor. Please God. I'm usually in favor of that. But. Nay. Unless he was fucking that red-headed announcer dude.
I am assuming your apotropaic wish has to do with "photos of Choire's splendor" (cf. tag #2).
Big deal, so Choire's a shepherd.
Agreed. The thought of Dave having sex with anyone is horrifying.
Funny how it's now Hetero sex among consenting adults that's a scandal.
I've been trying to get a gig on "Dirty Jobs" for the sole purpose of having sex with Mike Rowe.
David and the interns would play "stupid sex tricks."
And Paul Shaffer would watch and "Ah ha ha ha. Oh my. Oh my."
What's up Choire? Are you having trouble sleeping or something?
BREAKING NEWS.
Tell the staff to go sleep on the couch.
I enjoy the seriousness with which she says "Worldwide Pants".
#ohgoodnowthenameofthatproductioncompanyhassubtext
and still, no women on the writing staff.
Big, giant eyebrow raise at the tags, Mister Sicha. OH DO TELL.
What, Jolie? You're telling me you *wouldn't* want to curl up for a nap with Cat the cat after a hard day's work keeping the drawing of the awl from atop the page?
If by "curl up with Cat" you mean "curl up with Mary HK Awesome" then yes.
Dave does not get blackmailed. Too cool.
The only really creepy part of the whole thing was the hilarity of the studio audience as he was making this revelation… including a huge round of applause when he said that yes, he'd had sex with staffers. I know everyone is accustomed to laughing when they watch Letterman, but… really?
Well, that and the general impropriety of a boss being so pathetic as to sleep with those over which he has power.
It wasn't rape. and this never happens ANYWHERE
Of course it wasn't rape. And yeah, it happens everywhere… doesn't make it any more easily digestible. At the core it's almost all the same, old guy in position of power sleeping with people who work for him who would never sleep with him under any other circumstances. So… sexy.
Yeah, I'm guessing those ladies weren't too hard on the eyes? Power= two directions.
Also: never underestimate the power of the funny bone.
I can only presume that there was some uncomfortableness in the crowd, which sometimes people deal with by laughing easily. With crowd dynamics, if a handful of people start chuckling it can quickly get the whole crowd going (i.e., Oh something's funny? I'll laugh too!).
If these women came on to Dave (hey, it could happen), as opposed to Dave making the move, they may have been trying to gain favor but it wouldn't be Dave using his power to apply pressure to 'put out.'
If you don't get to sleep with anyone, why go for the position of power? The people who decide to sleep with the person in power are NOT pathetic, too, for liking power so much?
Well, actively or not, Dave is using his power… it just "is." Of course we don;t know the circumstances. I highly doubt Dave was being threatening… outwardly anyway. But I've seen enough Summer interns crops or jr. staff come through big companies and the exec guys often having a field day. No different with Dave. And if he was being blackmailed then they were relationships he wanted to keep secret which doesn't exactly testify to them being on the up and up. My base problem is just with him being pathetic mostly because it's just a weak, dick move.
ESPECIALLY because he often pulls moral high ground thing on people who, in the end, acted just like him.
And if he was being blackmailed then they were relationships he wanted to keep secret which doesn’t exactly testify to them being on the up and up. I know it's outmoded these days–but some people like their privacy! Wanting to keep a lid on this does not necessarily imply an illicit act on his part. He's said that he wants to protect the people involved, so perhaps the– connubial?- crime lies elsewhere.
True. Again, mine is more a personal distaste… perplexed about how Dave seems the victim…
Mr. Sauer, I agree in re: hypocritical of Dave (though Dave will certainly get run through his own mill now). I also suspect that we would agree that any kind of sexual harassment, in the workplace or anywhere else–and especially quid pro quo where the more powerful person is the aggressor–is flat wrong.
But I must also say that–assuming an consensual relationship of whatever provenance, as long as it's between adults and there is no coercion–I don't like the idea that anyone NOT in such a relationship with me and NOT the person in question might want to tell me whom I can and can't or should and shouldn't fuck.
He was the victim of blackmail, which generally cannot happen unless the victim has done something potentially embarrassing or illegal. Nobody is totally clean here.
CaptainFantastic: I do something every morning that would be embarrassing if put before the public. Don't you?
Hat: Agreed. I'm not saying there was something illegal here. Probably unethical due to employer/employee dynamic. And everyone should be able to fuck everyone. Agreed. But until details come out (might not) I don;t know if Dave should just automatically get the benefit of the doubt. AND if he should, then everyone should (and they don;t).
*Letterman audience-like applause at Hat's allusion to his morning standup*
Just playing a little devil's advocate here, Abe. What about the general impropriety of young, attractive staffers sleeping with a guy they work for who would otherwise not sleep with them other under circumstances.
Youth and beauty are forms of power too, even if they're not earned.
Hat: I'm not embarrassed by that (assuming you're talking about what the Nurse thinks you were talking about).
Captain: If you're trying to get me to type "micturation," it won't work!
Captain, does she mean singing in the shower?
Hmmm, yes. You mean that being "attractive" in the conventional sense? I guess I don't understand what the "threat" element would be in that relationship… (in the boss/employee one the power dynamic is a concern for one's employment). In just "using" one's attractiveness… like using one's fame or money. what does the boss have to fear?
The boss fears missing the opportunity to have sex with something that fine.
That's the beauty of summer interns, I get older and they stay the saaaaaame aaaaaaaaaage… hehyeeeeeeeeaaaaa
The boss's fear is of getting old and being sidelined from life, of not being the man's man he used to be or thinks he used to be, of the closeup view of the grave. Admittedly that's not so tangible a "threat" as concern for one's employment, but it's still terrifying. Why do older men so often tend to marry much younger women? To allay precisely that fear.
Sexual harassment of course was and is a difficult problem in the workplace, and it is admirable we have achieved a pretty sweeping change in social attitudes toward this problem in not much more than a generation. My problem is in the extrapolation from the idea that sexual harassment is acerbated by a power differential to the notion that every sexual relationship that includes a power differential will result in harassment.
There's a middle ground here, surely, where people can have redress from harassment without losing their freedom to socialize and, yes, bang each other.
"acerbated" is of course not a word. Try reading "exacerbated" there and see if I make any more sense.
I really hope the $2 million check was a giant poster-sized check, like the ones given to winners of golf tournaments.
abe, so sanctimonious! there is a lot of sex in show biz. And in any workplace (especially creative, I think) the power-sex thing is just more complicated than a simple manipulation. You can't always totally identify why you are into a certain affair — is it their power, their charisma, your own need for affirmation, the power that sleeping with someone higher up brings YOU, blah blah blah. In any case, consenting adults, etc. And not like we thought Dave was a moral prince to begin with, did we?
bleh, that was supposed to be somewhere else.
Again, I understand this. I (personally) just don't give the guy the benefit of the doubt.
Also: I'm pretty sure Dan Abrams' appearance on Today was some kind of sexual impropriety.
Ever since Clinton, I haven't cared a bit about any "sex scandal" at all. I think Vitter/Ensign/Sanford/Gingrich are a tad bit hypocritical for being so virtuous as "family men" and then wearing diapers and sneaking off to Argentina on government money, etc., but ultimately it's a love affair or sex and, therefore, a private matter in my book. (except for the gay-bashers who are actually in the closet, that's fair game).
Dave shagged some staffers over the years. This is the top news of the day??? I could not care less. Nobody knows any of the facts, so no need to give anyone the benefit of the doubt. If there was any sexual harrassment, then that will have either already been litigated or it will come out.
Were they children? Where they raped? Is he an elected official? Then I don't care!! Like Dave said, "I have my own problems."
Am I imagining it, or does Madonna's face look a littl puffy?
I was trying to guess what she's had done. Some kind of filler I think and maybe cheek implants.
Hey, the blackmailer won an Emmy!
Now THAT's good TV.
http://mediadecoder.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/10/02/update-alleged-letterman-blackmailer-identified/
and a photo
http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2009/10/02/crimesider/entry5357903.shtml?tag=crimesidercarousel
I guess this confirms all the "Dave likes to bang the interns" stories I've been hearing for years.
Apparently they like to bang him, too. Or choose to do it for reasons of their own. Maybe because he tops 10"!
In all my years of following show biz gossip I can tell you that he has never made any "who has the biggest schlong?" list. So it's probably just the old Kissinger adage that power is aphrodisiac.
"Top Ten List," get it?
Ha.
Hat the weird thing is after I wrote that I read this
nicepony 11:50 AM
I knew someone who was his assistant in the early 90s….they "dated"…she said he was cheap, refused to put out his cigars in cabs, and had a big dick.
the end.
Reply
on Gawker
http://gawker.com/5372885/gawker-exclusive-letterman-said-to-pay-assistants-law-school-bill
What a perv.
this really needs an "awl staff" comment.