Obama was 'Kenyan-born' in 2004 News Article

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Kenyan-born Obama all set for US Senate

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Kenyan-born US Senate hopeful, Barrack Obama, appeared set to take over the Illinois Senate seat after his main rival, Jack Ryan, dropped out of the race on Friday night amid a furor over lurid sex club allegations.

The allegations that horrified fellow Republicans and caused his once-promising candidacy to implode in four short days have given Obama a clear lead as Republicans struggled to fetch an alternative.

Ryan’s campaign began to crumble on Monday following the release of embarrassing records from his divorce. In the records, his ex-wife, Boston Public actress Jeri Ryan, said her former husband took her to kinky sex clubs in Paris, New York and New Orleans.

"It’s clear to me that a vigorous debate on the issues most likely could not take place if I remain in the race," Ryan, 44, said in a statement. "What would take place, rather, is a brutal, scorched-earth campaign – the kind of campaign that has turned off so many voters, the kind of politics I refuse to play."

Although Ryan disputed the allegations, saying he and his wife went to one ‘avant-garde’ club in Paris and left because they felt uncomfortable, lashed out at the media and said it was "truly outrageous" that the Chicago Tribune got a judge to unseal the records.

The Republican choice will become an instant underdog in the campaign for the seat of retiring Republican Senator Peter Fitzgerald, since Obama held a wide lead even before the scandal broke.

"I feel for him actually," Obama told a Chicago TV station. "What he’s gone through over the last three days I think is something you wouldn’t wish on anybody."

The Republican state committee must now choose a replacement for Ryan, who had won in the primaries against seven contenders. Its task is complicated by the fact that Obama holds a comfortable lead in the polls and is widely regarded as a rising Democratic star.

The chairwoman of the Illinois Republican Party, Judy Topinka, said at a news conference, after Ryan withdrew, that Republicans would probably take several weeks to settle on a new candidate.

"Obviously, this is a bad week for our party and our state," she said.

As recently as Thursday, spokesmen for the Ryan campaign still insisted that Ryan would remain in the race. Ryan had defended himself saying, "There’s no breaking of any laws. There’s no breaking of any marriage laws. There’s no breaking of the Ten Commandments anywhere."

—AP

http://web.archive.org/web/20040627142700/eastandard.net/headlines/news26060403.htm

Aside - Jack Ryan, Obama's main rival for the seat, who dropped out over the 'sex club' scandal, was married to Jeri Ryan, who played uber-hottie 7 of 9 on Star Trek Voyager.

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I didn't realise until now that her public revelations about her husband forcing her to go a sex club was connected to Obama, and basically paved the way for him to get an unimpeded run for the Senate seat.

Interesting in itself.

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The Sex Scandal From Outer Space

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By David Montgomery
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, June 26, 2004; Page C01

"If you are here to fraternize, I do not have the time."

-- the character Seven of Nine, in "Star Trek: Voyager"

Actress and pouty object of desire Jeri Ryan is rewriting the political sex scandal script.

Unfortunately for her ex-husband -- toothy and good-looking GOP Senate candidate Jack Ryan of Illinois -- Jeri Ryan's departure from the old themes has been disastrous for his political career. He found it just a little difficult this week explaining to heartland constituents his alleged romantic brainstorm: public sex in the kinds of clubs featuring mattresses in cubicles and whips and cages hanging from the ceiling.

She says the notion repulsed her. He denies proposing anything of the sort. Yesterday he announced he is quitting the race.

Two things make this sex scandal breathtakingly unconventional, and it is not the whips and cages:

The people in question were

married.

And:

No sex occurred.

This may be the first sexless sex scandal to bring down a politician. Ryan is being punished for kinky thoughts he denies thinking. Talk about the pain of unrequited love.

In the usual lusty plot, the foxy blonde in question -- almost always she is blond, except when she is Monica Lewinsky -- is an avid participant in the devil-may-care gymnastics. We will not soon forget the star turn of Rita and Rep. John Jenrette (D-S.C.) one night in 1976 on the Capitol steps. Not to mention Monica and the pizza and the thong.

Another typical plot point is infidelity -- proven or suspected. Think of doomed 1988 Democratic presidential primary candidate Gary Hart with Donna Rice on his lap aboard the good ship Monkey Business.

Alleged misuse of public funds often helps drive the action: Elizabeth Ray being paid as a secretary by Rep. Wayne L. Hays (D-Ohio), even though she couldn't type.

The Ryan affair lacks all the ingredients. Maybe what we have here is a casting problem.

Ever since the former Jeri Lynn Zimmerman was a beauty queen (Miss Illinois 1989, third runner-up and swimsuit winner in her bid for Miss America 1990), she has been cast as the babe. Squeezed into intergalactic spandex as the technologically enhanced Seven of Nine, she single-handedly raised the ratings of TV's "Star Trek: Voyager" when she joined the show in 1997.

The cat suit was so tight that, early on, it caused Ryan to black out on the set a few times, she told interviewers. Her character's back story was that, as a child, she had been "assimilated" by the Borg, the organic yet mechanical society that shared a hive-mind. "Resistance is futile," said Seven of Nine, the signature Borg line. It became the male-fantasy caption of sexy Seven of Nine pictures on fan pages all over the Web.

The character wrestled with becoming an individual, human and sexual. She would say things such as, "Guilt is irrelevant." "Pleasure is irrelevant." And the classic: "Are you in love with me, Ensign? . . . Then you wish to copulate?"

When "Voyager" was canceled in 2001, Jeri Ryan became the sexy lawyer-turned-teacher Ronnie Cooke in the series "Boston Public." She helped boost ratings for a while there, too, but the show recently ceased production.

Jack Ryan, 44, was a Senate candidate from central casting -- handsome, wealthy, possessing a social conscience. In 2000 he walked away from investment banking to teach at a boys' school on the rugged South Side of Chicago.

The beauty queen had met the investment banker when she was a student at Northwestern, from which she graduated in 1990. She was dealing blackjack at a charity event, and he lingered at her table. They were married in 1991 and had a son, Alex, now 9. They took turns commuting between Chicago, where he worked, and Los Angeles, where she worked.

It was in the spring of 1998, while Jeri Ryan was still playing Seven of Nine, that her husband took her to some interesting nightspots. Her version of the story emerged in court documents, released Monday, relating to their 1999 divorce and 2000 custody negotiations.

Referring to Jack Ryan as "Respondent," Jeri Ryan told the court:

"On three trips, one to New Orleans, one to New York, and one to Paris, Respondent insisted that I go to sex clubs with him. These were surprise trips that Respondent arranged. They were long weekends, supposed 'romantic' getaways. . . ."

"The clubs in New York and Paris were explicit sex clubs. Respondent had done research. . . . One club I refused to go in. It had mattresses in cubicles. The other club he insisted I go to. . . . It was a bizarre club with cages, whips and other apparatus hanging from the ceiling. Respondent wanted me to have sex with him there, with another couple watching. I refused. Respondent asked me to perform a sexual activity upon him, and he specifically asked other people to watch. I was very upset. We left the club, and Respondent apologized, said that I was right and he would never insist that I go to a club again. He promised it was out of his system.

"Then during a trip to Paris, he took me to a sex club in Paris, without telling me where we were going. I told him I thought it was out of his system. I told him he had promised me we would never go. People were having sex everywhere. I cried, I was physically ill. Respondent became very upset with me, and said it was not a 'turn on' for me to cry." In response, Jack Ryan told the court the claims were "ridiculous" and an attempt to "libel" him when he had "political aspirations."

"I was faithful and loyal to my wife throughout our marriage," he said then. "I did arrange romantic getaways for us but that did not include the type of activities she describes. We did go to one avant-garde nightclub in Paris, which was more than either one of us felt comfortable with. We left and vowed never to return."

The great irony of this political scandal is that Jeri Ryan apparently is not a sex pot, she just plays one on television. Unfortunately, even her husband may have miscast her in the role. In the spring of 1998, the Los Angeles Daily News asked Jeri Ryan if Seven of Nine was her alter ego. She laughed. "My husband wishes it were," she said. "He thinks she's the perfect woman, meaning she looks good in a cat suit, is efficient and always on time."

"She is cast in roles where she's going to be the object of desire," says Robert Thompson, professor of popular culture at Syracuse University. "One of the things she was being asked to play by her husband was the kind of role she plays professionally, demonstrating there is a difference between human beings and the roles they play."

In real life, Jeri Ryan defies the conventions of the classic political scandal. She was a National Merit Scholar. She is forever telling interviewers that she does not mind being cast in sexually appealing roles -- as long as the characters also are strong, intelligent and well-written.

Jack Ryan's campaign released a statement from Jeri Ryan on Monday, when the candidate was keeping hope alive.

"I consider Jack a friend," she said. "Jack is a good man, a loving father, and he shares a strong bond with our son. I wish him all the best, both in his life and career. I have no doubt he will make an excellent senator."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A6778-2004Jun25.html