Jack Ryan Is...

Yesterday the Los Angeles Superior Court released the divorce files of Republican Senate Candidate Jack Ryan and actress Jeri Ryan, revealing allegations that Jack Ryan tried to get his then-wife to have sex with him in public at various sex clubs. But the pain for Ryan doesn't stop there.

Deciding to hold a press conference, Ryan defended himself, repeatedly stating that he was always faithful to his wife and never directly responding to Jeri Ryan's allegations, instead referring to the denials made in the divorce proceedings:

"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,"

Throughout the hub-bub over the allegations themselves, a seperate, just as significant problem has arisen for Candidate Ryan: leading Illinois Republicans have begun to distance themselves from his campaign, charging that he lied to them about the nature of the allegations before the records were released. According to the Chicago Tribune, Ryan had told State Republican Chairman Judy Baar Topinka that there was nothing in the records to worry about, prompting her to make statements supporting him in the past week. And according to the Sun-Times:

Former Gov. Jim Edgar was stunned to hear about Jeri Ryan's allegations after Jack Ryan called Edgar over the weekend to describe the files, but made no mention of the sex clubs. Based on that characterization, Edgar told reporters earlier in the day the files would not likely sink Ryan's campaign.

"Edgar kind of feels like he took this guy at his word and is kind of stunned it could be different from what he was told," the source said.

Chicagoist has seen the outcomes of enough political scandals to know that it is never the content of the scandal that hurts, it's the response that matters (i.e. "I did not have sex with that woman."). Already two significant Illinois Republicans have been publically betrayed by Ryan, which is going to make a recovery from this scandal very difficult.