Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli has rolled out the
first TV spot of the state’s race for governor. The 30-second bit
features his wife, Teiro, talking about the wonderful things he’s
done.

“My husband, Ken, has spent his life standing up for the
vulnerable and those in need,” she says. “He’s worked the night
shift at a homeless shelter, spent his college days leading efforts
to prevent sexual assaults, and represented those suffering from
mental illness. As attorney general, Ken fought to find and
prosecute child predators and human traffickers. …”

Teiro Cuccinelli certainly is entitled to talk up her husband’s
virtues, and there is no reason she shouldn’t. On the other hand,
there is no particular reason she should, either. Plenty of
Republican Party stalwarts could have delivered the same message.
But having his wife do so might help Cuccinelli dampen the drumbeat
of accusations that he’s a charter member of the He-Man
Woman-Hater’s Club.

Besides, Cuccinelli is simply following standard operating
procedure for the modern political campaign. Family members often
appear as surrogates on the campaign trail. Spouses and children
are fixtures in glossy brochures, and in soft-pitch ads featuring
the paterfamilias (or materfamilias) striding purposefully across a
sun-drenched field. Signaling to the voters that a candidate is a
“family man” delivers a much larger message about all the virtues
that ostensibly implies: fidelity, responsibility, gentleness,
rectitude, etc.

And because candidates are celebrities, their relations become
celebrities, too. Michelle Obama appears regularly on magazine
covers — from Time and Newsweek to
Vogue, Glamour, Ebony, and Ladies’
Home Journal. Laura Bush regularly hit the hustings — not only
for her husband George but, last year, for Mitt Romney. When Bill
Clinton was running for president, Hillary Clinton famously
promised, “If you vote for him, you get me.” America did, and came
close to having not one President Clinton, but two.

The campaign of Mark Obenshain, who is running for Virginia
attorney general, sends out chatty “Tucker’s Take” e-blasts from
Obenshain’s daughter. (Recent subject heading: “Taxes and
Puppies.”) Anne Holton, Tim Kaine’s wife, made email pitches on her
husband’s behalf. In August, a news story in The
Times-Dispatch described Susan Allen, the wife of Kaine’s
opponent George, as George’s “not-so-secret” weapon. “During her 26
years as Mrs. George Allen,” reporter Wesley Hester noted, “she has
become a political veteran in her own right.”

None of this matters much — until a family member attracts
unwanted attention. Conservatives have attacked the Obama family
for enjoying an ostensibly lavish lifestyle (“Two Vacations in One
Week: Obama Girls Go From Bahamas Vacation to Idaho Skiing
Getaway”). Jenna Bush, daughter of President George W., made
headlines in 2001 when she was cited for underage alcohol
possession. Smart alecks cracked that the then-ubiquitous “WWJD”
bracelets meant not “What Would Jesus Do?” but “What Would Jenna
Drink?”

One possible answer: Billy Beer — a beverage promoted by Billy
Carter, the brother of President Jimmy. “I had this beer brewed up
just for me,” Billy testified on the side of every can. “I think
it’s the best I ever tasted. And I’ve tasted a lot. I think you’ll
like it, too.” Billy went on to visit Libya several times and
eventually registered as a foreign agent for the Libyan government.
None of this improved brother Jimmy’s already bleak odds of winning
re-election.
Gov. Bob McDonnell now has his own family issues. Virginia’s former
executive chef is facing embezzlement charges, and his lawyers want
to know how much food and beverage the McDonnell children might
have carted off. Asked to comment on the matter, McDonnell was (as
they say) tight-lipped — just as the Bush White House had been
regarding Jenna and her twin sister’s youthful indiscretions.

When family members draw unflattering press — or simply too much
press curiosity — elected officials sometimes demand that the media
give them more privacy. Politicians can be particularly protective
toward children, which is entirely understandable. So it is not
surprising that the Obama White House swiftly squelched coverage of
the Obama girls’ travels last year. As the first lady’s
communications director said in March, “From the beginning of the
administration, the White House has asked news outlets not to
report on or photograph the Obama children when they are not with
their parents and there is no vital news interest. We have reminded
outlets of this request in order to protect the privacy and
security of these girls.”

You certainly can’t blame the Obamas for that — nor can you
blame other pols who don’t like seeing any dirty laundry aired in
public. Still, there’s a bit of wanting to have it both ways here.
The media generally don’t drag family members into the spotlight.
The candidates themselves do that — in the glossy brochures, the
chatty emails and the soft-pitch TV ads. Having done so, the
candidates cannot so easily insist that the spotlight be turned off
at the first sign of blemish.

This article
originally appeared in the Richmond Times-Dispatch.