Tuesday, May 23, 2006
Honey trap!
I don't know whether this is the stuff of spy fact or only spy fiction. I've encountered the term "honey trap" in John Le Carre' novels, and it's uttered by one of the Israeli Mossad agents in Steven Spielberg's Munich.
If you believe spy fiction, then a lot of espionage activity resembles elaborate con games, and a "honey trap" is a con game in which the mark is lured by an attractive stranger dangling sexual favors.
If there really are "honey traps" in the real spy world, then the Porter Goss fiasco is even more amusing: "Spy Director Falls for Own Honey Trap."
The idea of a honey trap is lurid and depressing -- the Mossad agent in Munich knows it's a honey trap, but jumps in anyway because he's so desperately lonely, and winds up getting bumped off. Yet the name of the ploy is so darned cute! It sounds like something out of Winnie the Pooh. How incongruous is that?
Anyway, it turns out that Alexander Hamilton (by Ron Chernow) was brought down by.... a honey trap!
That's right: in 1791, an attractive stranger named Mariah Reynolds showed up at Hamilton's door, played damsel in distress fleeing abusive husband, and seduced Hamilton when he went to her place to lend her some cash to help her with her difficulties. He became so sexually obsessed with Reynolds that he couldn't break off the affair even after it became clear that Mariah and her husband James Reynolds set the whole thing up as a blackmail scheme. (James Reynolds apparently had pimped his wife out on previous occasions to make money.) Hamilton payed about $2,000 in hush money before he stopped in 1792.
I don't know exactly how, or to what extent, this played out in Hamilton's downfall. I'm only at disk #16 out of 29. The book-on-CD set was due yesterday, and I can't renew it because someone else has a request on it. Can the library increase my fine for a wilful overdue violation? I'm caught up in a recorded book trap!
If you believe spy fiction, then a lot of espionage activity resembles elaborate con games, and a "honey trap" is a con game in which the mark is lured by an attractive stranger dangling sexual favors.
If there really are "honey traps" in the real spy world, then the Porter Goss fiasco is even more amusing: "Spy Director Falls for Own Honey Trap."
The idea of a honey trap is lurid and depressing -- the Mossad agent in Munich knows it's a honey trap, but jumps in anyway because he's so desperately lonely, and winds up getting bumped off. Yet the name of the ploy is so darned cute! It sounds like something out of Winnie the Pooh. How incongruous is that?
Anyway, it turns out that Alexander Hamilton (by Ron Chernow) was brought down by.... a honey trap!
That's right: in 1791, an attractive stranger named Mariah Reynolds showed up at Hamilton's door, played damsel in distress fleeing abusive husband, and seduced Hamilton when he went to her place to lend her some cash to help her with her difficulties. He became so sexually obsessed with Reynolds that he couldn't break off the affair even after it became clear that Mariah and her husband James Reynolds set the whole thing up as a blackmail scheme. (James Reynolds apparently had pimped his wife out on previous occasions to make money.) Hamilton payed about $2,000 in hush money before he stopped in 1792.
I don't know exactly how, or to what extent, this played out in Hamilton's downfall. I'm only at disk #16 out of 29. The book-on-CD set was due yesterday, and I can't renew it because someone else has a request on it. Can the library increase my fine for a wilful overdue violation? I'm caught up in a recorded book trap!
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A honey trap took down former D.C. mayor Marion Barry. Remember his famous line: The bitch set me up.
Actually, with Mayor Barry, it was a little honey and a little crack cocaine. Sex and drugs -- a lethal combination.
Remember kids -- Just Say No!
Actually, with Mayor Barry, it was a little honey and a little crack cocaine. Sex and drugs -- a lethal combination.
Remember kids -- Just Say No!
Increase your fine? No. But you could rip it and put in on an mp3 player if you had one, and go ahead and return it. And then, because you're the upstanding citizen that you are, delete it all when you're finished.
Somehow though, even though I've never met you, I can't see you owning an mp3 player. But the idea of you walking around campus listening to a book on a dead president over an mp3 player really cracks me up.
Somehow though, even though I've never met you, I can't see you owning an mp3 player. But the idea of you walking around campus listening to a book on a dead president over an mp3 player really cracks me up.
It cracks me up to think of Hamilton as a president. That would have been a fun administration!
wwgbffu -- what would George Bush f*ing foul up?
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wwgbffu -- what would George Bush f*ing foul up?
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