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The most active thread yesterday was titled, "VA Democratic House candidate performed sex acts online for tips". This thread, which was posted in the "Metropolitan DC Local Politics" forum, is about the revelation that Susanna Gibson — a 40-year-old mother of two who is running for Virginia's House of Delegates in a suburban Richmond district — has been posting sexually explicit videos of herself and her husband online. This is really going to test the maxim of whether there is such a thing as bad publicity. But, on the positive side, Gibson will probably soon rival all Virginia politicians in terms of name recognition. For those who want their politicians to be transparent, Gibson has left very little to the imagination. There was a time when it didn't take much of a scandal for a candidate to withdraw from an election. But, that time appears to be gone. Numerous politicians have attempted to ride out — many successfully — scandals of varing degrees. Who can forget that former President Trump, while still a candidate, was caught on tape admitting to sexually assaulting women? Gibson shows no indication of backing down and has, instead, gone on the offensive against the Republicans who are behind the disclosure of the videos. Whether it is due to increased partisanship or changing mores, it is not clear whether this controversy will hurt Gibson. The first indications are that she has successfully increased her campaign fundraising in the aftermath of the disclosure. Those responding in the thread are divided between posters who think the videos are disqualifying and those who believe that consensual sex with a spouse is completely acceptable even if there is a bit of a twist. Conservative posters accused liberals of only being concerned about abortion and gun control and, therefore, ignoring anything negative about Democratic candidates. Democratic posters agreed that they only care about abortion and gun control and don't care what Gibson is live streaming herself doing. A significant number of posters contended that they would have to watch the videos in order to have an educated opinion. Gibson and her husband apparently solicited monetary tips in exchange for requested activities. This, Republicans argued, made this more than a matter of consensual sex and instead made it a form of prostitution. I am fairly certain that prostitutes are viewed more favorably than politicians among significant numbers of voters, so this line of attack may backfire on conservatives.