That doesn’t make the clamoring to see Spitzer charged under it any less disingenuous and partsan. The argument is that Spitzer is a horrible person and should resign because “he violated federal law.” Let’s be real. The Mann Act (if he violated it at all, which is debatable) is an antiquated statute which punishes the state’s aniquated conceptions of “immorality.” I know the word “immoral” has been changed to “criminal,” but in terms of gauging just how horrible a person Spitzer really is, it’s kind of begging the question since prostitution is only “criminal” because of the state’s antiquated notion that it’s “immoral.”
Looking at what Spitzer actually did (instead of what he could theoretically be charged with), all I see is a guy who used his own money to patronize a hooker. There are no victims. It’s really nothing more than a guy cheating on his wife (just like Rudy did. Just like John McCain did, by his own admission, during his first marriage). The fact that the state still tries to control its citizens’ sexual choices does not prove that Spitzer did anything truly immoral or unethical. A lot of what I’m hearing from the right is just rhetoric and partisan spin, trying to make him sound like a criminal – someone who’s "part of a ring – when he’s really nothing more than an honest, well-paying John. I think the feds should apologize for raping his privacy. The Republicans in NY should shut the fuck up (haven’t they learned their lesson about moralistic finger-pointing yet?) and the State of New York should move on with its business. Spitzer did nothing ethically wrong and nothing officially corrupt, regardless of what his political enemies (still butt hurt from his righteous crusade against Wall Street scumbags) might contrive to charge him with. I still think Rove is behind this somewhere. He’s done this kind of thing before (to the Governor of Alabama). Call me paranoid. Call me loony, but how many times have crazy, loony theories turned out to be true with this guy?
I think when you go from being voted in with nearly 70% of the vote, to having 70% of the citizens calling for your resignation (and half calling for criminal charges), you’ve lost your popular mandate and it’s time to resign.
Which he is apparently doing right now on live television…
That’s a lot of people’s opinions you’re hand-waving away. Apparently the people of NY (and DC) still feel that prostitution is an act they’d prefer remains criminal, despite the dissenting opinion from one man half a country away might think. Spitzer had the opportunity to go to a locality where it was legal and failed to do so. How can a government be expected to function when laws only apply when the people charged with enforcing them feel free to ignore these laws when they don’t fit their own agendas? And call upon these very same laws to prosecute others? One wonders if this was a Republican governor or a case of insider trading if you would have the same fevered defense of him.
That’s disappointing. I would go down defiant. I would make them impeach me. I would also expose every adulterous legislator in New York. Somebody has to stand up to this kind of hypocritical, sexual witch hunting sometime.
And I say that as a guy who’s never so much as held hands with any woman but my wife since the day we started dating (almost 20 years ago). I’m the king of monogamy but I despise this kind of thing. I can’t see why it has any relevance to a person’s ability to do his job.
If adultery disqualifies a person from holding public office, then John McCain should withdraw his candidacy too.
But adultery is really what it’s all about. I’m calling a spade a spade.
Anyway, depending on what states John McCain boned his tricks in during his first marriage, he might still have broken the law. Adultery laws were still on a lot of books back then.
Maybe for you, but not for a lot of other people. An employee of mine was once busted in a sting by an undercover female cop. He didn’t go to jail, but he had to appear before a court and paid a fine. If a governor isn’t smart enough not to break laws, then I find it perfectly understandable for people to want him to resign.
Well, if you have evidence that he broke any laws, let’s see it. Speculating that he might somehow have broken some law is, well, nothing but speculation.
Did your employee get fired? I’ve already said Spitzer should pay the fine. I don’t care about the fine. I’m saying he shouldn’t have had to resign. I said the same thing about Craig.
It’s a hypothetical. It doesn’t matter if i can prove it. The validity of the point is the same. Are you ready to say that McCain should be disqualified from public office if he ever committed adultery in a state where it was illegal? because if your answer is no, then why ask for proof?
I believe that Bricker’s argument (which I didn’t understand at first) is that Lawrence effectively ruled that adultery and fornication laws are unconstitutional. However, I believe my argument would still hold up for states which had fornication/adultery statutes before 2003 (in which case I could have been charged with fornication).
If you read what I said, you’ll see that I understand why some people would want him to resign. What I think is immaterial. What’s important is what his constituents think. And apparently they think he should resign. If the majority of McCain’s constituents thought he should resign, then he should resign.
Diogenes, it isn’t just about the paying for sex - he was structuring the financial transactions for this illegal purpose specifically to sail under the federal government’s reporting threshold. That’s not kosher, and that’s a thing he’d have gone after others for in a heartbeat when he was still prosecuting cases.
And I find it funny that you complain about moralistic finger-pointing - after all, Spitzer built a career pointing his moralistic bony fingers at others. It’s why there was cheering on Wall Street when he was busted - not because an honest prosecutor was taken down, but because a grandstander who liked to ruin reputations was.
I haven’t read this thread yet… so I’m not sure if anyone said the same, but here it is:
Elliot Spitzer is a Grandiose Narcissist. He thinks he’s above the law, and the rules do not apply to him… he even thinks it so unfair that he has to resign. I guarantee he is thinking, “How could this be happening to me? Poor me!!”
Yes, I am gloating at his demise because he has gone after and judged others with such self-righteousness that his fall clearly karma.
Just a few weeks ago he let all the Pataki political appointees go (he fired all of us)… so you know I am really thinking, wow, karma is a mother**cker.
And what about the 5 Million dollars Spitzer borrowed from his father in 94 when he ran for attorney general. This is money he never paid back or claimed as income or paid taxes on. There is clearly some kind of campaign finance law broken here. And why hasn’t the IRS gone after him for this? This has been news for a long time now (before he became governor), and the media never covered it. How convenient.
this is just another example of how Spitzer thinks he’s above the law. This is clearly tax evasion…
the only one that mentions this is Fred Dicker… and now the NY Times is talking about it (a little bit).
I’ll bet this situation is why the IRS was watching him to begin with…
Bricker, I am not an attorney and don’t play one on TV.
In fairness, Spitzer was paying for a high priced hooker, that’s it. He wasn’t making money from the prostitute or a prostitution ring. He wasn’t transporting prostitutes across state lines for financial gain. He tried to pay for the hooker without drawing attention to his activity; hence, the alleged structuring charge. He wasn’t structuring accounts with the intent to launder money and evade taxes. I don’t necessarily believe the Spitzer investigation was the result of the bank filing a suspicious activity report.
Bricker, I am not an attorney and don’t play one on TV.
In fairness, Spitzer was paying for a high priced hooker, that’s it. He wasn’t making money from the prostitute or a prostitution ring. He wasn’t transporting prostitutes across state lines for financial gain. He tried to pay for the hooker without drawing attention to his activity; hence, the alleged structuring charge. He wasn’t structuring accounts with the intent to launder money and evade taxes. I don’t necessarily believe the Spitzer investigation was the result of the bank filing a suspicious activity report.
I don’t think it is ridiculous. Spitzer has powerful enemies. The use of wiretaps to catch a John seems excessive, and the publication of the salacious details strikes me as an effort to humiliate. Obviously, the investigation was because of Spitzer’s high profile political position. Whether or not the investigation was because he was a hated politician, a hated Democrat, or both is a reasonable question to ponder.
