OPINION: Let the voters decide Weiner’s fate
During the past few days, since the revelation of Anthony Weiner’s “Carlos Danger” alter ego and his latest cyber-affairs, the drumbeat has been clamoring for Weiner to resign from the mayoral race. The Daily News advised Weiner to “Beat It!” The New York Post rhetorically asked his wife, “What’s wrong with you?” Several of Weiner’s rivals in the mayoral race have called on him to resign, and one Republican candidate says Weiner is unqualified to be the titular head of the Department of Education, which he would be as mayor, because he can’t be trusted around young people.
Sexually suspect behavior among candidates did not start with Anthony Weiner, or with Eliot Spitzer for that matter. Thomas Jefferson apparently had several children with his slave mistress, Sally Hemings, even though he denied it. In the 19th century, President Grover Cleveland fathered a child out of wedlock, as did Brooklyn-Staten Island Congressman Vito Fossella more than a century later. John F. Kennedy apparently had liaisons and affairs too numerous to count. And who can forget Bill Clinton and his various sex scandals?
Perhaps what disgusts people about Anthony Weiner is not what he did, but the way in which he did it. He apparently never had physical contact with any of the women he “sexted,” but instead became excited by sending and receiving lewd messages. Before the internet, this was known as “phone sex,” and was pretty popular with some people. It’s just not what we expect from our political candidates.
If Weiner, like Giuliani, had merely had a mistress, the public could have reluctantly accepted it. But “sexting” strikes an uncomfortable nerve in many people. In a sense, it’s immature behavior, like the crank calls that teenagers sometimes make (I plead guilty to having made some of these calls). It also calls into question Weiner’s emotional maturity for the job of mayor.