In reply to this : He's handed the Republicans his reputation, and far, far more important, he's also screwed up just when the state was on the verge of finally making some real progress toward enlightened government. Even if the Republicans are behind his fall (which would hardly shock me) , I am very angry with Eliot Spitzer.

Glenn Greenwald asked:

Were you angry with Bill Clinton for the same reasons?

My answer: Yes, very much so. A person who is in high office cannot engage in this degree of narcissism. If the President behaved irresponsibly so as to leave him open for assassination, we'd be angry. This is not significantly different.

Just as Samantha Powers is within her rights to consider Hillary Clinton a monster, but knows she's committing political suicide by saying it, a Clinton or a Spitzer knows they are in political trouble if they get caught with their behavior. That is the way the world is, they have to deal with it. It is part of the responsibilities of office.

Regarding Spitzer's "victimless crime" - All this stuff about victimless crimes, not a crime, etc., is nonsense. The President of the United States believes that it is a victimless crime that his intelligence agency is wiretapping without warrants and so nothing should be done about that.

Then while Spitzer's particular prostitution ring may be victimless, prostitution in general is not victimless. Surely you've read and heard enough about women being forced into it, even in New York City.

First time I've been disappointed here. GG should be leading the charge asking Spitzer to resign. Instead.....

The question is whether we are going to have a standard where any elected official must resign whenever it's discovered that they have broken the law -- whether it's when they smoked pot with friends once, or gambled in a private poker game, or committed adultery in those states that criminalize infidelity.

Yes - if an elected official has broken the law while in office, or is in office while the statute of limitations has not yet expired and is found out, then he/she ought to resign.

Another edition of simple answers to simple questions.

If a public official breaks a law and no one is demonstrably hurt, then it is A-OK.

And uust who are the victims of the President's warrantless wiretapping program? Yeah, I know, you can't find out whether you're a victim or not because the government won't reveal to you whether you were wiretapped or not. But if you're ignorant of any possible loss without someone giving you information, then how are you a victim?

Therefore, what the President did is perfectly fine. If the law is not the law for Spitzer, it is not the law for Bush and not for anyone else. If the law is an ass, you have the right to try to change the law through any number of methods. You have the right to civil disobedience; though that is hardly what Spitzer was doing.

Otherwise, there is one law for those whom GG supports and another for those that he is opposed to.

Even the best bat at 0.400. GG struck out on this one. On to the next battle.

How do you outlaw only forced prostitution? Today, what keeps a forced prostitute from getting away? How do you change that by outlawing only forced prostitution?

Is it the buyer's responsibility to report on forced prostitution? Is the buyer culpable if the buyer does not report it?

While we're at it, let us outlaw only inhumane slavery.

Sometimes, people get drunk and drive, or get drunk and abuse others. Therefore, we should outlaw all alcohol (rather than just outlaw drunk driving and assault).

"When Women Unite: The story of an uprising

( )

he film narrates the incredibly moving story of the anti-arrack (state-supplied distilled liquor) movement that led to the eventual ban of arrack sales in Andhra Pradesh in 1995. The movement started when a group of women participating in a literacy program started questioning their oppressed status. Spurred into action by the killing of a village woman (who was beaten to death by her drunk husband when she tried to prevent him from molesting their daughter), they took on the men of the village, the powerful arrack contractors, and the repressive state machinery in a valiant struggle that demanded a stop to the endless supply of arrack to their village (the only village tap dispensed water once in two days while the arrack shop received its supplies twice a day). The movement took hold and spread across the state over a period of four hard-fought years. It was a true grass-roots movement; even today it has no identifiable leaders. The movie documents the incredible courage of these women, their political and social consciousness and their steady realization that, through struggle, they could control their own destiny."

from:

http://www.sawnet.org/cinema/?Virmani+Shabnam