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

I said the opposite in the post.

And just who are the victims of the President's warrantless wiretapping program?

The people on whom he eavesdropped with no warrants. Their privacy was invaded and their constitutional rights violated.

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.

Try carefully to read this:

He should be treated no differently -- no better and no worse -- than the average citizen whom law enforcement catches hiring prostitutes.

... and it wasn't ok for the Governor of NY to compel a prostitute to cross state lines.

Both are illegal felonies, and both should (have) result(ed) in resignation.

I am disappointed that Mr. Greenwald is equivocating on behalf of the Governor. This is the first time I have disagreed with anything he has written. I am surprised because I had believed that Glenn was one of the most evenhanded journalists I have read. His reaction to this even has caused me to reexamine my prior opinion of his work.

The entire question of political motivation on the part of the Bush Justice Department is another issue entirely. I do feel that this is quite probably a result of warrantless wiretapping.

The prosecutors could gather enough information illegally to subsequently investigate and strike 'legally' without betraying their original illicit sources.

I suspect that, like the Clinton-Lewinsky scandal, there will be few individuals involved in this scandal exhibiting noble intentions.

The community standard is a good way to go because it's a living standard - someone is offended and actively decides to complain and the "offending" article is brought into the public for examination and judgement.

Do you have a right to not be offended?

If so, then do I also have that right?

Why not? How could he possibly have known that when he started with her? And what about the prospect that others would find out -- people she might tell, etc. Isn't the blackmail concern just as strong there?

It's totally unrealistic to expect elected officials suddenly to transform into saints, and as long as they aren't living like saints, the blackmail risk will always be there.

But how big is that risk? Are there any examples where that has happened of any significance?

Well of course it was possible Monica could blackmail Clinton. But not especially likely as compared to dealing with an arm of what usually turns out to be run by organized crime. He had spent considerable time with her, she's well vetted as a White House employee has no prior record of such things etc.

I agree we can't expect perfection, but I'm not really comfortable with public officials, particularly ones with law enforcement discretionary powers giving organized criminals a lever to apply against them.

In fact there are cases of significance where this has happened. David Brin mentions a case at the US Moscow embassy:

http://www.davidbrin.com/blackmail.html

Remember the U.S. Marine guards at our embassy in Moscow, some decades back? It all started when a few boys -- lonely and far from home -- were invited to party with some local "students." A little alcohol, then sex with local hookers... (where's the harm?)... were followed by a drug high or two... and a few lewd pictures... then some incriminating ones...

At any point, early on, those young men could have saved their own lives and served their country, simply by turning themselves in. The very first to do so might even have saved his career. Others could have escaped with minor punishments. Instead, alas, they let themselves be blackmailed, by gradual stages, into doing the KGB "just a few harmless favors"...

... relatively harmless, at first. Xeroxing a few embassy visitor lists. Penny-ante stuff.

Only then, the Soviets had real dirt on the poor fellows. Proof of espionage that could produce real prison time. And meanwhile the girls and drugs kept coming. Plus flattery. ("You are special, james Bond types -- above normal loyalties and laws." Very similar patterns of ego-milking helped to suborn the Walkers and that dismal FBI agent, Hanssen.)

Very soon, those marines were trapped. Fully in the pockets of their nation's enemies. And betraying really harmful secrets.

My name is a link to a time magazine article detailing a Hoover document from 1940 that I believe is this exact incident.

Actually I have minor personal experience with this in that while in the Canadian military we were briefed in a film about the possibility of foreign governments trying to lure us in with sex to get information or blackmail us. I was nobody particularly important or powerful and it was important enough for the military to warn me not to get myself in a compromising position with a potential foreign agent. At the time we laughed at the cold war paranoia (it was the 90s) but it was a real issue at some point.

Also, I'd note that Wilkes bought hookers for Duke Cunningham. I don't believe there was explicit blackmail, but if Cunningham ever thought of terminating the relationship with Wilkes and going clean, the knowledge that he had so much dirt on him would have prevented that.

That's another whole aspect to corruption, once you're in, it's very difficult to get out because others know about your skeletons. So you can get pulled much deeper than you had intended just in the interest of covering up your first relatively innocuous deeds.

I think you've got a pretty sound presentation.

Oh come on Glenn, you're a champion of speaking truth to power, and now you want to throw in the towel for poor Eliot? He made his own bed, no? Sure - prostitution, smoking pot, etc. don't rise to the level of murdering thousands of innocent civilians in a mindless moralizing campaign of neocon self-love - but if anyone should be held accountable for a crime, it should be the politicians and prosecutors who write and enforce the very laws they are breaking. It's not like Elliot need fear the reaper here; he's simply going to have to endure humiliating media scrutiny, a mock trial, and will live out his current domestic situation in the doghouse.

But Spitzer should be nevertheless be prosecuted for the same reason Charlie Rangel was right to call for reinstating the draft at the beginning of the Iraq war. The consequences of the actions of our government should be made manifest for everyone equally. The only chance we have of preventing the powerful from abusing their position is to hold them just as accountable for their actions as citizens as they would hold everyone else. To do unto them as they would do unto others.

The proper way to remedy the injustice of Spitzer's situation (if it is indeed injust, which is not the point I'm debating here) is not to let him off the hook, but to let everyone off the hook, by amending the stupid law that would penalize him in the first place. We do have the mechanisms in place for doing this, we just seem to have forgotten how to use them. We should start by not electing clowns to high office. If we do, well, who's to blame for that? Well, that would be us, no?

What we should not do is to arbitrarily enforce the law. There's no end of trouble if we go down that road, as I think you well know. Yes, this does happen from time to time, but that doesn't make it right.

If the court of public opinion comes down on Elliot's side, then perhaps someday the law will too. And when the laws are amended, then and only then should the judiciary act as you suggest. Maybe there is a better system of government, but for now, that's the one we have, and I personally have not invented a better one. Have you?

This is a silly position to take. Don't sully your excellent reputation by defending Elliot. No matter how much good he has done (and I think he's done a lot), he screwed up here (so to speak). He's a public figure, so he's going to have to endure more humiliation than most. Good for him.

Oh, and the difference between prostitution and pornography? Pornographers aren't liars. Trust matters. Ask Elliot's wife. Trust is the foundation of civil society. Pornographers don't have any secrets. Prostitutes and their clients are intentionally deceitful.

That's just semantic bickering, however; as the main point remains that one is illegal and one is not. If you don't think that's right, then run for office, make that your platform, and fix the law. Otherwise live with the laws we have or overthrow the government. You can also continue squealing from the sidelines that "somebody should do something", but don't expect much to come of it.