Before you refer again to prostitution or solicitation as "victimless crimes," please have a good look at the face of Gov. Spitzer's wife as she stood dutifully beside him at the podium during his "apology." The woman was absolutely stricken, humiliated, numb, confused and betrayed. She will undoubtedly also be furious when she has a private moment to reflect on how her life suddenly came come crashing down around her ears. Victimless crimes? Hardly. Every wife and child of a man such as Mr. Spitzer is a victim, just as surely as if they had been raped or abused by him themselves, only to have pictures of the entire sordid affair paraded before the public.

This whole incident is distinctly unfunny, but maybe we can get a coinage out of it. The term hooker came from a mid-nineteenth century Union general whose troop likes, uh, professional women. How bout "gettin' a spitzer"? Has a repellent ring to it, as it should. Not as bad as, say, taking it Craig style, but still revolting.

I find prostitution disgusting because I think society's ideal is that sex is a deeply intimate, personal thing, as as such, should not be part of commercial transaction.

I see what you are saying, but...not everyone agrees with you. I think sex is intimate and personal, I have friends (male and female) who look at it a ton more casually than I ever could. Some of them have might have some personal "baggage", but a few just like having sex, tons of sex, casual, with strangers, etc.

There are a number of things that I find disturbing or immoral that I do not believe should be prohibited by law. Porn is the best example, porn is not for me and I would hope anyone I cared about would not be involved in it, but "good" old fashioned porn is a ton different than forced porn, child porn, etc. which no one disputes should be illegal.

I think part of the reason that some reason that women are "enslaved" by the practice is because of the illegality. Who are they going to turn to for help?

Let's impoverish you and then drop you on the ground of a society run by women whose most basic belief is that men are only good for what's between their legs, and good for only as long as the surrounding area is young, smooth, good-looking, and tanned.

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You guys with issues can stay on and get yourselves some women-hatin' done. That's what you're really here for anyway, not to discuss prostitution.

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Victimless crimes? Hardly. Every wife and child of a man such as Mr. Spitzer is a victim, just as surely as if they had been raped or abused by him themselves, only to have pictures of the entire sordid affair paraded before the public.

I see that, 600+ comments into the discussion, reasoned and rational debate still dominates this topic.

Plainly, everyone opposed to criminally punishing non-coercive, fully consensual prostitution among competent adults is a woman-hating, exploitative misogynist driven completely by a self-interested, latent (or active) desire to use the services of those prostitutes himself.

Including the women.

Quick, someone shout down that woman-hating man, Nora Ephron, for calling what Spitzer did a "victimless crime:"

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/nora-ephron/eliot-spitzer-the-short-_b_90869.html

Glen Greenwald, Hear,Hear!

Mrs. Spitzer is a political wife; hardly the stuff of which victims are made. Think Poppea Sabina, or the women of the Julian clan, all imbued with formidable supplies of what Mona calls moral agency.

Honestly, unless you're absolutely determined to have us break out the hankies, I'd think you'd be more careful about characterizing women as such fragile creatures, so dependent on the whims of men. They are not, nor have they ever been.

I'm very angry at Governor Spitzer for stupidly throwing away his potential in New York State and in national politics. But --

Isn't this a prime example of why "if you have nothing to hide you shouldn't be afraid of warrentless wiretapping" is wrong wrong WRONG? Everyone has things in their private life that would reflect badly on them, whether directly or taken out of context by those who would use the information against them.

It is not the sex, it is the hypocrisy. If Governor Larry Flynt were caught with a prostitute I would say more power to him. Spitzer is a guy who has feasted on being the squeaky-clean guy showing us other peoples’ dirt and then cleaning it up for us. It is what made him so popular. One of the big busts the he was especially proud of was focused on prostitution.

We have seen repeated hypocrisy in this country from people who loudly espoused on thing, be it patriotism, moral rectitude and all sorts of other high-sounding things. When push came to shove (Li'l Scooter, Vitter, Foley, Craig et. al., ad nauseum) they folded their tents. These were all Republicans. They said, and say, one thing and then do completely the opposite and stay to the bitter end.

Spitzer is a Democrat. He needs to do the right thing and resign.

That being said, it is fascinating that 2 Democratic Governors have now been destroyed through the works of Bush’s Justice Department, Don Siegel and, now, Elliot Spitzer. I want to know every step how our government decided to go after a sitting governor. I would also like to know the name of his bank that blew the whistle (so I can make certain not to have one red cent in there). Also, who were these other johns paying up to $5K per hour? I’m sure we’ll see some more captains of government and industry in the nets of the law. Why will I not be surprised if the ones getting hammered are Democrats and the ones getting the free passes are Republicans?

Just for the record, the reason it often takes so long for you to get answers to your endlessly repeated questions is that you don't really ask them in good faith, but only with the idea of being shown another argument that you've already fashioned a weapon against because you're so sure that you know exactly what the response is going to be because of course you've already heard it all before. If that's so, why do you keep asking?

All you have to do then is give me an answer that I'm not expecting..

That couldn't be all *that* hard, could it?