Hey Tony! How 'Bout Resigning From The House So You Can Spend More Time In Junior High?

Jack Shafer, "Anthony Weiner's Semantic Satiation". June 6

FIRST, The Odd Confluence of Military History and Poor Marksmanship, As Performed By the Inmates of Slate Under the Direction of Jack Shafer: Officialdom has been deflecting criticism of itself by accepting full responsibility at least since the time God owned up that Mistakes Were Made in the Garden of Eden, and went ahead and punished Eve anyway. This was not something Mickey Kaus discovered in the wake of Waco. Mickey Kaus has never discovered anything, except how to make an inexplicable living. You would think that absolving yourself by blaming yourself would seem the most natural thing in the world to someone who writes for Slate.

I'm less judgmental about the "sin" that Weiner confessed to this afternoon, of sexting his junk or his chest shots to six women over three years. If you're as old as Weiner (46) and have never done something naughty but still legal, you're probably immune to the power of human desire, have no sense of fantasy, and have been living in a locked veal cage in a convent basement. You don't have to be a libertine to not care about a politician's kinks, as long as those kinks don't get in the way of his job.

Hey, I'd be the last guy to tell you that utter weirdness can't cold-cock (sorry) a man in his Forties, but look: if we're gonna criticize Weiner's pro-forma behavior, both the denials and the Oh Shit I'm Stuck apology, then let's throw in this reaction for good measure. No, it is not fucking understandable. The moment Representative Anthony Weiner could not say "with certitude" whether a cellphone snapshot of someone's underwear was his or not we were done.

Look: it's beyond time to acknowledge that we in the West couldn't deal with the 19th century, let alone face the 20th, and that over the past thirty years or so we've descended into a bunch of children playing in a mud puddle. We already know about human sexuality, Jack. We have at least since Krafft-Ebing. What David Vitter does in private is between him, his hookers, and his pediatrician. We know that. If David Vitter, or Larry Craig, finds a little sexual joy in this lifetime they're probably in the top 50th percentile, and more power to 'em. They're hypocrites, of course, and worthy of our opprobrium for that, and lots else. But we're got the "human sexuality is weirder than Oprah might allow" bit.

But it is about the act here, or at least the context: Sexting? Really? Twitter sex? At 46? I begrudge no man his Kink, but that doesn't mean I renounce all right to consider it. Sending snapshots of your coyly-concealed junk to anonymous accounts isn't sex. It's digital obscene phone calling, virtual heavy breathing. I'd'a defended him for being discovered with a harem of oiled-up cabaña boys; behaving like a fourteen-year-old girl is something else entirely. Pace Congressman Weiner, Congressman Weiner needs a long vacation. And not on the taxpayer's dime.