Sexual Scandals Recurrent Phenomenon in U.S. Politics

United States – The private lives of leaders are examined under a magnifying glass by the public. “Sexual scandal”, is a recurrent phenomenon of US political life.

The sexual scandal that cost Eliot Spitzer his post as New York Governor, is just the last one on a long list of such incidences in American political life, where the private lives of leaders are examined under a magnifying glass by the public.

Bill Clinton wins the presidency in 1998 even with an adventure with the young White House intern Monica Lewinsky; whereas at the time of the presidential campaign in 1988, the favored candidate for the democratic nomination Gary Hart had to withdraw himself from the race because of an extramarital relation; and dozens of Congressmen, governors, CEO’s fell for similar reasons in the United States.

Impregnated with moral values of Puritanism, the Americans demand their politicians to be flawless in their private lives. “Public opinion expects of its officials very high moral standards, and if it does not get that, the public wants them to pay”, explains to the AFP Costas Panagopoulos, professor of political science University Fordham New York.

These three last decades, a good group of around fifty sexual scandals occurred in American political life, and the Chicago based consultant group Challenger, Gray and Christmas, counted 60 bosses of businesses forced to resign for reasons linked to their personal life. The revelation of the fact that Eliot Spitzer was a customer of a prostitution network caused a wave of national indignation, and the democratic governor had to first attempt to obtain pardon with a habitual tactic: regret it in public. Accompanied by his spouse, and mother of his three girls, facing the television cameras that transmitted his act of contrition to the entire nation, the “customer number 9” Emperor’s club VIP member requested forgiveness from his family and the state.

But the formula that had worked, in the case of Bill Clinton and of other protagonists of scandals, was not sufficient in the case of Eliot Spitzer. The governor, threatened with proceedings of dismissal by the republicans, resigned two days later. The FBI, who had recorded his private conversations in the framework of an investigation on the network of international prostitution, had followed Spitzer. The authorities passed the information to the New York Times, who published the news and joined in unison the media choir calling for the resignation.

“Forty years ago, all these behaviors were accepted, there was not this habit to oversee the people, and one accepted tacitly that men with power behave poorly”, said Siva Vaidhyanaphan, journalism professor at the University of Virginia. That position has now changed and “police, journalists and political opponents are on the lookout for all reprehensible behavior of leaders, and finding that is a victory in a competitive political world”, estimates the professor.

Bill Clinton was able to finish his term as president more popular in the latter years because “Americans forgave his behavior, because they did not see hypocrisy and found sincere his contrition”. John Zogby, director of a poll institute, estimates also that “the principal reason is hypocrisy…the voters do not like it when people say one thing and do the exact opposite…In the case of Spitzer, hypocrisy was tangible”. Follows Mr. Zogby, for that in addition the governor “was not in position to await the pardon, since he had not forgiven himself”.