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Lisa Zeidner and John Allen Paulos

the breakfast table
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from: John Allen Paulos

This Candidate Is Brought to You by Viagra

Posted Tuesday, June 29, 1999, at 1:48 PM ET

Hi Lisa,

Holy Euclid. There seems to be no quasi-mathematical riff that will get me gracefully out of commenting on the presidential penis. Obvious Leno-ish jokes (Clinton's never been known as a straight-shooter; another Tricky Dick in the White House) come to mind. So do science-fiction scenarios in which rival drug companies--Pfizer for Viagra, another with a cure for Peyronie's, a third for a different dysfunction--sponsor presidential candidates in the future. (In a sense this came close to happening with Dole in the 1996 election.)

But is there a relationship between a leader's sexuality and his or her public policy? My guess is that the answer is: Seldom and only in a convoluted, subtle way. It'd be criminal to reduce it to a sound bite such as sexual frustration leads to aggressive behavior.

You're right that, despite torrents of speculation (to which you've just added a rivulet), we know nothing very substantive about the Clintons' marriage. I find it sort of reassuring that we don't. Despite relentless probing, there does seem to be a small zone of privacy.

More generally, studies of sexual matters are notoriously unreliable. People simply don't tell the truth to the chirpy sex-researcher on the telephone (or, as your friend said, they may not be completely sure themselves what the truth is). Most surveys of sexual practices, for example, show that (heterosexual) men average many more sex partners than do (heterosexual) women. But these two numbers should be the same. If they differ, what credence does such a survey deserve? Not much. The difference probably is due to posturing and conforming to gender roles.

Same thing with self-reports about many issues other than sex. The numbers by themselves often mean little unless they're imbedded in stories with agents who have motives and quirks.

Yours,
Agent John

the breakfast table
entries
1234567891011121314151617
from: John Allen Paulos

This Candidate Is Brought to You by Viagra

Posted Tuesday, June 29, 1999, at 1:48 PM ET
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John Allen Paulos is a professor of mathematics at Temple University and the author of six books, most recently Once Upon a Number (click here to buy the book). Lisa Zeidner, a professor of English at Rutgers University, is the author of four novels, most recently Layover (click here to buy the book), and two books of poems.
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