General Discussion

You're just a nice, harmless old man who has the occasional impure thought but never acts on it because you haven't been steeped in the aura of power for decades. Why do we keep reading news about famous celebrities and politicians who are accused of sexual harassment? Because their power gave them a sense of entitlement, which makes them feel like they can help themselves to whatever they want, including women's bodies. Age has nothing to do with it. While it's true that most powerful men behave themselves, obviously many do not, The Former Guy being a prime example. A powerful man knows he can grope and touch and be a pest and get away with it; an ordinary man would risk legal and social consequences. Or maybe he's civilized enough to know that the attractive woman he's having impure thoughts about is also a human being with agency over her own body and that he has no right to do or say anything suggesting he thinks of her in a sexual way.

That Cuomo allegedly asked the woman if he could kiss her instead of just doing it doesn't get him off the hook. If true, he showed that he thought of a woman he didn't even know as a sexual object and had the nerve, which his power gave him, to express that thought. It was offensive as hell; it embarrassed and degraded her, and put her in the impossible position of rejecting an important and powerful man. Whether the allegations are actually true and whether he should resign remain to be determined, but "unwanted flirtation" from a powerful man is a lot more oppressive than the same behavior from some random old fart.