A New York Times reporter called me today and asked if I could see any personality traits from Congressman Weiner’s signature and writing.
You will have to read the NY times for my comments… but your comments are very welcome. Just login and post away!
Anthony D. Weiner’s letter of resignation was a matter-of-fact two sentences, informing the New York secretary of state, Cesar A. Perales, and Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo that come midnight Tuesday, he was stepping down. But his signature – an oversize looping squiggle, almost larger than the entire typed text of his statement – may offer some clues into his personality, at least according to handwriting experts.
“He’s out of bounds; he’s not within boundaries,” said Dianne Peterson, a handwriting expert based in Tennessee. “His emotional slant is that his head overrules his heart; his head is in control of his heart.”
Noting the “big hump” that constitutes the core of the signature, Ms. Peterson explained, “It represents a writer who wants to cover up, that they are protecting themselves through formality, ritual and control.”
“They pretend to live by the rules, but they don’t adhere to their own rules in private,” she said.
Handwriting experts pointed out that Mr. Weiner’s personalized John Hancock is what’s known as a symbolic signature – “a signature which is not legible and the individual letter forms cannot be reasonably recognized,” Bart Baggett, a handwriting expert and the president of Handwriting University International, wrote in an e-mail.
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“While not an indicator of deception in itself, the person who chooses a symbolic signature normally does so because of excess demands for his signature (salesperson, department head, politician, and celebrity),” Mr. Baggett wrote. “People who choose a symbolic signature tend to have a cluster of traits in common: excessive ego, secretiveness, need for privacy, arrogance, and high self-confidence in their area of expertise.”
He added: “Mr. Weiner probably possesses all of the above traits, but also has the ‘optimistic’ upward slant and the fluid wavy stroke symbolizing intelligence and fluid thinking.”
Lynn, a handwriting expert who spoke on the condition that she be identified only by her middle name because she wanted to protect her identity in the small community of handwriting analysts, said that Mr. Weiner’s large signature represented “a person who might be a bit flamboyant.”
People with that type of signature, she said, “like to make a big show of things and make a great presentation of things.”
Still, Lynn added, there is something paradoxical about the signature, indicating a man who is showy while simultaneously guarding his privacy.
“What’s ironic about the signature is that it’s a signature of complete anonymity, and so when somebody signs with more of a graphic design-looking signature, where there’s no definable letter forms and it’s just a graphic symbol, it is a person who wishes to remain anonymous to those outside of his inner circle,” she said. “People in politics end up being very, very cautious, and caution is seen on the ending stroke, because it’s a long line.”
Needless to say, an overabundance of caution did not seem to be Mr. Weiner’s problem.
Ms. Peterson said that the ambiguous letters also signify someone who doesn’t “really care what other people think of them,” adding that the small mark above the signature signifies “a slash of anger, when someone is angry about something.”
The full, legible signature on the top of Mr. Weiner’s Congressional Web site is not actually his, a spokesman for Mr. Weiner confirmed. In fact, though the resignation signature comes at a particularly trying time in his political career, it seems remarkably consistent with previous signatures.
“This seems to be a man with typical traits of a master politician,” Mr. Baggett wrote.
– Quoted from The New York Times Mobile