but it was hardly more offensive than David Vitter's, Newt Gingrich's, or Rudy Giuliani's, and they're all prominent political figures and Republicans in good standing.

Republicans tolerate hypocrisy from their right-wing moral scolds. No surprise there.

Good. I've been a cheerleader for Spitzer every time his name has come up in here recently, but I'll say yet again that Spitzer is a great asset to the Democrats and his personal transgressions shouldn't undermine that. He doesn't have the temperament of a great executive-- he was a failure as governor even before the scandal-- but as a policy enforcer there are few more competent individuals in either party. I'm glad to see he's trying to make a comeback.

Spitzer made a humiliating personal mistake, and he's paid a high price.

That's for true. Her rates were outrageous. He could have saved tons of cash on Craig's List.

Oh, wait, that's not what you meant. :)

All joking aside, it's the hypocrisy that gets me. Railing against prostitution in public while engaging in it simultaneously really chafes my grits.

Spitzer wasn't interesting because of his thoughts and ideas -- he really wasn't a great or orginal thinker. Instead, he was interesting because as attorney general and governor he could actually put a new approach to ethics and finances into play. Now that his political career is over, he doesn't have much to offer.

"but it was hardly more offensive than David Vitter's, Newt Gingrich's, or Rudy Giuliani's, and they're all prominent political figures and Republicans in good standing."

Who is in good standing. I would say more like they won't go away no matter how hard we want them to. Plus since when are republicans setting the bar ?

Spitzer has no business in any position of power. The guy might be as smart as Doogie Howzer, but sending hookers wires through the very banks that hated him is beyond stupid, it shows a real lack judgment when women are involved. It's one thing to have an affair, it's quite another for a former prosecutor to commit several crimes so that he could get his rocks off.

So refresh my memory: while he was the highest law-enforcement officer in New York, did Spitzer have anything to do with the prosecution of prostitution rings? If so, that's a horse of a different color, political corruption and not just moral corruption.

I like what Spitzer did in attempting to keep Wall Street in line, and he's obviously a keen intellect and erstwhile fine politician. But adultery is one thing, and flagrantly breaking laws one is sworn to uphold is another. Sadly, I think he crossed the line into territory chiefly occupied by members of the Bush administration.

that spitzer was "in the penalty box" at all is absurd.

why is it that democrats that "get caught" at things even bother with the penalty box? republicans sure as hell don't.

convicted felon "buddy" cianci, former mayor of providence, convicted for having used his public office for personal gain, has a regular gig as a political commentator on my local (rhode island) abc affiliate.

and they do it without blinking.

i don't know when it happened but at some point the rules changed for public figures -- no matter what you do or say, you're always welcome back.

doesn't matter how repulsive your views and effect are -- barbara walters was fawning over rush limbaugh this morning on the view ("he makes a lot of money and he has a lot of viewers," she says apparently as justification for her ready acceptance).

gah.

Spitzer's piece was a cliche with no value added. But then why should he be held to a higher standard than most of the garbage that passes for reporting or analysis? On the other hand, why do we need more garbage?

Spitzer is a loose cannon with a really bad personality. He is a bully. It is a good thing that he was purged from the D party, and I don't care how is was done.

BTW, it would be a good thing for the Rs if they got rid of Gingrich, for those who are intrigued with the analogy.

why is it that democrats that "get caught" at things even bother with the penalty box? republicans sure as hell don't. -karen marie

I'd like to think we're unlike Republicans in many ways. I'd like to think that Democrats possess some integrity and accountability.

I don't think it's a double standard; I think we hold ourselves to higher standards.

Ben said the former governor may need a few "soft-focus interviews about his personal transgressions" to help the rehabilitation along.

Thanks but no thanks. I would far rather him rehabilitate by writing informative op-ed pieces or perhaps doing lectures. I'm willing to concede that he's sorry, and I don't need to have his wife sit by for a media dose of humiliation.

while he was the highest law-enforcement officer in New York, did Spitzer have anything to do with the prosecution of prostitution rings?

Um, yes. He busted at least one of them, and made a pretty big deal about it. It's a step beyond the hypocrisy of goons like Limbaugh, who at least only *talked* about getting medieval on small-time drug abusers. Personally, I think both drugs and prostitution should be more or less legal, but I would have really prefer that Spitzer's career stay over, just as I had hoped Limbaugh's would be.

I don't need to have his wife sit by for a media dose of humiliation.

That's what bugged me the most, actually. Mrs. Spitzer has aged very well and the family is stinking rich. Her lawyers could bleed him dry in the divorce settlement. She should just take the money and run, move to Europe, buy some nice clothes, and date much younger men. Why stand by a preening, arrogant husband who spent thousands of dollars to screw a 25-year-old without a condom?

A couple days ago Henty Blodget was giving investment advice to NPR listeners. From Wikipedia.

In 2002, then New York State Attorney General Eliot Spitzer, published Merrill Lynch e-mails in which Blodget gave assessments about stocks which conflicted with what was publicly published.[5] In 2003, Blodget was charged with civil securities fraud by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.[6] He settled without admitting or denying the allegations and was subsequently banned from the securities industry for life. He paid a $2 million fine and $2 million disgorgement.

Blodget is, demonstrably, a crook. Spitzer is a petty criminal and hypocrite and yet they just won't go away.

There doesn't seem to be much here except the obvious - unfettered free market capitalism corrupts itself, always, as the players ultimately consume each other until there are only a few giants left standing, dominating the economy and holding it hostage to their greed and avarice. Happens every time. Too big to fail is a blueprint for disaster, and we got it, apparently, from the financial world to the manufacturing base.

Only we're not learning this time. We're bailing them out instead of busting them up, cutting them down to size, so they work as intended, and we don't wind up being their slaves.

As to Spitzer, can he be rehabilitated publicly? I haven't the slightest idea. Bill Clinton was, but I kind of think Spitzer is radioactive, that something seethes beneath the surface of this man, something volatile and dangerous. And he has no foundation to prop him up as Clinton had.

I'd hire the guy for a think-tank in a New York minute, but beyond that? I don't think so. Not until he's conducted himself responsibly for a few years, anyway, and it's not the call-girls that bother me - hell, that should have been legalized decades ago. It's the recklessness, the hypocrisy of this man. I don't trust him.

Any hetero male who looks at the chick Spitzer fooled around with and says they would never consider doing what he did is lying. Period.

We're all human, folks, it's just a matter of which things you screw up on. What he did was wrong, but the financial rapists he went after for years and years and years have been doing things that are WAY worse. If there was a "cleaner" dude to take them on then I'd say fine, leave Spitzer on the bench. But I don't see anyone with Spitzer's credentials ready to go right now.

If anyone says Spitzer can't be a good person for the job because he had an affair, then they better be ready to say Bill Clinton wasn't as good president as George W Bush.

Racer X,

Spitzer didn't have an affair or fool around with someone. He paid thousands of dollars to visit a prostitute several times while simultaneously fighting to bust prostitution rings. The distinction matters.

It's rank hypocrisy.

Racer X,

"We're all human, folks" -- my nomination for dumbest thought of the year. It's the all-purpose excuse.

... but I kind of think Spitzer is radioactive, that something seethes beneath the surface of this man, something volatile and dangerous. And he has no foundation to prop him up as Clinton had.

Yeah. Spitzer fell primarily because there was no one in the state - NO ONE - who would stand up for him when he needed someone to watch his back. Beyond the hypocrisy, beyond the psychopathology, beyond the arrogance, the simple fact that makes him unusable as a Democratic public figure is that, in a word, nobody likes him.

I agree that Spitzer's transgressions should not exclude him from the political sphere forever and, especially in times like these, his insight and expertise should not be shunned in a fit of puritanical pique.

That said, however, can we please cut the crap about Spitzer having made a "mistake'? Please??

He didn't pick up the wrong fork at a state dinner, or misplace his hat. He didn't repeatedly schedule trysts with a prostitute by mistake (Excuse me Miss, you seem to have misplaced your garments - here allow me...) He made a conscious choice to violate the law and he (understandably) tried to keep the fact a secret from the public and his family.

A mistake is inadvertent, this was an intentional act. He shouldn't be punished for it forever, but there's no need to pretend that it was just a misfortune that could have happened to anyone.

lets remember

that Palin's $150K wardrobe fiasco did not cause her to destroy her family's trust, subject her to felony investigation, nor cause her to have to resign her governorship.

Spitzer's $100K sex fiasco did all of the above.

Considering the quantity of money involved being passed to an illegal business, It is just amazing to me that he is not in jail.

However, I do not wish him there.

But, reality-based analysis demands that if we pick on Palin for her wardrobe gaffe, we should be beating up on Spitzer for his sex gaffe.

Palin rallied Republicans.

Spitzer put a black mark on Democrats, and hurt them.

That is a fair comparison.

So, if ya wanna pick on Palin, cause she deserves it, ya can't avoid the conclusion that Spitzer deserves being picked on more!

And any man who spent that much money for just ONE girl ... well, ya gotta wonder what else is in his closet!

5 years from now I'll feel different. Recovery of reputation takes time. A lot of time and work.

".. scandal notwhihstanding .." is a phrase which a partisan will deliver only for those on his side, and never for those on the other side.

I'm on noone's side.
Reality isn't either.

Wouldn't it be refreshing to find a political blog that wasn't partisan?

Spitzer's first column on Slate made a valid point about the evils of bigness in business — but made it in extraordinarily turgid prose. I wanted to cheer for the idea. Instead, I had to fight to keep awake.

If Spitzer is that dull, no wonder he needed hookers for excitement.

However, it isn't all bad news.Spitzer has provided the world with one great scientific discovery — the discovery that the main difference between a $4,000 hooker and a $100 hooker is $3,900.

Thank you for your contribution to the world's knowledge, Eliot. Now please go away and stop boring us.

Crankily yours,
The New York Crank

Good to hear Spitzer back up Senator Sanders' suggestion to link bailout money to anti-trust action.

Don't want to break up? You can't need the money enough.

He sure drove the price of hookers up.

As usual, Steve is generous -- and though I respect, always, his civility, I think, this time, we could wait a bit more. Spitzer's screw up, in all senses of the word, wasn't about a momentary lapse in judgment, and his quick spin throughthe so-called penalty box (a nice rich job with his dad's rich firm, the remarkable courtesy of New Yorkers who pretty much left him in piece as he went to "work") is hardly impressive. The man is a bully, a nasty piece of work, arrogance on legs and so deluded by his egomanical self-absorption that he -- a law maker and enforcer -- truly believed he was above the law. I keep thinking this is supposed to be a country in which no one, not even rich son arrogant hotdoggers, are above the law. As in, above the law of the land, marital bonds, sexual exploitation, common decency and kindness. Such delusion requires, I should think, serious self analysis with expert guidance, and that takes time. A bit more time than six months. I remember the story of Profumo, the English pol who got caught with a hooker in a sex blackmail scam of some kind in England way back when -- the early 60s? the late 50s? Stripped of power and respect, he work for years at something the equivalent of a soup kitchen in a poor London neighborhood, did over time a lot of good, and eventually was formally re-introduced to decent society when the Queen knighted him or something akin. Now that, to me, seems real effort -- not just a going through the easy motions -- in reclaiming one's better self. Spitzer got embarrassed, although he appears hard to embarrass, humiliated his wife and his children (and we don't see much of them looking happy), and stripped of a job he was doing badly precisely because of his character faults. Let him work on those a little before he presumes to strut his stuff for public benefit again.

I do think that the timing of Spitzer's op-ed (11/16) and the sudden flurry of interviews with the prostitute (11/19) was an interesting juxtaposition.
Not that I'n cynical about the media or anything...

Re the post above which asks, "I remember the story of Profumo, the English pol who got caught with a hooker in a sex blackmail scam of some kind in England way back when -- the early 60s? the late 50s?"

It was 1958-1959. (I remember it well because I was studying in England at the time, and the tabloids there nearly kept me from passing geology.)

The hooker in question, Christine Keeler, was a willowy, heart-stopping, knockout brunette. (There was also an attractive blonde named, I think, Mandy something, who later married an Israeli.) And even allowing for inflation, the, umm, related emoluments weren't even close to today's $4,000 for a prostitute with a ridiculously fictional name (Ashley Dupree? Gimme a break!) who is reasonably attractive, but no Christine Keeler.

A sign, I fear, that both in corrupt politics and prostitution, the sums of money involved keep going up while standards keeping falling.

Crankily yours,
The New York Crank

CORRECTION!!!
I just checked out Christine K on Wikipedia and it turns out the trouble begins pretty much in 1961 when I was several years gone from England.

So why did I have so much trouble with Geology? And am I having a senior moment? Doctor, please help!

(But the pix on Wikipedia do confirm my memory of how she looked.)

Crankily confused,
The New York Crank

CORRECTION!!!
I just checked out Christine K on Wikipedia and it turns out the trouble begins pretty much in 1961 when I was several years gone from England.

So why did I have so much trouble with Geology? And am I having a senior moment? Doctor, please help!

(But the pix on Wikipedia do confirm my memory of how she looked.)

Crankily confused,
The New York Crank

Ashley was really really hot.

But Spitzer is as much a Sanctimonious asshole as any Republican closeted gay office holder.

Mr. Spitzer essentially told his beautiful daughters that marriage without trust is just fine. Had he been physically capable of feeling empathy he could not have done what he did because the price they had to pay would have caused him to recoil in horror.

He doesn't feel remorse because his sense of entitlement means he can't understand why anyone would feel he'd done something wrong. He is manipulative and prone to rages. There's more. It's in the DSM-IV.

Mr. Benen is clearly a very compassionate person; but his empathy is misplaced when it comes to Mr. Spitzer. Many politicians suffer from this personality disorder - to varying degrees. They are often very charismatic and operate at a high level. But, in the more deeply affected, a signature behaviour is extreme recklessness.

It is almost impossible for them to change. It's a sad story, and we should feel compassion for Mr. Spitzer and his family; but it's foolish to trust him because he's not able to trust himself. People with a compulsive hunger for admiration at all cost are ultimately dangerous to themselves and those around them.

It's a good thing Ms. Lewinski was operating alone. A clever colleague, with an understanding of this personality defect, could have put Mr. Clinton, and therefore the US, in a very compromising position. The same goes for Mr. Spitzer.

Dem leaders always miss the point and believe transgressions destroy your career despite that republicans just say fuck what the public thinks about it...just hush for now and then we'll call it a mistake you learned from and are now readya to get back to work.

Spitzer is 100X better than any repuke in office now... that's why the feds went after him in the first place...he's too good a dem. I wouldn't hesitate to vote for him as long as he corrects his behavior.

Spitzer's column debut was great, but check out the comments, they are VICIOUS. We'll see how long he keeps writing and how long Slate let's the experiment continue. It could be a short-lived comeback for Spitzer. . .

Speaking as a prudy old lady feminist, I'm fine with Spitzer in an advisory role. I've read his two recent columns (Slate & WashPost) & I found them pretty informative and useful. He has a lot to offer & I hope Obama scoots him in the back door much as Clinton scooted Dick Morris into the White House after Morris' hilarious toe-sucking undoing.

However, Spitzer's transgressions went well beyond sucking body parts. He violated the very laws for which he sanctimoniously prosecuted others. In addition, he participated in an "industry" that routinely victimizes women. As such, he is not fit for public office, now or after some Jimmy Swaggert-style penance rollout.

In America, there ARE second acts, but they are not starring roles. Senator Spitzer? Not a chance.

The Constant Weader at www.RealityChex.com