We may be hearing a bit more about Silda Spitzer in the coming weeks. The negative parallels between her husband's indiscretions and the ancient news that Bill Clinton was also caught smoking cigars with a 22 year old are too prominent to be overlooked.
Moreover, Hillary's publicists are visibly desperate for angles. Jon Stewart has shown, the 'who-will-answer-the-redphone-in-the-middle-of-the-night' ad relies on a concept borrowed from Walter Mondale's ill-fated lurch at the Presidency in 1984.
Sooner or later, one of Hillary's marketing geniuses may notice that the flip side of this scandal has yet to be played. While it's undeniably true that (A) Eliot and Bill are horn-dogs, it's also very clear that (B) Silda Alice Wall Spitzer is an attractive, sympathetic woman whose humiliation is undeserved simply because her husband couldn't keep the 'little governor' in his pants.
A summa cum laude graduate of Meredith who went on to Harvard Law, Mrs. Spitzer has a considerable and highly-trained brain. According to the New York Times, on the eve of her husband's entrance into gubernatorial politics in 2005, she met with Hillary to discuss "how to maintain a private sphere for our family" while being "helpful in [her] husband's campaign." She then put a first class legal career on hold to tend her high-powered political marriage. She has three beautiful, well brought up daughters who will probably never end up in a skanky liaison with a married man at the Mayflower Hotel.
Could public sympathy for Silda equate to a similar sympathy for Hillary, and move the electorate beyond its memory of husband Bill's indiscretions? Would this sufficiently soften Hillary's image for her appeal to spread out from a committed center of hardline feminists to the mainstream majority of American women who currently favor Hillary's brilliant, handsome, youthful and male opponent?
With the departure of Geraldine Ferraro, the transition in Hillary's image may have already begun...
During this period we should expect to hear much more too from David A. Paterson who is, after all, Hillary's guarantee that she does not share Ms Ferraro's unpleasant opinions about 'lucky' black men.
In fact in the coming weeks, news about how the affable, well-born new Governor is coping with the job is bound to rival headlines about Barack Obama, and also to invite comparisons about how Paterson's hard-earned experience compares to Obama's ability to seize the moment of opportunity.
The resignation-and-succession story has already obscured Obama's Mississippi victory. It has completely commanded the nation's attention since Monday. How long will the distraction last?
Of course, while it does, it's good news for Hillary. Since she's blameless and all angles point towards her, it's excellent publicity.
Eliot Spitzer was her super-delegate. The humiliated wife is her mentee. Gov. Paterson was touted as the likiest candidate for her Senate seat.
And oddly, the Mayflower Hotel where the dirty hula actually took place last Valentine's Day is the same spot where Monica was first photographed embracing Bill during the '96 election. (It was also the site where Senate Investigators later interviewed her about her involvement with the last Democratic President).
Meanwhile, just as David Paterson invites comparisons with Obama, Eliot Spitzer invites comparisons with John McCain while Ashley Alexandra Duprey (aka Kirsten) invites comparisons with Vicki Iseman. One might well ask, -- and many will in the coming weeks -- why Senator McCain did not share the same fate as Governor Spitzer.
So the theatre of the 2008 election has become very interesting and other candidates will now be hard pressed to rival the attention-getting scale of the drama currently swirling around Hillary Clinton in the Empire State.
Talk about lucky!
Still, Barack Obama is a very clever man and a quick learner. He may well start wagging the dog himself very soon. Of course, if he does, he has most of Hollywood to play with.