What Goes on in Albany, Stays in Albany

To paraphrase Sigmund Freud, Why does sex make everyone so crazy?

Today Governor Eliot Spitzer joined a long line of people in the public eye who have been caught keeping company with sex workers. Unlike Hugh Grant, he can't go on the Tonight Show and laugh it off -- although I'm sure Leno would love to have him since there's nothing more popular than sex jokes. The more resonant joke, however, is the reaction of the media. The headline "Governor of New York's Hotel Visit With a Hooker" has elbowed the presidential election out of the news cycle today. Who cares that we're fighting two wars and the top candidates of a major party are in a steel cage death match. The Governor with hooker? Stop the presses!

Make no mistake, I am not defending soon-to-be-ex-Governor Spitzer. Someone with his predilections might have thought twice about railing against call-girl rings when he was the, ahem, Attorney General of New York. That this East Side Savonarola was in violation of the Mann Act is certainly rich with irony. But come on. The last time I checked, we were having a spirited debate about government surveillance powers because the terrorists are trying to kill us. If that's true, and many people believe it is, perhaps law enforcement might find better use for their time? And I don't really want to mention Iraq right now, since everyone is more focused on Client #9, but how many billions of dollars are unaccounted for there? Might some government sleuth deployed on the Catch-Eliot-Spitzer-With-His-Pants-Down detail be put to more profitable use figuring out exactly what happened to that bundle?

In the calm of this hurricane is the Spitzer marriage which, if his wife's proximity is any indication, seems solid. Frankly, I am amazed he got his wife to appear with him at the news conference, given the media frenzy. If I recall, James McGreevey, the part-time homosexual former Governor of New Jersey had his wife glued to his arm when he faced the media during his excoriation. Do these guys drug their spouses? My wife would knee-cap me. But I digress. Good for the wives, they're the ones with the backbones (ask Hillary).

The unhinged reaction on the part of the media and, by extension the public, is a national embarrassment. Once more, the French are laughing. I don't really care what the French are doing, but still...do we have to keep making them laugh? The Republicans hate the French but their joy in Spitzer's downfall is surely mitigated by the fact that the French, having barely recovered from their national, Bill Clinton-induced paroxysm of hysteria, are at it again.

Sure it's a confusing situation. Eliot Spitzer was not patronizing a sex-slave operation. He has standards! He had sex with someone he was not married to. He has no standards! But he paid her a lot of money. That's good for the economy. But she didn't intend to pay taxes on it. That's bad for the government. Prostitution is not going away any time soon. That's awful. But it's legal in Nevada. That's fine. But do we want the rest of the country to look like Las Vegas? Oh, wait. It already does.

While everyone is piling on Spitzer, I am reminded of President Bush's deathless words: "I don't do nuance."

Comments

[Cathexis]

And they said that Warrantless Wiretapping wouldn't pay off! :-/

One more tool with which to target ones' political enemies.

[nikto]

Always remember:

IOKIYAR

INOKIYAD

2 simple rules to replace our outdated Constitution in The New Corporate Era.

[Stirner]

What's all this defense of that prissy law-enforcing prick Spitzer? I don't know about you, but I'm sick of these loud-mouth governmental hypocrites. If we lived in a reasonable society, this holier-than-thou fraud would be put in stocks on the public square. We would be encouraged to hurl whatever smelly crap happened to be at hand toward this liar. Imagine -- this bully trying to force us to obey an irrational law prohibiting Prostitution, while, as a "Governor" he simply choses to ignore it! -- What a dirty little Twirp. All the "forgive and forget" types who live in a world of their own merely generate more Spitzers in the real world.

[research]

Conservatives wanted Spitzer gone, so they found some dirt.

Maybe Cheney heard about it during some illegal wiretapping. "Reportedly, the information came to light from a federal wiretap of his cell phone"

Now the US Justice system serves the fascist republicans.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eliot_Spitzer

Meanwhile the conservative BushCo fascists continue to commit war crimes.

[desmirl]

At least it was with a woman.

[andyboy]

Mr Greenland,

I assume this is all tongue in cheek. Nobody is looking into or is goingto look into any fraud or waste related to Iraq.

Are you aware thge Iraqi's are spending only 4.4% of the amount they are supposed to be on "reconstruction"?

The Iraqi shills for America are stealing every penny they can get their swarthy little sweaty hands on just like Cheney and Bush and Halliburton and Blacwater et al.

This whole operation was never anything more than a thinly disguised feeding frenzy.

And the whole while the poor regular old Iraqi citizen who was supposed to be getting free and al this happy horseshit gets screwed or blown up or shot or throat slashed.

5 years down the line. Nothing has been accomplished except a whole lot of warmongers made a ton of money on both sides.

[larry278]

Prostitution isn't legal in Las Vegas or Clark Co, NV. You must go to another Nv county to find legalized prostitution. Hookers & Johns get busted in Vegas. I've been told that counties in Nv which have legalized prostitution can't advertise that fact in Clark Co, Nv or Vegas due to a legal technicality. The hand bills you get on the streets of Vegas aren't ads for prostitutes according to the law. They are just pictures & words designed to be misleading by astute people.

[drumbeat]

So Hillary's statement about Spitzer is something like 'let's wait and see what happens in the next few days' She didn't wait for a moment before calling for Samantha Power's head to see how that would play out. This is the problem Hillary lovers will have to face if she becomes President. She is compromised. There are a number of issues she simply can't come out strongly on because her position is compromised by skeletons from her own past - people in glass houses tend not to throw stones.

[TheJibreelaMonsters]

this whole thread is very disturbing... How can you turn a NYS Gov sex scandal into a Halliburto­n/Iraq/GWB conspiracy is amazing for these liberals. The sad thing is, the HuffPo is a good spot for news, because they do not hide the fact that they are mondo Libs however the bloggers sometimes need to check them selfs. Cut and Paste your crazy talk on some other left wing blog that nobody reads. I'm holding out hope for the HoPo. This is now I get my news "fair and balanced" now its off to Drudge.

[joebaggadonuts]

because the R's don't prosecute their own, but the D's do. R's are liars and cheats, D's are square. It's that simple.

[musselmanm]

Seth this investigation was started because of a bank audit designed to alert the authorities about possible money laundering or terrorism activity which needs to be reported to the authorities. I do not in any way support our current administration or any of their radical Nazi-like activities.
This was a normal financial transparancy which is enforeced each and every day in our financial institutions.
Our press continues to make fear the name of the game. In this instance I thin Governor Spitzer was as James Carville said, outed by a rat. That does not matter.
When one holds so many citizens up to a standard which they expect people to live up to, they must also live up to that standard.
We the People are not asking our leaders to be perfect, we just want them to be on the level which they hold us to. Spitzer has prosecuted so many citizens for many of the same actions he perpetrated.
I am asking you , Seth to bring responsibility back to our objective of learning the truth, not the spin. I know it makes for good press but we have some very harsh problems facing us and this should be a ssite which promotes ideas of worth through the printed word. If I want hate, fear and smear I can listen to our current administration for so much of this that I cannot wait to change our country to something better, in which we respect the ideas of others and do not try to blow up the headlines with uuneeded hypocricy and hypothification.

[AtomicSplash]

This is real simple. If we are ever going to distinguish ourselves form the conservatives then ethics and criminality has to be the front line of the fight. I'm tired of all the excuses I'm hearing surrounding this case. Elliot took the oath to uphold the law. He has broken that oath. If the charges warrant it then he has to stand before the bar and make his plea. And if he is found guilty he should receive no less than the harshest punishment mandated by law.

I’m personally getting tired of individuals taking the oath of office with their fingers crossed behind their backs. While I can’t police the republican party, I can say something about the actions of democrats. If you really want change then now is the time to say no this kind of behavior. I don’t care if a republican justice department ran the sting. I don’t care there are “real” crimes or “more important things” on the agenda. We trusted this man to do what he gave us his word he would do. If he broke that trust, in flames is the only way he should be going down.

[Guitarsandmore]

"Might some government sleuth deployed on the Catch-Elio­t-Spitzer-­With-His-P­ants-Down detail be put to more profitable use figuring out exactly what happened to that bundle? "

As long as we're all so concerned about someone blowing their wad, how about the wad of money being blown in Iraq? Excellent point! Government must be held accountable for its actions. If I have to obey the law, then the crook in the Whitehouse has to obey the law, too!

[commgdn]

Jeez a governor has his own economic stimulus package and everyone gets upset. Small businesses are the backbone of our nation. Governor keep it up with what you are doing.

[nikto]

"If I have to obey the law, then the crook in the Whitehouse has to obey the law, too!"
==========­==========­==========­==========­==========­==========­==========­======
Uh, actually, no he doesn't.

Republicans are not subject to U.S. laws now.

I think it's in the Patriot Act.

Or somep'n.

[CatfishJohn]

...sir, i beleive the billions of taxpayers dollars disappeared in Iraquagmire is fait accompli...first, the corporate media is too doggedly concerned about the vicisstudes of britanny's spears mental health and missing white girls to even mention anymore the $12,000,000,000 or so in plastic wrapped pallets of american cash that arrived and immediately went vamos several years ago. subsequently, of any publications on the Halliburton/KBR price gouging etc. matter, only the Progressive Populist thought it more important than say Mike Hucakabee's guitar playing to report that DOJ sent exactly one-- 1!--- inspector to Iraq to look into Halliburton-like machinations and he was swiftly brought home in 2 months finding 1 measly count of war profiteering despite all the documented criminal theft of taxpayers dollars our soldiers endured (e.g. rotted food; toxic, unfiltered river water to shower and cook with) at the hand of cheney's minions and disciples at KBR etc. via the trademark criminal cronyism agenda of Bushco. You think an Obama "lets all hold hands and sing Kumbaya" presidency or a corporatist Clinton white house is intending to look into these matters in 2009???...very doubtful....

[Novista]

Oh, such fun & games as the American Puritans crawl out of the woodwork.

I've read several bogs and commnts, not that I care what Ellliot did, but it's interesting to see the high moral ground fill up so quickly.

He broke the law, shock horror ... Near as I understand, this started with a 'suspicious money transaction' reported by his bank to the IRS. The moralists should never forget that Big Brother is watching everyone. Maybe y'all never do anything wrong; it only takes one 'suspect' library book to put you in the barrel.

Perhaps the real moral to the Spitzer story is: you can screw with a prostitute and maybe get away with it, but don't screw around with Wall St.

[njdon]

the ...ummm.. journalists of wall street were trying to blame spitzer for monday's stock market decline.

[livetotell]

Government leaders are on call 24 hrs a day . They knew that when they were elected . Bill Clinton knew it and Spitzer knew it and I don't want them whoring around on my dime at 3 0'clock in the morning when the phone rings . At least Spitzer didn't do it in the Whitehouse.

[rudyinbama]

I wondered if Lucienne Goldberg was still alive.