I wrote on Tuesday that Eliot Spitzer should resign. Therefore, I’m relieved that rumors of his resignation were not as “greatly exaggerated” as I thought. Evidently, after counting votes made it painfully clear that he would not survive an impeachment trial, he was forced to resign yesterday just 18 months into his 4-year tenure:
To every New Yorker, and to all those who believed in what I tried to stand for, I sincerely apologize. I look at my time as governor with a sense of what might have been….
Over the course of my public life I have insisted, I believe correctly, that people, regardless of their position or power, take responsibility for their conduct. I can and will ask no less of myself. For this reason I am resigning from the office of governor….
Frankly, despite all the drama, Spitzer’s tragic rise and fall can be summed up in three aphorisms, namely: 1) what goes around comes around; 2) people who live in glass houses shouldn’t throw stones; and 3) no man is an island unto himself.
Because, by all accounts, Spitzer conducted his life, in public and in private, without any regard for these aphorisms or for the basic tenets on winning friends and influencing people.
Winning friends and influencing people, of course, are the keys not only to achieving political success but also to surviving political failure. In fact, the only reason other public figures have survived sex scandals, and Spitzer has not, is that they cultivated political friends and allies that Spitzer, alas, does not have.
Recall, for example, that Bill Clinton defied calls for his resignation only after counting votes confirmed that virtually every Democrat and even a few Republicans in Congress were prepared to stand by him. By contrast, Spitzer has alienated so many members of the NY legislature that not a single Democrat, to say nothing of Republicans, seemed willing to stand by him.
Indeed, it speaks volumes that Spitzer had so little goodwill even among his former colleagues at the attorney general’s offices – who are now prosecuting him – that they refused to grant him a deal for no jail time in exchange for his resignation.
But the good news is that he will be replaced by Lt. Gov. David Patterson – who will become the first black (and first legally blind) governor of New York.
My prayers are with Spitzer and his family as he atones for his life of egregious hypocrisy….
Meanwhile, seen here are pictures of “Kristen” – the call girl who Spitzer squired down to DC (the night before Valentines’s Day) for the $4,300 roll in the hay that destroyed his career.
The New York Times outed her yesterday as Ashley Alexandra Dupre (nee Youmans). She is a 22-year-old wannabe pop star from New Jersey who ran away from home at 17 to seek fame and fortune in New York City.
Unfortunately, like thousands of girls who run off to big cities every day with great expectations of becoming a star, she ended up becoming a prostitute (albeit a high-end one).
“I left a broken home. Left abuse…. I just don’t want to be thought of as a monster. It is complicated….”
Well, Ashley should consider herself a success: She’s famous. She clearly made a fortune. (Reports are that she rents a Manhattan high-rise apartment for over $8,000 a month; and, given her rates, that’s only two nights’ work). And, since the media have already pegged Spitzer as the monster, she’ll probably be thought of as far more sympathetic than Monica Lewinsky.
Related Articles:
The hypocrisy of “Mr Clean” Spitzer’s assignations with prostitutes
Eliot Spitzer resigns
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