Indeed I am. That's great, great news. And that he goes down in such flames of hypocrisy is all the more delicious. The Greeks had another H-word for this, ending in "ubris."
And when he does, New York gets its first black governor. I wonder if he'd be able to win reelection? We may find out.
And you'd think that Wall Street (which hated him, with good reason) would be celebrating, but the Dow is down. I guess that higher oil prices overrode any "Ding Dong, the witch is dead" feelings.
Is there any reason to think the new guy will have different policies? If not, Wall Street wouldn't have much to celebrate, I think.
Is it just me that thinks this or do the Democrats have the morals and libidos of alley cats? Jeez, these guys can't keep it in their pants!!
OK Jim Harris, tell me how I'm wrong.
These kinds of actions can't be boiled down to which side of the aisle you're on. This boils down to people who have no respect for the position they occupy. Both conservatives and liberals in office are guilty of these types of behavior. Its doubly amusing in this case cause he was going to "clean up corruption."
I'll bet he tries to avoid resignation as long as he can. If Gavin Newsome and Jim McGreevy can do it, so can he.
Is it just me that thinks this or do the Democrats have the morals and libidos of alley cats?
You're half-right about that, Steve. Democrats do have the libidos of alley cats, and so do Republicans and people in general. That is because humans and alley cats are both mammals with the same reproductive instincts. It's not pretty, but it is natural.
And it shouldn't be illegal. There should never been a federal wiretap of this prostitution ring, just as Larry Craig should never have been arrested. In both of these cases, the government and the public have both acted as marriage counselors from hell. We would do better to follow the example of France --- look at what happened to Nicolas Sarkozy. Sarkozy was clearly sleeping around, he dumped his wife and married a sex toy model. French public opinion is that this is less than stellar conduct, but they didn't make him resign.
It is bad that Spitzer was hypocritical enough to bust people for what he did himself. Maybe he should resign for that. Although again, it's problematic to make hypocrisy the world's worst sin. That attitude makes it harder to get rid of bad laws.
Now, I do think that how a candidate treats his spouse says something about his character and could be a reason to vote against --- as long as it is only one factor among several. Even then, I do not understand this strange moral code that we have, that if you cheat on your wife, you're supposed to dump her and marry the new girl so that you can look monogamous. If it were one of my relatives, I would prefer that he patch things up with his long-time family. Anybody can make mistakes; it's a lot worse to then declare that they weren't mistakes at all and stick with them for the duration.
If you want to vote on the basis of marital fidelity in this election, then fine. You should just look at the conduct of the candidates themselves and not argue guilt by association.
Both conservatives and liberals in office are guilty of these types of behavior.
And what profession isn't? Do you think that priests behave better?
Speaking of hypocrisy, it has passed with little notice that the New York Times broke this story. Every red-tinted news desk can leap from bashing the Times for gossip-mongering to lifting the Spitzer story from the Times without credit. They, as part of the media, generally don't give credit after a story circulates. So they can still bash the Times on a perception-as-reality basis. That won't diminish the influence of the Times though, because the critics don't have a replacement --- and if they did they would soon criticize it for the same reasons.
"Do you think that priests behave better?"
Yes, I think that priests behave better.
According to CNN.com, Spitzer is apologizing but not resigning.
Spitzer is a genuinely bad person who has abused State power to extort and bully for his personal political gain. I'm delighted to see him brought down.
Not only its first black governor, the first legally blind governor in the country.
As for Spitzer it couldn'a happened to a nicer guy.
Jim,
I knew you'd never let me down.
Democrats do have the libidos of alley cats, and so do Republicans and people in general. That is because humans and alley cats are both mammals with the same reproductive instincts. It's not pretty, but it is natural.
Not quite, Jim. Unlike humans, cats only have a desire to mate when when the female is in a period of estrous or "heat."
It appears your knowledge of biology is... no, that's too easy. :-)
Unlike humans, cats only have a desire to mate when when the female is in a period of estrous or "heat."
Fine, it's not EXACTLY the same. Cats only mate when they are in heat, whereas people are happy to mate any day. So people have even more libido than alley cats.
There are other differences too: (1) Cats don't wear clothes, while people usually remove them to have sex. (2) Cats have sex from the rear, with people that's only one of several positions. (3) Cats have litters of 2-5 kittens, people mostly only have one baby at a time. Despite these differences, there are broad similarities between sex in cats and sex in people.
There, hopefully I have now made it past "Sex Ed".
Meanwhile the New York Times, which as I said broke the story, says that Spitzer should resign. If you think that prostitution should be illegal, then it only makes sense. But if you are unimpressed with the war on prostitution, then it's a tough call.
After all, compare this case to the Republican David Vitter, who was also caught seeing prostitutes. Vitter kept his job, despite touting abstinence-only sex education. It's hypocritical, but he probably should keep his job. Maybe now he will STFU about abstinence. And again, it's too bad that Larry Craig had to go, because maybe he has learned something about gays in the military.
It will be interesting if McCain ever touches the Eliot Spitzer story with a ten-foot pole. Could he say, "Way to go, New York Times! You bagged Mr. Clean with a sex scandal!"
Unlike humans, cats only have a desire to mate when when the female is in a period of estrous or "heat."
Course, the males go out of their way for a female in heat. So I think the libido thing isn' t that far off.
Jim Harris:
If you think that prostitution should be illegal, then it only makes sense. But if you are unimpressed with the war on prostitution, then it's a tough call.
Way to misframe the argument. This issue has little to do with prostitution. The current scandal is politically fortunate, but Spitzer should have resigned long ago for abusing power. He should never have run for office. A person of such poor character and temperament should never hold a position of authority, not even a minor supervisory position.
It will be interesting if McCain ever touches the Eliot Spitzer story with a ten-foot pole. Could he say, "Way to go, New York Times! You bagged Mr. Clean with a sex scandal!"
Spitzer was never "Mr. Clean". That's his own dishonest spin, which the press, ever eager for access, kept parroting. He has always been a thug in a nice suit.
Hmmm. H-word, ends in "-ubris".
Halabalabubris?
Anonymous @ 6:30 AM was me.
Sorry, but this has nothing to do with politics, it's morals. If he wasn't a nasty prosecuting attorney who had a "zero tolerance" rule for others I wouldn't care . . . let's face it, we all want pretty young girls whether we admit it or not - all, all, all men. It's just a matter of "if & how" we go about getting them. Some of us simply think about the cashier at the supermarket - some use the inetrnet, porn - some use prostitutes . . . and some get a girlfriend. None of us ignores this desire.