Forgive us for not being too terribly shocked at the news that New York’s crusading governor, Eliot Spitzer, has been implicated in a prostitution scandal. To us it is more surprising that the press and the public were so naive as to miss the obvious warning signs of Spitzer’s dangerous habit for so long.
Although it was duly reported in the media, no one seemed to find it somewhat odd that Governor Spitzer declared the first three weeks of this year “Prostitute Week,” “Anal Sex Week,” and “Anal Sex with a Prostitute Week,” respectively.
Then there was his somewhat unusual appearance at the white tie Al Smith Dinner, an annual A-list political event that is sponsored by the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York under the personal patronage of Cardinal Edward Egan. Spitzer arrived late without his wife Silda but accompanied by two women whom he introduced to the Cardinal as Sapphire and Chardonnay. Sapphire, who wore a tight lime-green cocktail dress with a plunging neckline, described herself as the governor’s “friend” and said that she had known him for approximately three months. Chardonnay, a Ukrainian national who spoke very little English, declined to answer any questions about her relationship with the governor except to say that she was thrilled to meet the “King of America,” evidently a reference to Cardinal Egan.
It is episodes like this which should have raised a warning flag and been examined in greater depth by the press, rather than buried in a brief mention in the Metro Section. Even if there were, in fact, nothing inappropriate about Spitzer’s relationship with Sapphire and Chardonnay, there is still the appearance of impropriety to consider along with the governor’s judgement in inviting them to such a high profile event and parading them before reporters and the assembled dignitaries.
In retrospect, it almost seems like he wanted to get caught.
There was, for example, the interview he gave to British television in which he joked that there was “room under my desk for a hooker to give me [oral sex] and you guys would never know.” Spitzer then refused to allow the camera crew to look under his desk and appeared distracted, at one point moaning and rocking his head back with his mouth open.
On another occasion, Spitzer invited his rival, State Senate Minority Leader Joseph Bruno, for a helicopter flight during which he suggested that they could both have sex with prostitutes while hovering over their respective residences, something he told Bruno he did frequently. When Bruno subsequently recounted the discussion to a reporter for the Albany Times-Union, Spitzer said that he had been speaking metaphorically and denounced Bruno for engaging in “typical dirty politics.” The Times-Union ran a brief item attacking Bruno that reported Spitzer’s actions only in the context of making the case that the Minority Leader was “utterly humorless.”
Looking back further, to Spitzer’s college days, one can easily see the deep roots of his lifelong fascination with prostitutes and deviant sexual activities. At Princeton, Spitzer was known to the other members of his eating club, Tiger Inn, as “Pimpzler” because, as one of them put it, “he wanted to bring strippers and hookers to everything. ‘Christmas Party: let’s have hookers. Homecoming Weekend: we’ll get some hookers. Spring Formal: instead of dates, let’s invite hookers.’ Even for a college student, that guy had a one-track mind.”
At Harvard Law School, Spitzer’s own official biography reports that he “frequented the strip bars in Boston’s Combat Zone with his mentor, Professor Alan Dershowitz.” What the biography conveniently fails to mention is that Spitzer and Dershowitz were known as “the rubber glove twins” among Boston’s stripper community because of certain actions they would ask the dancers to perform in a private room for which they were willing to pay extra.
“He used to talk about how he was going to be president one day,” said Danielle Garcia, 48, a retired Combat Zone stripper who encountered Spitzer and Dershowitz frequently during the former’s years at law school. “And we all believed him. He was very persuasive.”
In the end, the lesson to be learned from the downfall of Eliot Spitzer is not about one man’s hubris and arrogance or even about his tragic flaw or possible mental illness. It is about our own blindness and naivete; for what is remarkable about Spitzer is not that he fell so far but that he rose so high in the first place.
– The Editors
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The Downfall of Governor Eliot Spitzer: An Old Yorker Commentary
Forgive us for not being too terribly shocked at the news that New York’s crusading governor, Eliot Spitzer, has been implicated in a prostitution scandal. To us it is more surprising that the press and the public were so naive as to miss the obvious warning signs of Spitzer’s dangerous habit for so long.
Although it was duly reported in the media, no one seemed to find it somewhat odd that Governor Spitzer declared the first three weeks of this year “Prostitute Week,” “Anal Sex Week,” and “Anal Sex with a Prostitute Week,” respectively.
Then there was his somewhat unusual appearance at the white tie Al Smith Dinner, an annual A-list political event that is sponsored by the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of New York under the personal patronage of Cardinal Edward Egan. Spitzer arrived late without his wife Silda but accompanied by two women whom he introduced to the Cardinal as Sapphire and Chardonnay. Sapphire, who wore a tight lime-green cocktail dress with a plunging neckline, described herself as the governor’s “friend” and said that she had known him for approximately three months. Chardonnay, a Ukrainian national who spoke very little English, declined to answer any questions about her relationship with the governor except to say that she was thrilled to meet the “King of America,” evidently a reference to Cardinal Egan.
It is episodes like this which should have raised a warning flag and been examined in greater depth by the press, rather than buried in a brief mention in the Metro Section. Even if there were, in fact, nothing inappropriate about Spitzer’s relationship with Sapphire and Chardonnay, there is still the appearance of impropriety to consider along with the governor’s judgement in inviting them to such a high profile event and parading them before reporters and the assembled dignitaries.
In retrospect, it almost seems like he wanted to get caught.
There was, for example, the interview he gave to British television in which he joked that there was “room under my desk for a hooker to give me [oral sex] and you guys would never know.” Spitzer then refused to allow the camera crew to look under his desk and appeared distracted, at one point moaning and rocking his head back with his mouth open.
On another occasion, Spitzer invited his rival, State Senate Minority Leader Joseph Bruno, for a helicopter flight during which he suggested that they could both have sex with prostitutes while hovering over their respective residences, something he told Bruno he did frequently. When Bruno subsequently recounted the discussion to a reporter for the Albany Times-Union, Spitzer said that he had been speaking metaphorically and denounced Bruno for engaging in “typical dirty politics.” The Times-Union ran a brief item attacking Bruno that reported Spitzer’s actions only in the context of making the case that the Minority Leader was “utterly humorless.”
Looking back further, to Spitzer’s college days, one can easily see the deep roots of his lifelong fascination with prostitutes and deviant sexual activities. At Princeton, Spitzer was known to the other members of his eating club, Tiger Inn, as “Pimpzler” because, as one of them put it, “he wanted to bring strippers and hookers to everything. ‘Christmas Party: let’s have hookers. Homecoming Weekend: we’ll get some hookers. Spring Formal: instead of dates, let’s invite hookers.’ Even for a college student, that guy had a one-track mind.”
At Harvard Law School, Spitzer’s own official biography reports that he “frequented the strip bars in Boston’s Combat Zone with his mentor, Professor Alan Dershowitz.” What the biography conveniently fails to mention is that Spitzer and Dershowitz were known as “the rubber glove twins” among Boston’s stripper community because of certain actions they would ask the dancers to perform in a private room for which they were willing to pay extra.
“He used to talk about how he was going to be president one day,” said Danielle Garcia, 48, a retired Combat Zone stripper who encountered Spitzer and Dershowitz frequently during the former’s years at law school. “And we all believed him. He was very persuasive.”
In the end, the lesson to be learned from the downfall of Eliot Spitzer is not about one man’s hubris and arrogance or even about his tragic flaw or possible mental illness. It is about our own blindness and naivete; for what is remarkable about Spitzer is not that he fell so far but that he rose so high in the first place.
– The Editors
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on March 10, 2008 at 10:57 pm Leave a CommentTags: Spitzer?? I hardly KNOW her!
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