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Saturday September 12, 2009

‘Client 9’ keeps New Yorkers guessing

State Side by LIM AI LEE


IF THE buzz is to be believed, Eliot Spitzer will soon be humming Stand by Me. Barely 18 months after quitting as New York governor over a sex scandal, there is talk of him planning a political comeback.

Last week, the New York Post ran a cover story, “You Can’t Keep a Bad Man Down”, quoting sources as saying that Spitzer had privately discussed the prospect of running for statewide office as early as next year.

The Democrat is said to have held informal discussions in recent weeks about the possibility of making a bid for state comptroller or the US Senate seat currently held by Kirsten Gillibrand.

Though the Post has often been criticised for its lurid headlines and sensationalism, the report has nevertheless set tongues wagging within and outside political circles.

Spitzer stepped down as New York’s chief executive in March 2008 after he was unmasked in Manhattan federal court as “Client 9” in a bust involving a major call girl ring.

He was revealed to have paid US$4,300 for a romp with escort Ashley Dupre, then 22.

Spitzer, who now works at his father’s real estate company, refused to comment when approached by the Post but told rival tabloid the Daily News he had no plans to run for office. Still it has not reined in speculation nor checked conspiracy theories from flying.

For one, Spitzer had started re-appearing in the public eye months before the Post report. In March, he gave his first TV interview to CNN, speaking out against the million-dollar bonuses handed out to American International Group executives.

In July, Spitzer, who was Attorney-General for nine years before becoming Governor in 2007, made the cover of Newsweek and was also featured in Vanity Fair.

Over the last several months, he has been interviewed on radio and TV, including on the Today show and Morning Joe on MSNBC, mostly talking about Wall Street and the financial crisis.

He has also been writing a column for Slate, an online magazine owned by The Washington Post Company, with his first article criticising the federal government’s bailout programmes.

Once dubbed the Sheriff of Wall Street, Spitzer told CNN of the need for new regulations to rein in Wall Street’s “recklessness and greed”. He added it was his duty to speak out on such issues.

The subject of his past invariably crops up and Spitzer appears to be remorseful.

“I am where I am because of my own conduct. I would say to (critics) that I never held myself out as being anything other than human. I have flaws, as we all do, arguably. I failed in a very important way in my personal life. And I have paid a price for that.”

Although Spitzer has indicated that he’s not interested in subjecting his family to the rigours of another campaign, he has not totally ruled it out.

“If by politics you mean running for office again, I’ve a hard time seeing politics as a career. I wouldn’t want to put my family through the agony,” he told Vanity Fair. “But that doesn’t mean I can’t participate somehow in the public debate about the issues.”

Recent polls have shown Spitzer to be ahead of his successor Governor David Paterson, whom many New Yorkers see as indecisive and ineffective.

Unlike Spitzer, Paterson took over a state as it entered its worst recession and also had to contend with the recent power tussle in the New York Senate.

Spitzer’s re-emergence in public seems well-timed. Some quarters believe those who want him to run for office could have leaked the information to the Post in hopes of drumming up publicity or testing the waters.

“Maybe Eliot Spitzer doesn’t look so bad any more. With the New York State government spiralling into disarray and the financial industry climbing out of a bomb crater, many New Yorkers might feel nostalgia for an era when a prostitution scandal was the most pressing issue facing the state,” Forbes.com columnist Jon Bruner noted.

Spitzer’s long-time foe and Republican lobbyist Roger Stone just cannot wait for his “comeback”.

“I’m salivating. This man is comic gold. He’s the gift that keeps on giving,” Stone told Talk1300 AM in Albany after the Post report.

The Nation editor Katrina vanden Heuvel, however, is all for bringing back the man who took on Wall Street and AIG long before it was trendy.

“He speaks with passion and clarity about what went wrong and what needs to be done to restore integrity to our system,” she said. “He is chastened by personal scandal, yet untouched by complicity in Wall Street’s public scandals which have obliterated peoples’ savings and devastated our country.”

But are New Yorkers ready to forgive a disgraced ex-governor? More importantly, are they ready to accept him back in public office?

In a snap poll last week, Survey USA asked New Yorkers some questions about Spitzer.

Of the 500 people interviewed, 15% said they would vote for Spitzer again no matter what office he sought.

Some 47% said they might vote for him, depending on which office he sought. Roughly two out of five voters (39%) said they would not consider voting for Spitzer under any circumstances.

A third of New York voters said they had no respect for Spitzer, while 20% gave him a lukewarm 5 on a scale of 10.

Meanwhile, as the nation speculates on his political future, Spitzer has taken on a more mundane task – teaching political science at City College of New York.

But what he does over the next few months will be closely watched as Spitzer is definitely still tabloid gold.

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