Inner Sinner

It's a very familiar story: crusading moralist busted, revealing inner sinner. There are more than a few oddities here - why, for example, was this the subject of a federal anti-corruption probe?

A 47-page federal affidavit from an F.B.I. agent investigating a prostitution ring lists the man at the hotel as “Client 9,” and includes considerable details about him, the prostitutes and his methods of paying for them. A law enforcement official and another person briefed on the prostitution case have identified Client 9 as Eliot Spitzer, the governor of New York.

As it happens, the guy with the perfect LSAT seems to have managed to commit a federal crime in order to achieve his expensive assignation. Is it just another example of the smart guy assuming tthe laws were too dumb for somebody as smart as him?

Now I don't happen to think that his behavior should be considered that criminal. Aside from his wife, who is the victim here? The law, however, reads differently, and from the standpoint of the Republican Party, Eliot Spitzer was a very high value target.

I doubt that his apology to his family and the public will save his electoral scalp. In this country, getting caught with a prostitute is more serious than lying the country into a war that costs thousands of American lives and trillions of American dollars.

Wall Street scam artists (one of Spitzer the crusader's favorite targets) took the news pretty well. They cheered at the stock exchange.