Governor Eliot Spitzer's character is on display now day after day, and it's obvious what can be concluded. He has no character. None.
Yesterday's admission by his Press Secretary, Christine Anderson, that he was fully aware of an effort to encourage the Internal Revenue Service to investigate Senate Majority Leader Joe Bruno is merely the latest example of Spitzer's inability to distinguish between right and wrong.
The IRS is a Federal agency staffed by pocket-protector bureaucratic thugs who can destroy lives in a relatively short period of time. Governor Spitzer understands this reality. Who better to go after Bruno than this bunch?
The Governor, yet again, has a commonality with the 37th President of the United States, Richard Milhouse Nixon. Nixon was also enthralled with using the IRS to pursue and discredit his political opponents.
According to White House tapes, Nixon said the IRS should "go after a couple of media people ... Dan Schorr, Mary McGrory." This also included Los Angeles Times publisher Otis Chandler. "I want him checked out with regard to his gardener, I understand he's a wetback," said Nixon.
Nixon also ordered his chief hench-aide H.R. Haldeman to use the IRS against Democratic contributors. "Please get me the name of the Jews. You know, the big Jewish contributors of the Democrats," he said.
Governor Spitzer may not be dumb enough to install a taping system in his offices. If there were tapes, though, New Yorkers would undoubtedly hear his Inner Nixon come out with regard to his obsession with Joe Bruno.
Eliot Spitzer is unfit for public office. He has neither the temperament nor the personal decency to lead 18 million people. In less than a year in office he's succeeded in becoming a failed, polarizing and conniving Chief Executive who has little chance of returning New York to its rightful place as a great American state.
