Spitzer: Pathos, Not Power
In defense of Spitzer, I have to say that the great-man-abusing-power narrative does not seem apt in his case. In fact, it seems rather out-of-date. If you read the wiretaps closely, you'll discover that, as a consumer of sexual services, Spitzer was actually shockingly powerless. Client 9, the governor of New York State, had to make dozens of phone calls and multiple trips to an ATM machine over the course of three days just to get a single date with a prostitute.
How do I know this? From an abridged transcript of his exchanges with the escort service that ran as a sidebar on page 5 of the New York Times Metro section yesterday morning. I cannot for the life of me find it online; I suspect it only ran in the local edition. So let me summarize:
On Monday, Feb. 11, the booking agent at the Emperors' Club VIP asks a coworker to notify her when an overdue package arrives from Client 9, presumably a deposit of cash sent by mail. On Tuesday, Feb. 12, she calls Client 9 and tells him the package has not yet arrived. He reassures her that the address was the same as in the past, "no question about it." Ten minutes later she calls to say that they cannot proceed if the package does not arrive. The next day, Feb. 13, Client 9 calls the booking agent to tell her that he has reserved a room at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington. An hour later she gets a text message telling her the package has arrived. She immediately calls him to suggest that when he sees the prostitute, Kristen, he give her extra cash upfront to avoid such problems in the future. They discuss his debt—$2,600—and he agrees to give Kristen an extra $1,000 toward future appointments. The booking agent urges him to give $1,500 instead. Client 9 agrees to go out and look for a bank. An hour later he calls the booking agent to tell her where Kristen should go in the hotel. The agent tells him again how much he owes her. He promises again to find a bank.
A few minutes later, the booking agent texts Kristen to ask her to text back when her "four hours" begins. Two and a half hours later, just past midnight on Feb. 14, Kristen leaves Spitzer's room.
This, my friends, is pathetic. It's practically an outrage. No one with less to lose would ever allow himself to be importuned and harassed by an employee of an escort service evincing such cavalier familiarity. It's hard to avoid the conclusion that she felt entitled to give Spitzer such a hard time precisely because he was the governor of New York State—because he was so blackmail-able. (Was he being blackmailed? The sums involved make you wonder. And his public anti-prostitution stand would only have added to his value as a mark.)
So I don't buy the thesis that he abused his power by seeking paid sex. Whatever you think about prostitution—I for one don't understand why's it illegal,rather than well-regulated, but that's not wholly relevant here—Spitzer's bumbling, embarrassing effort to buy himself some must stand as another example of how the private lives of public figures have become fearful, furtive, diminished affairs, denied all but the most conventional responses to the urgings of human desire. Not that Spitzer, when a prosecutor, didn't do his bit to make life more miserable for those vulnerable to being shamed by surveillance techniques and technology. But his situation now makes the larger point. Refuse to pity the powerful if you must, but don't think for a minute that running a government in the modern world makes it easier for one of them to get extramaritally laid.