10 years ago, Bill Clinton survived a sex scandal that ultimately led to his impeachment and non-conviction thereof. Now, Elliot Spitzer is resigning his office of New York governor effective Monday at noon (Eastern) because of a sex scandal. In both cases, Republicans held narrow majorities in the legislative branch responsible for pursuing and trying impeachment, with one of the few substantive differences between New York’s version and the federal version being the 7 members of New York’s Court of Appeals (NY’s analog to the Supreme Court) being part of the jury.
Depending on how those 7 judges would have voted on any articles of impeachment, a flip of anywhere between 7 and 14 of the 30 Democrats would have ousted Spitzer. We know that the abandonment by one’s own party is what sunk Richard Nixon, and that lack of abandonment is what saved Clinton from conviction.
Meanwhile, the DNC stirred the pot a bit thicker by stating they would not be filling Spitzer’s superdelegate slot (H/T – American Princess). Spitzer was (well, is for a few more days) in the Hillary Clinton camp, and his Lieutenant Governor David Paterson, who is also a superdelegate and who will assume the office of Governor, is also in the Clinton camp. Clinton also won her “home of the week” state, but not by a real smashing majority (59%-40%).
So, is some sense of shame returning to the Democrats, is Spitzer a bit more honorable (relatively-speaking) than Bill Clinton, or are there enough Barack Obama supporters around Albany to sabotage the Hillary Clinton campaign by any means necessary?
Some observers noted that Spitzer was disliked by a LOT of Democrats in the NYLegislature–he was uncompromising and an ass to deal with.
I don’t think that the Dems are going to start excising sinners-in-office on a wholesale basis.
And Bill wasn’t disliked by a lot of ‘Rats? Of course, he was a bit too compromising (not just in his lack of taste in women).
I think Dad29 was close. Spitzer was never really “one of the gang.” He was a guy who always painted himself above the party. Clinton was the party. Spitzer going down was about Spitzer, it wasn’t about the Dems. Clinton going down was about the Dems; they weren’t going to let that happen.