If I was a hooker, a thousand dollars would be my price, all right*

I thought about calling this post, “ROXXXXXXXAAAAANNNE, you don’t have to sell your body to the night…or to the now-disgraced former-governer of the great state of New York” but, it didn’t fit very well into the title bar…

I also briefly considered trying to come up with some pithy play off Randy Travis’ “Three Wooden Crosses” (you know the one, with the Hooker, the Preacher, the Farmer and the Teacher, and all but one of them dies in a tragic bus crash in a song that really should be in the top 10 of “Most Depressing Songs of All Time”) – but, I couldn’t come up with anything catchy enough, although I did briefly bat around “Three Federal Wire-Taps” and something about a hooker, a governor, a blind politician and grieviously wronged wife…but, it wasn’t going anywhere.

So, I went with the Rolling Stones. You can’t go wrong with a Mick Jagger quote, right?

Anyhoo, up until about 36 hours ago, I had tremendous respect for Eliot Spitzer. Husband and I were burned, badly, in the Global Crossings scandal – and as share holders we were left with EIGHT CENTS of our investment. 8. CENTS. So, it was with blissful bitter cheer that I watched then-Attorney-General-of-NY Spitzer go after fraud on Wall Street.

But, there is probably nothing I hate more than HYPOCRISY. And that is the only word I can think of to describe the Spitzer Situation.

You know what I really want to know???

I want to know what kind of org@sm is worth $4300, the governorship of the State of New York and a decent shot at the Presidency of the United States of America? What kind? Because, seriously, I hope that was one mind-blowing climax.

Actually, I take that back. I kind of hope it was mediocre. Because, yeah, I HATE HYPOCRISY. (And, it kind of boggles my mind that the call-girl in question was making something like 5.4 times my going hourly rate. I thought lawyers were expensive, but, evidently we don’t hold a candle to the cost of a well-appointed whore. And I bet they don’t have to finish 7 years of higher education!)

I don’t even have a problem with prostitution, conceptually. I have argued, in the past, that it might be better for everyone if it was legalized, regulated, and taxed as a service.

But, as I mentioned just two posts ago, I do have a problem with adultery, and, oh, I don’t know, maybe SPENDING MONEY YOUR SPOUSE DOESN’T KNOW YOU ARE SPENDING? To the tune of EIGHTY-THOUSAND DOLLARS???

Oh, and let’s not forget BREAKING THE LAW. Breaking the LAW that one was CHARGED WITH ENFORCING.

Honestly, I am flummoxed. Why can’t politicians keep their pants in their own bedrooms? Why???

And why, for Pete’s sake, is Silda Spitzer standing in front of the nation, looking shell-shocked and mortified, right next to her husband? I mean, of all people who have been WRONGED by the actions of this one man, SHE IS THE PERSON he hurt the most. I am pretty sure that, in her shoes, I would be off contemplating which very sharp object I would use in the re-arranging the offending disgraced ex-governor’s manly bits, and not standing next to him to share in his very public humiliation.

When I was a graduate student in Sociology (a Master’s Degree I started and did not finish), I wrote a huge paper on the subject of Prostitutes and Sex Workers. I read several hundred interviews of prostitutes, and at the time I was dumbstruck by the fact that many of them said that their clients generally loved their wives, and felt that by having a "business transaction" with the hooker, they weren’t actually cheating on their wives because it was "only a business transaction" and not an affair. (It’s kind of amazing the kind of ridiculous illogic you can buy into if it feels good enough.) But I kept coming back to the fundamental question, which was, “Why aren’t they just having sex with their wives, then?”

I find this mind-boggling. I wish I could find a link to a study I ready once that said wives are more likely to forgive physical infidelity than emotional infidelity, and that the reverse was true of men. It’s kind of stunning, really, what people are capable of forgiving one another for. So, I suppose it’s possible that Mrs. Spitzer will forgive her husband for this. Maybe. (Although if they would like to get divorced in an adjoining state I would gladly give her my card…KIDDING!)

But, I don’t think that Eliot Spitzer, even if he is forgiven by those nearest and dearest to him, is going to find the public, who trusted him and cheered him on and believed that he was a guy who was truthful and honorable and not your average politician – is going to forgive that it turned out he was just as corrupt as the rest of them.

LM

*The Rolling Stones, "If I Was A Dancer"