New York Mets celebrate St. Patrick's Day, new governor with win

New Yorkers hope the luck of the Irish, above, helps plow a path toward political success in their state with new Gov. David Paterson, who replaced disgraced Democrat Eliot Spitzer. Maybe it will leave them dancing in fields of green, like the Mets, below.

As David Paterson was being sworn in as New York's first black, blind, male, Harlem native, bar-failing and affair-admitting governor in front of lawmakers in Albany, every other New Yorker was in Viera, Fla., watching the New York Mets beat the Washington Nationals, 7-3, in a spring training game. South Florida, which is as teaming with New Yorkers as New York is criminals, came out to support the Mets during a difficult time for the state and its politics. About 5,500 people were at Space Coast Stadium, which is the most I have seen at the usually poor fan-drawing Nats facility.

St. Patrick's Day probably played a role in the good attendance. Irish green bloods and wannabe green bloods enjoyed watching a bunch of overpaid athletes in green hats, drinking green beer and eating green hot dogs.

I felt luck was on my side most of the day. I got a sweet ticket in section 215, row 21, seat 15. With that numeral repetition, I must have had something going on.

And the shamrocks were really working for New York, too. They had the Nats' number since the first inning.

But, not surprisingly, I don't think the New York fans in attendance could get their home state's politics off their minds. Here's how the baseball game told a story of the rise and fall of a grandstanding politician.

In the beginning, there was a newspaper, The New York Times, that raked up some dirt on Eliot Spitzer, a Democratic governor who had apparently paid thousands of dollars for a high-class prostitute, Ashley Alexandra Dupre of the now-defunct Emperors Club VIP. The Times was accusing Spitzer of being a rake, moving around money slyly to hid his immorality from his wife and constituents.

The story was something quite off the wall: A self-professed scrupulous politician who endeavored during his short term as governor to eliminate corporate malfeasance apparently was a hypocrite. It was as bizarre as "The band is on the field. The band is on the field." Or, maybe, "The cars are on the field. The cars are on the field."

Spitzer was stuck in a situation he couldn't free himself from, like a broken bat that jabbed into the infield sod. He was faced with resigning only days after the Times story broke. How could such a disgraced politician continue leading a bedraggled state?

Though Spitzer's wife urged him to stay the course, scary people dressed in green, with green lips, yelled at him to call it quits. The pressure was mounting from opposing Republicans, too.

So Spitzer handed off the governor's hat to his lieutenant - just as the Nats' Boone brothers, Bret and Aaron, would do with their special green St. Patrick's Day ball caps. The Statehouse would belonged to Paterson.

A packed crowd of legislators gave Paterson a few standing ovations, as the 5,500 fans at Space Coast Stadium did for their teams. Paterson is hoping to ride the wave of public optimism for a compassionate and bipartisan gubernatorial administration, and for a large step by minority groups such as blind people, black people, male people, Harlem people, bar-failing people and affair-admitting people.

But Paterson won't be asking for any handouts as an old Irish man would seek free beer at baseball game on St. Patty's Day. He's got a tough road ahead.

People will be lined up wanting Paterson to address problems and put his signature on legislation passed through the New York Assembly and Senate, and on the impending budget, which has been of great concern. It will be a situation reminiscent of Mets outfielder Ryan Church trying to sign autographs for all the fans lined up outside the stadium after the game.

Paterson must do plenty of legwork. He must blindly put a finger up and hail a cab if necessary to get around and ask New Yorkers what's on their minds. He must be a governor of the people.

Paterson needs to do his reading as Joe Smith does on long team bus trips. Apparently, he's reading Michael Crichton's latest novel, "Next," about politics and biotechnology. Maybe biotechnology will lead to Paterson actually being able to read a book.

Paterson must be stern and discriminate instead of readily giving by putting his signature on any old bill. If it doesn't deserve his autograph, he should just send it back to where it came from.

In the end, Paterson hopes to blow the hats off everyone and stop the proverbial wrecking ball for his state of New York.

The Nationals pitcher, catcher and pitching coach were in the shape of a shamrock - until the umpire came out to break it up. Luck obviously was not on their side. Let's hope Paterson's fate isn't similar.

The Boys of Spring home

New York's Eliot Spitzer was best-paid governor, and he got plenty of money from Kenneth Starr and Donald Trump

Despite a personal fortune developed on Manhattan's highfalutin law scene, New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer also was the highest-paid governor in 2007 with a $179,000 salary. Of course, that pleasure will pass to Lt. Gov. David Paterson, a more modest Harlem native who failed the state's bar exam.

Spitzer also had no problem raising money for his campaigns, both as attorney general and as governor. With enough funds to pay for political costs, he had plenty of his own cash to cover "personal expenses."

(Photo by U.S. State Department)

Campaign contributions

According to campaign finance reports filed in the state of New York, Spitzer already had almost $9 million in contributions for his 2010 re-election bid. That included $500,000 of his own money.

Most of Spitzer's financial allies have been hedge fund whizzes and top partners at law firms nationwide, but mostly in New York City. But they have come from both ends of the political spectrum.

Prominent Spitzer donors included the politically conservative "Apprentice" host Donald Trump, who chipped in $20,000, and his wife, Ivanka, who contributed $10,000 to his 2010 campaign. A politician who once prided himself in rooting out evil on Wall Street and in other segments of corporate America, Spitzer now is on the wrong end of Trump's "You're fired" trademark.

Brian D. Obergfell, a partner at the Emmet, Marvin & Martin law firm in New York City, donated $20,000 to Spitzer. Obergfell's wife, Jo-Ann, gave $10,000. Not surprisingly, Obergfell was rewarded by Spitzer with an appointment to the New York State Banking Board in June.

Spitzer also named Dale Hemmerdinger, who gave $10,000 to his campaign, chairman of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority.

Some other notable donors were:

• Kenneth Cole, fashion designer, $10,000
  

• DLA Piper Rudnick, largest global law firm chaired by Major League Baseball's "Mitchell Report" author, George Mitchell, $10,000
  

• Leo Hindery Jr., executive in residence at Columbia Business School and Huffington Post contributor, $10,000
  

• Nancy Elizabeth Lieberman, former college basketball superstar and current Hall of Famer, $10,000
  

• Edward Norton, actor who starred in movies such as "American History X" and "Fight Club," $10,000
  

• Richard Dean Parsons, chairman of Time Warner (AOL and CNN parent), $10,000
  

• Ronald Owen Perelman, investor and Forbes 28th richest man in the United States, $10,000
  

• Arvind Raghunathan, managing director at Deutsche Bank, $10,000
  

• Jonathan Rosen, New Yorker book critic, $10,000
  

• Jerry Speyer, whose company owns Rockefeller Center and the Chrysler Building in New York City, $10,000
  

• Kenneth Starr, former White House special counsel who investigated Bill Clinton's Whitewater land transactions, $10,000

Gubernatorial salary

For many governors, salary is not an issue because of their own wealth. For example, California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger would have been the highest-paid in 2007 at $206,500, but he gives his paycheck back to the state. By law, Schwarzenegger must accept it. But he chooses to unload the money to his charity of choice, California, once he gets paid.

Multimillionaire New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine willfully reduced his own salary to $1 last year. Corzine is a former chief executive of financing giant Goldman Sachs. He reported an income of about $6 million in 2006 mostly through stocks, bonds and real estate.

The best Internet source for gubernatorial salaries is here, a story I wrote last year for Stateline.org, an arm of The Pew Research Center in Washington. If you search Google "governor salary," you would get that Web site. (Included in this post is the accompanying graphic by Stateline.org, which grants permission to reuse material with proper credit.)

It looks as though the governor had plenty of personal funds left over to pay for a high-class prostitute.

Blogger's note: All above information is original research done by The Offlede.

OFFLEDE EXCLUSIVE! New York Post, scared out of its wits, takes down Ashley Dupre photos; Eliot Spitzer disappointed

A screen shot of the New York Post's Web page, http://www.nypost.com/seven/03142008/news/regionalnews/dupre/photo01.htm, comes up empty early Saturday morning, after the tabloid took down a racy photo gallery of Gov. Eliot Spitzer's alleged call girl, Ashley Alexandra Dupre, or "Kristen," her reported prostitute alias.

It's out of character for The Offlede to be the first to do something (after all, it's not The Lede), but there's a first time for everything, including a first time not to be second. So, tell your friends. ...

Sometimes, controversy created by the media is easily foreseen. I saw this one coming. And it was banging drums and waving huge fluorescent red flags along the way.

The Associated Press just moved (3:45 a.m.) a story (here) about Ashley Alexandra Dupre being vewy vewy angwy over the use of her MySpace photos and other pictures of her in publications.

And apparently the extremely racy photos that the New York Post ran of her were taken by an outside photographer and sold to the newspaper on a freelance basis.

Interestingly enough, though, the photo gallery that the Post had on its Web site no longer exists. If you were to click this link, which once led to the gallery, you would see "Page Not Found." I spared you the effort above, too.

The AP story was not successful in getting a comment from the Post on its publication of the photos in print. The story did not address that the Post Web site had taken down the photos sometime late Friday or early Saturday.

Well, I'm addressing that here: They're gone. And I don't know anything more.

The AP also explained its own reasoning for running the MySpace photos on the wire. I jokingly created four questions requiring keen news judgment that, hypothetically, were flying around the newsrooms of The New York Times, Newsday, the New York Post and the New York Daily News. (See this post.) But it appears that they probably were pretty accurate.

Here is the quote from the AP story:

"The Associated Press discussed the photos obtained from the MySpace page in great detail and found that they were newsworthy," said Associated Press National Photo Editor V.W. Vaughan. "We distributed the photos that were relevant to the story. Those photos did not show nudity, nor were they explicit."

Before I posted the MySpace photos on The Offlede, which was done as a media criticism instead of an exploitation of New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer's alleged prostitute, I looked at the MySpace terms of use. Here is what they say, in part:

By displaying or publishing ("posting") any Content on or through the MySpace Services, you hereby grant to MySpace a limited license to use, modify, delete from, add to, publicly perform, publicly display, reproduce, and distribute such Content solely on or through the MySpace Services, including without limitation distributing part or all of the MySpace Website in any media formats and through any media channels, except Content marked “private” will not be distributed outside the MySpace Website.

It seems that MySpace rightfully distributed them. For further details, click here.

I think this is an Offlede exclusive because I can't see a story about the Post's photo removal anywhere else on the Internet, not even on Gawker, New York City's media gossip blog. Creeps everywhere probably are disappointed about the Post's removal of the gallery, so real blogs such as Gawker better get on the story.

In this post, Gawker says, "New York 'Post' Has Best Week Ever."

Just imagine what would happen if it turns out that the feds had the wrong "Kristen" in the first place.

It could prove to be the Post's worst week ever.

From classy to trashy: Photo crops of Spitzer's call girl reveal character of New York media

One of the main stories on the Web sites of four New York newspapers is about soon-to-be-former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer's alleged mistress, Ashley Alexandra Dupre (also known by her prostitute alias "Kristen" ... allegedly).

Each newspaper grabbed photos from her MySpace page, and each cropped them a bit differently. Look at the differences. They really show something about the nature of these papers' coverage of the news.


The New York Times: Good quality, but pretty conservative. A close crop. Nice aviators. Real classy.



Newsday (disclosure: I'm a former employee): Enlarged, decreasing quality, but still a respectable crop. Newsday is a tabloid only in format, not in content. And as usual, Newsday enjoys the scenery around the subject of the photo. Where is this taken, anyway? Not Melbourne.



The New York Post: Genuine tabloid picture. Eliot Spitzer's alleged woman in high-quality, eye-popping format.



New York Daily News: Gives us the whole thing. Enlarged and poor quality. Real trashy.

I can hear the questions flying in the newsrooms right now:

New York Times: "Indeed, we must search deep into our minds and ask ourselves, Is this photo really newsworthy? Call the company therapist immediately."

Newsday: "We should ask ourselves, Is her body below the neck really newsworthy? Put a poll on the Web site to see what our readers think."

New York Post: "This photo came from MySpace? I wonder if Murdoch knew her. Hey, get the Rupe on the phone, stat!"

New York Daily News: "Why did she have to wear all these clothes? Someone ask Hugh Hefner if he has made a deal with Kristen!"