When will these politicians learn???
At least they got the first ever black governor out of this.


'Deeply sorry' Spitzer resigns TheStar.com - Columnist - 'Deeply sorry' Spitzer resigns

JOSHUA LOTT/REUTERS

Gov. Eliot Spitzer leaves his apartment building with his wife Silda in New York City en route to a press conference where he announced his resignation. Mar 12, 2008.

WASHINGTON Eliot Spitzer resigned this morning as governor of New York state, completing one of the most stunning falls from power in recent U.S. political history.

Spitzer made a brief statement at his Manhattan office, almost 48 hours after it was revealed that he had been caught up in a prostitution ring and had spent an evening with a high-priced call girl in the U.S. capital last month.

Once more, just as she did Monday, his wife Silda Wall Spitzer, stood grim-faced at her disgraced husband's side.

"I am deeply sorry I did not live up to what was expected of me,'' said Spitzer, a 48-year-old Democrat once thought to be a future presidential candidate.

"To every New Yorker and to all those who believe in what I tried to stand for, I sincerely apologize.

"I look at my time as governor with a sense of what might have been.

"I cannot allow my private failings to disrupt the people's work.''

His resignation will take effect next Monday and he will be replaced by 53-year-old Lt.-Gov. David Paterson who will become the state's first African-American governor.

Paterson, who is also legally blind, is considered by most observers as largely untested for someone assuming the leadership of the country's third most populous state.

"In the last few days, I have begun to atone for my private failings,'' Spitzer said, "with my wife Silda, my children and my entire family.

"The remorse I feel will always be with me. Words cannot describe how grateful I am for the love and compassion they have shown me.''

Federal officials say Spitzer had at least half a dozen similar encounters with hookers in the past eight months and had spent as much as $80,000 on women.

They say he had encounters with prostitutes in Dallas and Florida as well as Washington, where he was ultimately caught on a federal wiretap, identified as Client 9, arranging payment for an encounter at the U.S. capital's upscale Mayflower Hotel.

He had booked room 871 at the hotel under the name of a longtime associate and prominent fundraiser.

State Republicans had threatened impeachment hearings if Spitzer did not step down and public opinion, fuelled by the New York city tabloids, was overwhelmingly in favour of his resignation.

Spitzer said he would try to heal the hurt within his family, then try to serve the public good again, outside politics.