Dancing on Spitzer's Grave

Well, Eliot Spitzer's political grave that is. Wall Street is simply giddy with joy at the man's downfall. That prostitution is a victimless crime is true, that libertarians and classical liberals (like myself) argue in favour of legality is also true.

But if you'd like to see why there is such glee at recent events, try this from Alan Reynolds.

In 2002-2005 I documented in some detail what today’s Wall Street Journal editorial referred to as Eliot Spitzer’s “consistent excesses as Attorney General.”

A January 2003 piece on “Spitzer’s Shakedown” revealed the fatuous nature of his inquisition against Wall Street.

In 2004, there was Spitzer’s ridiculous “Mutual Fund Fee Fantasy.” In 2005, in “Trial by Press Release,” I unraveled Spitzer’s flimsy case against the insurance brokerage arm of Marsh & McClellan.

Shortly after one of these articles appeared I received a phone call at home from an investigative reporter with one of the largest New York newspapers. He prodded me for quite a while to find out if I had been influenced or bribed by one of the companies Spitzer had attacked. Did I know anyone at, say, Merrill Lynch? (Nope). Do I own stock in the company? (Not then, and I’m currently shorting financials.)

I explained that nobody has accused me of any breach of integrity since I began writing in 1971. Besides, it would be very expensive to bribe me, I joked, because I had accumulated more money through investing than I know how to spend. I asked the reporter where he had gotten this very bad tip. He told me he had been contacted by Mr. Spitzer’s office. Hardball was their favorite game.

Do read the rest of it, it's a quite wonderful indictment of Spitzer, his methods and his political career. The only sadness in the whole story is that he fell for screwing a willing screwee, rather than the general public.