Eliot Spitzer Has Been a Superdud for Clinton

Until his resignation NY Gov. Eliot "Client 9" Spitzer was a pledged superdelegate for Hillary Clinton. Under DNC rules he will lose that post upon resignation and there will be one less superdelegate casting a vote in Denver. His superdelegate position won't be replaced (Lt. Gov. David Paterson is already a superdelegate). Hillary Clinton can't afford to lose pledged votes.

Spitzer has been a superdud in more ways than one as detailed here:

For a supporter, New York Gov. Eliot L. Spitzer (D) sure hasn't done Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) any favors lately.

After all, it was Spitzer who, in the view of her advisers, caused the slide that put her where she is today, fighting from behind for the Democratic presidential nomination. A question about his proposal to let illegal immigrants get driver's licenses tripped her up in a debate in late October and ended 10 months of unquestioned dominance in the race for the nomination.

Now, his apparent involvement with a prostitution ring has not only distracted attention from her efforts to take down the front-runner, Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.), it has also brought back unhelpful memories of her own husband's dalliances in office. There on cable television again were pictures of Bill Clinton hugging Monica S. Lewinsky. And the image of Spitzer's wife standing painfully by his side while he acknowledged unspecified wrongdoing could not help but remind some of Hillary Clinton's own stand-by-her-man moment.

This certainly is not the way Clinton's strategists would have mapped out this week on the campaign trail. They want voters to be thinking about that 3 a.m. phone call in terms of who is ready to handle a crisis in the White House, not in terms of where an unfaithful husband might be catting around town. And, sure enough, the late-night comedians wasted little time linking the Spitzer case to the Clintons. Jay Leno joked Monday night that Spitzer's scandal "means Hillary Clinton is now only the second angriest woman in the state of New York." David Letterman offered a Top 10 List of excuses Spitzer might cite, including the No. 1 excuse: "I thought Bill Clinton legalized this years ago."

Hillary Clinton was asked about the case late Monday and, predictably enough, tried to brush it off without comment. "I obviously send my best wishes to the governor and his family," she told reporters. Still, it is hard to imagine that will be the last time she is asked about it.

Clinton never has recovered from that ill-fated illegal immigrant drivers license question in the Philadelphia debate many moons ago. It knocked the "inevitibility" right off of her. Reminding everyone of her husband's past (and probably present) infidelities can't be very helpful either. The Clintons want you to remember their version of history, not what really happened.