I think Spitzer understood that this was a model that had to change, and I think he was working towards that. As ineffective as he was, his organization was quietly shifting the power balance in the State Senate– it is likely that the Democrats would have had control after the next election, and that might have enabled him to start making some of the changes that need to be made. I do not think that David Patterson will be able to accomplish these things. I suspect that Patterson is not inclined towards change– he is a creature of the New York State Legislature. That culture is one where he is comfortable operating, and it seems unlikely to me that he will be inclined to alter that. Even if he is, he doesn’t have a lot of political capital. What made Spitzer credible as an agent of change was that he obviously didn’t care about the political status quo. There are a lot of reasons people hated him– he was a prick, for one thing (I’d forgotten how gratuitously cruel he was to Hevisi, for example)– but the main reason he engendered so much dislike was that he was not playing the Albany game by the rules everybody else in Albany was comfortable with.

Poor son of a bitch. His wife and family hate him, if he has a friend in the world it would be headline news, and even the $5,000 dollar hookers hate him for screwing up and getting them busted.

It is hard to see Patterson getting re-elected, although it is early days. I voted for Tom Souzzi last time, and would do it again. Maybe Bloomberg will take a whack at it– he stands enough outside the system to be able to accomplish the necessary. Meanwhile, roads will crumble, schools will decline, population will migrate, the Sabres will miss the playoffs, and the Bills quarterback situation will remain unsettled.