A.B.'s Corner, Volume 5, Come on in and take a load off..... Options

[jeffmoskin]

Spitzer is an individual for whom no one really feels any pity ....

He is a vicious individual ....

And people see this as a form of divine retribution for Spitzer's HUBRIS ...

Spitzer is a political ICARUS who believed in his mind that he could fly right through the sun .....

And it would have to get out of his way when he did ....

And like the other one .....

Spitzer's wings were only held together with wax ....

And so ....

He should resign ....

For the good of the state .....

And so ....

Sigh.

When will this country separate the public lives of elected officials from the private.

How many years did we lose looking for Monica's blue dress when we could have been taking care of public business?

I don't care if Spitzer was a mean SOB.

Or an angel.

He was elected GOVERNOR, and unless he screwed the State of New York, I really don't care who he screwed personally.

[jeffmoskin]

Good News !!

As I type this, Carolyn is resting or snoozing in the living room recliner. I brought her home from the hospital yesterday. She has been there since February 6. The road ahead is still not perfectly smooth but we have great optimism and faith in God that we will have many good years together.

Thanks to all who have shared the past tough times with me. Your thoughts and words have been a big help to me.

Snuff, Your involvement in the Obama campaign should be very interesting. Good luck!

A.B.

Thank goodness, Mr A.B.

And my prayers to Carolyn for a speedy and full recovery.

And how lucky you are to have her back at home.

The news is good.

[amy]

Good News !!

As I type this, Carolyn is resting or snoozing in the living room recliner. I brought her home from the hospital yesterday. She has been there since February 6. The road ahead is still not perfectly smooth but we have great optimism and faith in God that we will have many good years together.


A.B.

This is very good news, A.B.

I bet Carolyn is enjoying that recliner and the quiet of home after being in the hospital for so many weeks....and she's back home with you...just great!

Do you get to see Beacon at all? He must miss you and Carolyn although I'm sure he's being spoiled rotten.

[Pegatha]

Congratulations to you and Carolyn for this reprieve, AG. I hope that you both enjoy every new morning!

[Livyjr]

Spitzer's DUTY as NYS governor, jeffmoskin, BY OUR NYS CONSTITUTION, which is not subject to being voted on or vetoed or altered or amended by people in other states of the union ...

Was to "TAKE CARE THAT THE LAWS ARE FAITHFULLY EXECUTED" ....

Prostitution, for good or bad, is AGAINST THE LAW ...

By dealing with this illegal prostitution as he was, Spitzer was PROTECTING the breaking of the law ....

HE WAS NOT TAKING CARE THAT THE LAW WAS FAITHFULLY EXECUTED ...

HE WAS TAKING CARE TO BREAK THE LAW, HIMSELF, AND TO PROVIDE HIS PROTECTION TO THOSE WHO LIKEWISE WERE ALSO BREAKING THE LAW ...

He went against all the honest folks in New York State when he made that choice ....

And anyway, the LOSER is supposed to be resigning here today ...

So that will be the end of his political career here, anyway ....

Some of the wags in the know say that he is going to move to California to run for governor as a DEMOCRAT out there, and they say that he will be welcomed in with open arms ....

And California will then make him president ....

And so ....

Get the TRASH out of NY, and I don't care where he goes ...

And when he gets out there to California, jeffmoskin, THEN your values will prevail ...

STATE'S RIGHTS, after all ...

And I can live with that ...

And so ...

[Livyjr]

YOU BETTER WATCH OUT, AH-nold ....

CLIENT 9 THE DEMOCRAT from New York is coming out there to take the governor's office away from you ....

By the WILL of the people of California ...

And so ...

[Livyjr]

Sigh.

When will this country separate the public lives of elected officials from the private.

How many years did we lose looking for Monica's blue dress when we could have been taking care of public business?

I don't care if Spitzer was a mean SOB.

Or an angel.

He was elected GOVERNOR, and unless he screwed the State of New York, I really don't care who he screwed personally.

Read it and weep, jeffmoskin ...

HUBRIS!

Don't leave home with it ...

At least here in NYS ...

And so ...

"Spitzer tripped up on laws he enforced"

By SAMANTHA GROSS and DEVLIN BARRETT, Associated Press

Last updated: 6:23 p.m., Tuesday, March 11, 2008

NEW YORK -- Eliot Spitzer knew how to catch bad guys by following the money.

As attorney general, he once broke up a call-girl ring and locked up 18 people on corruption, money-laundering and prostitution charges.

He ruthlessly investigated the pay packages of Wall Street executives and was so familiar with shady financial maneuvers that he rose to become the top racketeering prosecutor in Manhattan.

But in the end, it appears that Spitzer may have been done in by the same behavior he built a career out of prosecuting.

In fact, it seems he was tripped up by some of the very financial accounting methods he used so successfully against multibillion-dollar Wall Street firms.

http://www.commongroundcommonsense.org/for...mp;#entry811581

[amy]

Liv....I guess your "guv" has created a bit of a problem for himself.

~"Here's what happened, it was one of those sting deals. And they caught Eliot Spitzer, Gov. Spitzer, with a wire, recording him soliciting a prostitute. And I'm thinking, 'Holy cow, we can't get Bin Laden, but we got Spitzer. We got Sptizer.'" --David Letterman

~"The big new scandal breaking here in New York, Eliot Spitzer apparently involved in some kind of prostitution activities -- you know what that means?: Hookers. And right now, Spitzer is huddling with his advisers to develop a drinking problem." --David Letterman


~"According to the FBI wiretap, they had the transcript, Gov. Spitzer was listed as Client No.9. No. 9? He's the governor, who were the eight guys in front of him? You'd think as governor, you'd at least get to go first." --Jay Leno

[jeffmoskin]

I know that prostitution is illegal (dumb law, IMHO) and that if you cross state lines you violate the Mann Act (passed in the 1900s to ban white slavery).
I also know that Spitzer was a pit bull against the barons of Wall $treet who make millions making deals shipping jobs to China.

Is it possible he was set up?

Who will chew Wall $treet's butt now? Patterson? I don't think so.

[Livyjr]

Spitzer was DIRTY, jeffmoskin ...

He was THE MAFIA ...

He wasn't cleaning up Wall Street ....

He was taking control of Wall Street ...

Him and his THUG "DEPUTY SHERIFFS" ...

He was ICARUS ....

He thought he could fly to the sun ...

And DARWINISM caught up with him ...

And now, he is gone ...

And I personally am glad of that, as a citizen and resident of this state ...

And so ...

I am personally amazed at the power of PROPAGANDA ....

How this Spitzer was able to pull the wool over the eyes of so many intelligent people who could not perceive that he was nothing but a THUG ...

TIME Magazine has him down as their CRUSADER OF THE YEAR ....

Let's see them live that down ...

And so ...

[Livyjr]

Is it possible he was set up?

I don't think so, jeffmoskin ...

Take a look at his face right above here ...

Does he look like somone indignant at being set up and falsely accused?

Or does he look like someone who was caught with his pants down in a fancy cat house?

ARROGANCE and HUBRIS caught CLIENT 9 Spitzer ....

And if he was set up, he did it to himself ....

By being an ARROGANT, CONCEITED FOOL ...

And so ...

"Spitzer tripped up on laws he enforced"

By SAMANTHA GROSS and DEVLIN BARRETT, Associated Press

Last updated: 6:23 p.m., Tuesday, March 11, 2008

Banks are required to file Suspicious Activity Reports to the government whenever they observe something they fear may be a crime.

In court papers, Client 9 -- identified by another law enforcement official as Spitzer -- hurried to get more than $4,000 in cash to pay a call girl at a Washington hotel.

That kind of activity, repeated over time, is just the kind of thing that would set off alarm bells with a bank's compliance officer, who is trained to be on the lookout for what is called structuring or "smurfing" -- a pattern of transactions aimed at hiding the nature or purpose of certain money.

Spitzer of all people should have known that, said Miami-based lawyer Gregory Baldwin, credited with coining the term "smurfing" in the 1980s as a federal prosecutor.

"I think he's done enough cases where he's charged money laundering that he would know exactly what kind of information you get from the banks."

"It's such a perfect example of what goes around, comes around," he said.

Whether Spitzer thought he was smarter than the feds because of his own professional experience is, for now at least, a matter for psychologists to speculate on.

A person familiar with the investigation told The Associated Press that the probe began with a referral from banks to an Internal Revenue Service office on Long Island about suspicious transactions involving accounts ultimately traced to Spitzer.

The IRS studied the records and then referred the case to federal prosecutors in October.

It was then assigned to the public corruption unit of the federal prosecutor's office in Manhattan.

Although the public sometimes thinks it requires a transfer of $10,000 or more to attract attention, banks can label transactions suspicious even if they involve far less money, said Walter Pagano, a former IRS agent who has testified in court on white-collar crime.

Spitzer might have tried to keep his transfers below the $10,000 threshold, underestimating the scrutiny that banks give to lesser amounts.

"The whole situation is marked by irony, hypocrisy and self-righteousness."

"And the other irony of it is that you've made a career off of a wiretap, and your demise is by the same prosecutorial tool."

end quotes

Spitzer is a PUTZ, jeffmoskin ...

That's probably the best and most charitable thing that you can really say about him ....

And the look he left on his wife's face in that picture speaks volumes about the man's lack of character and values ....

And so ...

[Livyjr]

TIME MAGAZINE CRUSADER OF THE YEAR!

Spitzer of all people should have known that, said Miami-based lawyer Gregory Baldwin, credited with coining the term "smurfing" in the 1980s as a federal prosecutor.

"I think he's done enough cases where he's charged money laundering that he would know exactly what kind of information you get from the banks."

"It's such a perfect example of what goes around, comes around," he said.

And so ...

This post has been edited by Livyjr: Mar 12 2008, 01:53 PM

[Snuffysmith]

Carolyn is recovering at home with AB which is wonderful news. I am licking my wounds at home from a dental implant this morning. My canines are keeping me company. Don't feel like writing much, but thought this article from Steve Clemons might add to the commentary on the Spitzer Affair:


Eliot Spitzer: A Dog Bites Man Story?





The political tremors emanating from the news that Eliot Spitzer met a prostitute in Washington, DC at the Mayflower Hotel are obvious, but a friend of mine who is an expert on probability theory suggested to me that beneath the surface noise, this is really just a "dog bites man" story.

In other words, people meeting prostitutes happens regularly through our society.

He writes:

My instinct when the Spitzer news broke was that "married man visits prostitute" is a bit like "dog bites man". Happens all the time. I did a little research to back that up. From studies it is estimated that there are 23 FTEP's (full time equivalent prostitutes) per 100,000 population seeing roughly 2.4 customers per day. With a population of 300 million that makes for 165,000 prostitute visits per day.

As to what percentage of those are by married men, I'd say 25% might be a conservative guess, so let's say 40,000 married men visit prostitutes per day. That number could be off, but I'm sure it's order of magnitude correct.

A source for prostitution's prevalance is available via wikipedia and its excellent roster of notes -- particularly the entry under "occurrence".

From the entry:

According to the paper "Estimating the prevalence and career longevity of prostitute women" (Potterat et al., 1990), the number of full-time equivalent prostitutes in a typical area in the United States (Colorado Springs, CO, during 1970-1988) is estimated at 23 per 100,000 population (0.023%), of which fraction some 4% were under 18. The length of these prostitutes' working careers was estimated at a mean of 5 years. A follow-up paper entitled "Prostitution and the sex discrepancy in reported number of sexual partners" (Brewer et al., 2000) goes on to estimate a mean number of 868 male sexual partners per prostitute per year of active sex work, and offers the conclusion that men's self-reporting of prostitutes as sexual partners is seriously under-reported. A 1994 study found that 16 percent of 18 to 59-year-old men in a U.S. survey group had paid for sex (Gagnon, Laumann, and Kolata 1994).

A number of reports over the last few decades have suggested that prostitution levels have fallen in sexually liberal countries, most likely because of the increased availability of non-commercial, non-marital sex.[20]

I don't think that this will really help check the political drama around Spitzer -- but I think it's useful context.

-- Steve Clemons

[jeffmoskin]

I don't think so, jeffmoskin ...

Take a look at his face right above here ...

Does he look like somone indignant at being set up and falsely accused?

Or does he look like someone who was caught with his pants down in a fancy cat house?

ARROGANCE and HUBRIS caught CLIENT 9 Spitzer ....

And if he was set up, he did it to himself ....

By being an ARROGANT, CONCEITED FOOL ...

And so ...

The man has been caught in his own web of hubris.

Cannot be denied.

The great moralist, caught with his pants down.

But...

he was a pit bull against the greedy Wall $treet bastards.

Who will step up to the plate now???

[Livyjr]

But...

he was a pit bull against the greedy Wall $treet bastards.

Who will step up to the plate now???

Somebody ...

Or maybe nobody, jeffmoskin ...

Or maybe Darwinism ...

Or maybe God will step in and intervene ...

"GET OUT OF SODOM AND GOMORRAH, DO NOT LOOK BACK!"

Or the fall of Babylon ...

Whichever, it seems that FATE or HUBRIS is catching up with not only Eliot Spitzer, but also Wall Street and its TYCOONS and such ...

Sew the seeds of EXCESSIVE GREED, after all, and eventually a crop of thorns will arise where the seeds fell ...

HUMAN HISTORY, jeffmoskin ...

The DRAMA of human life ....

The Greeks had it in spades, it seems ...

But then, a careful reading of history shows that all civilizations have the same thing to some degree or other ...

Look to the Meditations of Marcus Aurelius for confirmation of that ....

Or the Bible ....

And jeffmoskin ....

You are from New York, meaning the city ....

You surely must know the history of NYS and Wall Street and ROBBER BARONS, such as Jay Gould ...

That is back around the end of the 1800's and the beginnings of the 1900's ...

And the CRAP is really still the same, especially today ....

And Eliot Spitzer wasn't trying to end the CRAP, jeffmoskin ...

He was trying to take it all over and become its BOSS OF BOSSES ...

Like a lion tamer in a cage of submissive lions made so by a liberal dosing of the lion tamer's whip ....

And this all takes us right on back to our earliest conversations in CGCS, jeffmoskin ...

About the "meaning" of life, and moral compasses and belief systems, etc ...

"Many are called, few are chosen" ...

"Leave the dead to bury the dead" ...

Or just simple Pinnochio and the kids who run off with Jimmy Lampwick and get turned into donkeys for the mines ....

And so ...

[Livyjr]

I don't think that this will really help check the political drama around Spitzer -- but I think it's useful context.

-- Steve Clemons

Snuf, with all due respect to this person Steve Clemons ...

He is WAY WIDE of the mark here ....

This has nothing to do with whether or not prostitution is a good thing, or a bad thing, or new, or ancient, which it most certainly is, from a reading of history ...

The rebel Jesus in the Bible in one case stepped in to prevent the stoning to death of a woman thought to be a prostitute ...

"Let he who is without sin cast the first stone ..."

And that was some 2,000 years ago, now ...

In many civilizations, past or present, prostitution is a fact of life, and is not necessarily illegal or unlawful ...

BUT ...

That has nothing to do with what happened here ...

And the efforts of this Steve Clemeons to trivialize Spitzer's behavior are in fact ludicrous ....

Spitzer was not JOE CITIZEN, here ....

He was the elected governor of the State of New York ...

BY OUR CONSTITUTION, which is not subject to being voted on or nullified by citizens of other states of this union, when he swore his oath of office here in NYS, Spitzer swore to uphold the NYS Constitution ...

Which made it his duty to US, the CITIZENS of this state, to take care that the laws of NYS were faithfully executed ....

And there is where he failed, and miserably so ....

Here, in America, Snuf, for good or bad, LIBERTY is defined as:

Freedom from all restraints EXCEPT such as are justly imposed by law.

- Black's Law Dictionary

Now, there is where my disagreement with your Steve Clemons would stem from in this specific case ...

Whether or not it should be, and that is a moral judgment, prostitution is and remains illegal in NYS and America ...

Now, your Steve Clemons can make all the arguments that he wishes to the effect that laws against prostitution in NYS or America are not in fact "JUSTLY IMPOSED BY LAW" ...

BUT ...

I myself am of the mind that once a law is made law, then until revoked or repealed or deemed unconstitutional, it is law ...

Whether or not it was "justly imposed" in my personal opinion does not alone serve to negate it ...

AND AS NYS GOVERNOR, Eliot Spitzer did not have the unilateral authority, jurisdiction or discretion to "decriminalize" prostitution so that HE could then participate in it, to the ruin of his family ...

Your Steve Clemons, on the other hand, seems to have a feel that a bunch of people can merely get together and decide that they don't like this or that law, such as the laws against prostitution, and thusly negate the law as if it did not exist ...

WITHOUT HAVING TO GO THROUGH THE DUE PROCESS OF HAVING THE LAW CHANGED OR NULLIFED IN COURT OR REPEALED ...

Which I believe is part of what led Spitzer to his ruin here in NYS, starting right at DAY ONE ...

When he tried to become a CAUDILLO ...

Instead of assuming the constitutional duties of a governor of the State of New York ...

And so ....

Perhaps you would do me the favor of forwarding my feelings on this matter to this gentleman for his consideration as to how a citizen of the State of New York looks at this matter ....

And tell him that if he does not like our laws up here, that he should then move here, and become a citizen himself, and then he can take lawful measures to have these laws changed, or removed from the books ...

But in the meantime ...

Well ..

And so ...

[amy]

Or maybe Darwinism ...

Or maybe God will step in and intervene ...

Good Morning!

Speaking of God......




~So Rene Descartes is seated at the bar.
The bartender asks "can I get you a drink?"
Descartes says, "I think not." So now there's no Descartes!
(The moral nonsense: "Don't ya put Descartes before divorce")

~One day the zoo-keeper noticed that the orangutan was reading two books - the Bible and Darwin's Origin of Species.
Surprised, he asked the ape, "Why are you reading both those books?"
"Well," said the orangutan, "I just wanted to know if I was my brother's keeper or my keeper's brother."

~Over the massive front doors of a church, these words were inscribed, "The Gate of Heaven." Below that was a small cardboard sign which read, "Please use other entrance."

~Rev. Warren J. Keating, Pastor of the First Presbyterian Church of Yuma, AZ, says that the best prayer he ever heard was, "Lord, please make me the kind of person my dog thinks I am."

~A woman went to the post office to buy religious stamps for her Christmas cards.
"What denomination?" asked the postal clerk.
"Oh, good heavens! Has it come to this?" said the woman. "Well, give me 50 Baptist and 50 Catholic ones."

~A woman was at the beach with her children when her four-year-old son ran up to her, grabbed her hand, and led her to the shore, where a sea gull lay dead in the sand.
"Mommy, what happened to him?" the son asked.
"He died and went to heaven," the mother replied.
Her son thought a moment and then said, "And God threw him back down?"

~After the church service a little boy told the pastor, "When I grow up, I'm going to give you some money."
"Well, thank you," the pastor replied, "but why?"
"Because my daddy says you're one of the poorest preachers we've ever had."

~When some people came to dinner, the hostess turned to her six year old daughter and said, "Would you like to say the blessing?"
"I wouldn't know what to say," the girl replied.
"Just say what you hear Mommy say," her mom answered.
The daughter bowed her head and said, "Lord, why on earth did I invite all these people to dinner?"

~One beautiful Sunday morning, a priest announced to his congregation: "My good people, I have here in my hands three sermons...a $100 sermon that lasts five minutes, a $50 sermon that lasts fifteen minutes, and a $10 sermon that lasts a full hour. "Now, we'll take the collection and see which one I'll deliver."

~A local priest and a pastor were fishing on the side of the road. They thoughtfully made a sign saying, "The End is Near! Turn yourself around now before it's too late!" and showed it to each passing car.
One driver who drove by didn't appreciate the sign and shouted at them, "Leave us alone, you religious nuts!"
All of a sudden they heard a big splash, looked at each other, and the priest said to the pastor, "You think maybe we should have just said 'Bridge Out' instead?"

[Abu Beacon]

Sigh.

When will this country separate the public lives of elected officials from the private.

How many years did we lose looking for Monica's blue dress when we could have been taking care of public business?

I don't care if Spitzer was a mean SOB.

Or an angel.

He was elected GOVERNOR, and unless he screwed the State of New York, I really don't care who he screwed personally.

Can't help agreeing with every word from Jeffmo. Although I feel this is retribution at its best, it still seems to me to be a tempest in a teapot. ( to quote one of our past presidents, Warren G. Harding, I believe. )

Wish all the self righteous would look over their own lives before condemning the fallen. ( Screwing the public is a whole different thing., )

I do feel sorry for all the wives of politicians who are caught up in these types of embarrassments.

A.B.

[jeffmoskin]

Can't help agreeing with every word from Jeffmo. Although I feel this is retribution at its best, it still seems to me to be a tempest in a teapot. ( to quote one of our past presidents, Warren G. Harding, I believe. )

Wish all the self righteous would look over their own lives before condemning the fallen. ( Screwing the public is a whole different thing., )

I do feel sorry for all the wives of politicians who are caught up in these types of embarrassments.

A.B.

To support what you wrote, Mr. A.B., - this from the Letter to the Editor page on NYT:

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/13/opinion/...tml?ref=opinion

"To the Editor:

Re “The Myth of the Victimless Crime,” by Melissa Farley and Victor Malarek (Op-Ed, March 12):

In the various political roundtables this week, everyone seemed to agree, at least, on the “victimless crime” argument. I am shocked that the thoughtful, intelligent people (mostly men) on these shows are so comfortable with the idea that a woman would choose to have sex for money.

Do these people know any women? Can they really believe that this is a choice?

We have programs in place to reach out to people who “choose” to use drugs or “choose” to live on the streets, so why do we view prostitution, high-priced though it may be, as just another comfortable, middle-class career choice?

Yes, Eliot Spitzer’s prostitute probably drank fine wine. That doesn’t change the fact that she engaged in a psychologically damaging transaction every day.

I applaud Melissa Farley and Victor Malarek for calling our attention to the one neglected and yet terribly important issue of the Spitzer scandal.

Kathleen Reeves
New York, March 12, 2008

And yet, in "Old Europe" to use a Rumsfelianism, when Francois Mitterand died, present at the funeral were his wife, and his long-time mistress. And the hang-dog look on their faces were because he had died, not because he was "unfaithful."

We are different cultures, America and Europe.

This post has been edited by jeffmoskin: Mar 13 2008, 08:35 AM

[Abu Beacon]

..."

ow ...

In many civilizations, past or present, prostitution is a fact of life, and is not necessarily illegal or unlawful ...

BUT ...

That has nothing to do with what happened here ...


BY OUR CONSTITUTION, which is not subject to being voted on or nullified by citizens of other states of this union, when he swore his oath of office here in NYS, Spitzer swore to uphold the NYS Constitution ...

Which made it his duty to US, the CITIZENS of this state, to take care that the laws of NYS were faithfully executed ....


BUT ...

I myself am of the mind that once a law is made law, then until revoked or repealed or deemed unconstitutional, it is law ...

Whether or not it was "justly imposed" in my personal opinion does not alone serve to negate it ...

AND AS NYS GOVERNOR, Eliot Spitzer did not have the unilateral authority, jurisdiction or discretion to "decriminalize" prostitution so that HE could then participate in it, to the ruin of his family ...

WITHOUT HAVING TO GO THROUGH THE DUE PROCESS OF HAVING THE LAW CHANGED OR NULLIFED IN COURT OR REPEALED ...

Which I believe is part of what led Spitzer to his ruin here in NYS, starting right at DAY ONE ...

Reading through your post, Livyjr, I can easily understand your outrage because you are viewing this indiscretion of Eliot Spitzer as a legal issue rather than a moral issue. Actually it can be classified as both. I have a feeling that many if not most people, feel that prostitution should not be illegal mainly because it is unenforceable just as prohibution was in the 20's. However, as you say, it is the law, like it or not, which puts Mr. Spitzer in a different category as one who enforces the law, not merely as one who should obey it. I see it, frankly, more as a situation where a person who did not control his human failings rather than one who failed to control his behavior in enforcing an unenforceable law.

A.B.