Eliot Spitzer Extends "Olive Branch" While "G.O.P. Pouts"
New York State Gov. Eliot Spitzer delivered his second State of the State address in Albany on Wednesday, and Nicholas Confessore, the liberal journalist for the American Prospect turned Times journalistwrote it up for Thursday -"Niceness,Campaign in Albany Gets Nowhere as G.O.P. Pouts." Confessore felt sorry for the governor, who hashad a tough year, jilted both by legislators in Albany and by the public at large.
"Like an eager and earnest suitor, Gov. Eliot Spitzer spent much of his second State of the State address wooing and praising lawmakers, with particular emphasis on Senate Republicans, his most bitter adversaries in Albany. Like haughty coquettes, the Republicans spurned him.
"They smirked. They rolled their eyes. They grunted dismissively. And though Mr. Spitzer's speech on Wednesday sprouted more olive branches than a Tuscan hillside, Republican senators and Assembly members mostly sat on their hands.
"Not even the governor's conspicuous and deliberate praise of individual Republican lawmakers could ease the chill in the air. When Mr. Spitzer singled out Senator George D. Maziarz, an upstate Republican, for his efforts on a landmark worker's compensation overhaul last year, Mr. Maziarz's fellow Republicans cheered ironically, and lightly needled him.
"'There goes your re-election!' one yelled out. (Mr. Spitzer tried to lighten the mood. 'Sorry, George,' he said, to laughter.)
"Though Democrats in the Legislature have also had strained relations with Mr. Spitzer, some were disheartened by the Republicans' frostiness."
Gee, wonder why Republicans would act so "frosty" toward Gov. Spitzer? Could it have something to do with "Troopergate," in which state police were misused to track the travel of Spitzer's political nemesis, Republican Sen. Joseph Bruno? Strangely, neither Confessore nor Danny Hakim (who wrote the lead Metro story on Spitzer's address) mentioned it, even though it's one of the main reasons relations between Spitzer and Republicansare so "frosty."
