Basically, our writers have one thing to say: arguments about the insignificance of extramarital sex in Europe should have absolutely no bearing whatsoever on the American public's reception of Spitzer's involvement with the Emperors' Club VIP. But since people like Alan Dershowitz are insisting that the story would not even make the "back pages" of European newspapers, we thought we might as well do some fact-checking.
Spitzer actually shows up on the front pages of several European papers, including Il Gorniale
and El Pais. And we don't read German, but we know lingerie when we see it. Additionally, the story is currently among the top five most emailed on The Guardian's site, with the headline, "'Mr. Clean' Exposed as Call-Girl Client".
But this is stating the obvious. Obama is even bigger news for European audiences and the primacy of U.S. political celebrity abroad is well-established. We just don't know what Dershowitz thinks is so much better about front pages in Europe than in the U.S. Nor do we think the argument makes any sense.
As New York's attorney general, Spitzer cast himself as a crusader for civic virtuosity. Unless he's planning to take his "steamroller" ways to Nevada, we expect him to uphold the letter of the law in New York. If Spitzer wanted to legalize prostitution in New York, he could have added it to his Day One Agenda and chosen to run as a libertarian.
