SUBSCRIBE NOW WELCOME BACK. Do you want to continue reading where you left off? New Republic subscribers can pick up where they left off no matter which device they were previously using. SUBSCRIBE NOW

Go Home The Blind, Leading

THE PLANK MARCH 10, 2008

The Blind, Leading

BY DAYO OLOPADE

Today’s wiretap bombshell
implicating New York Governor
Eliot Spitzer in a prostitution sting could result in a resignation as
early as this evening, according to several sources. Spitzer’s likely
successor, Lieutenant Governor David Paterson, would be only the third black
governor in American history, and the first blind one.

Paterson, who is totally blind in his left eye and has only partial sight in
his right, would join the handful of other blind politicians who have held positions
of national prominence.

Eugene Saulsy of Indiana
lost
his sight at the turn of the last century, making him the first blind American
senator. Thomas Pryor Gore—grandfather of Gore Vidal—was blinded in a childhood
accident and later served three terms as the senator from the new state of Oklahoma. And the year
that Paterson won his current position, another blind
politician, Kristin Cox, ran for Lieutenant Governor in Maryland.

David Blunkett, a blind man who served as both Education Secretary and Home Secretary
under Tony Blair in Britain, wrote a series of diary entries published in the Guardian in 2006, ruminating on the experience of living and legislating in a sighted world.

One of the problems of not being able to see is
drinking orange juice
when there is a wasp in it. This happened to me. I had it in my mouth
and was about to chew it when something told me to spit it out. I did
so, but it stung me and my mouth, face, arms and hands all started to
swell. It was one of those frightening experiences when you think:
"There's no one around, what do I do?" Living on my own is sometimes
quite frightening.

And later:

In many ways, not being able to see required me to
be much more alert and alive to what was going on around me, as well as knowing
when people wanted to intervene and being ready to sit down and allow them to
raise a question or make a point. It is possible to work out where someone is
most likely to be sitting. It is possible to know from their voice who they
are. Question time, which for departmental questions is once a month and lasts
for an hour, I always found easy. After all, the secretary of state has the
last word.

Bringing it all full-circle, Blunkett, perhaps today's most well-known blind
politician, was himself embroiled in a public sex scandal
when his married and pregnant mistress decided to end their three-year affair.
Blunkett was permitted to stay in Blair’s cabinet for a time, however, and returned to
remained in public service afterward--setting a precedent that perhaps preempts Paterson’s succession.

--Dayo
Olopade

SHARE YOUR THOUGHTS

Show all 20 comments

You must be a subscriber to post comments. Subscribe today.

20 comments

How about a good, old-fashioned Democratic sex scandal? In a political shocker today, New York Governor, rising Dem star,...

- Anonymous

March 10, 2008 at 6:45pm

You must be a subscriber to post comments. Subscribe today.

If Spitzer were only just a senator, or president of the United States, he might be able to weather this.

But, what gives him special status, and special vulnerability, is his previous incarnation as vice busting, do-gooding, uncompromising, crusading NY State Attorney General.

What could be more wonderful than seeing a guy like that go down.  Now you know how Michael Milken felt when Giuliani blew the presidential nomination race.

- ChanRobt

March 10, 2008 at 6:48pm

You must be a subscriber to post comments. Subscribe today.

Only Fox News seems to be rolling with resignation.  MSNBC, CNN, ABC, NY Times, and CBS all don't have it, and this has bene the case for hours, which makes me think Fox has it wrong.

- Crock1701

March 10, 2008 at 6:49pm

You must be a subscriber to post comments. Subscribe today.

The democrats are doing a stunning job of handing their lead back - our own governor, the ethically severly challenged Blago, is the real target of Fitzgerald's investigation of Rezko, and soon enough he will be doing tap dancing to avoid George Ryan's fate.  

There will be plenty of talking points for the thunder on the right guys and gals.

- jemerk

March 10, 2008 at 6:53pm

You must be a subscriber to post comments. Subscribe today.

Great post, Dayo.

Isn't life interesting?

- teplukhin2you

March 10, 2008 at 7:16pm

You must be a subscriber to post comments. Subscribe today.

Charles Foster Kane strikes again.

What men will do in the pursuit of the ever alluring and dangerous  "strange".  Truly amazing...we  are all Fredo Corleones...

good hearts but weak and stupid...

- thejauntyboulevardier

March 10, 2008 at 7:28pm

You must be a subscriber to post comments. Subscribe today.

The world is waiting to hear from one of the Empire Girls if the Governor had a "wide stance".

Spitzer oughta stonewall.  He wasn't hitting on teenage pages.  He wasn't in a men's room.  And the woman in question was not a young employee of New York state.

So whatz evrabuddy complainin' about?

- ChanRobt

March 10, 2008 at 7:30pm

You must be a subscriber to post comments. Subscribe today.

Dayo Olopade writes:

-- Blunkett was permitted to stay in Blair’s cabinet for a time, however, and returned to public service afterward, setting a precedent that perhaps preempts Paterson’s succession.

The reference to "returned to public service" suggests that Olopade doesn't fully understand the British political system.  Members of the Cabinet are invariably either MPs or members of the House of Lords. The latter typically happens when a Prime Minister wants someone other than an MP to fill a cabinet position and will then give them a peerage so they can sit in the House of Lords. David Blunkett was an MP throughout his entire time in the Cabinet and, indeed, remains one today.  There is consequently no real meaning to the idea that Blunkett "returned to public service" because he never left public service.

- ndmackenzie

March 10, 2008 at 7:43pm

You must be a subscriber to post comments. Subscribe today.

"Now you know how Michael Milken felt when Giuliani blew the presidential nomination race"

Or Tim Tabor of Goldman. He was definitely innocent.

- teplukhin2you

March 10, 2008 at 8:21pm

You must be a subscriber to post comments. Subscribe today.

I hear the media going on about his image as a crusader for ethics, implying that what he's done is unethical.  Sorry, don't understand.  If he resigns out of shame, or to atone to his family, then that's cool.  But since when is being a john -unethical- ?  

- jm_rice

March 10, 2008 at 9:02pm

You must be a subscriber to post comments. Subscribe today.

jm_rice, can you imagine an ethical standard by which we might hold that the person vested with the highest authority for seeing that the laws are enforced must himself obey the laws? I'm willing to cut some slack for misdemeanors and such -- no need to impeach President Grant over his horse-speeding citations (true!) -- but in Spitzer's case we're talking about criminal actions that are felonies under federal law carrying twenty-year sentences.

Maybe it's just me, but I think "don't commit felonies" actually is an ethical standard for a state's chief executive.

- rhubarbs

March 10, 2008 at 10:17pm

You must be a subscriber to post comments. Subscribe today.

Also, since it sounds like New York might soon be in need of a new governor, perhaps this could be Hillary's big chance. It's no longer possible for her to win the Democratic presidential nomination without handing the November election to McCain in the process, so either way she's not gonna be our next president. Which means switching gears to a run for governor in 2010 could be a smart move for New York's second-most-popular U.S. senator.

- rhubarbs

March 10, 2008 at 10:57pm

You must be a subscriber to post comments. Subscribe today.

Yeah, but you know Grant was drunk as hell on that horse.

- WoodyBombay

March 11, 2008 at 12:20am

You must be a subscriber to post comments. Subscribe today.

WoodyBombay, read Grant's superb memoirs.  Which he wrote in about a year while painfully dying of throat cancer.  It was a tremendous act of will done to provide money for his family. (After his death, it generated something on the order of $800,000, a tremendous sum adjusting to at least $16 million now.)

Grant's work is considered one of the great military accounts of history.  Up there with Julius Caesar's.

So whatever else you know or think you know about U.S. Grant, never forget his final feat of immense courage.

Not to mention, he won the Civil War, dude.  What have you done sober?

- ChanRobt

March 11, 2008 at 3:09am

You must be a subscriber to post comments. Subscribe today.

Blunkett,

   What an authoritarian nightmare of a Home Secretary he was!  He also said that our schools were 'swamped' by immigrants.  His 'public service' was of the sort we could do with less.  Still, that's New Labour, I guess.

- GoodLiberal

March 11, 2008 at 7:59am

You must be a subscriber to post comments. Subscribe today.

Chan, good call there. Every American should read Grant's "Personal Memoirs." Best presidential memoir written, and one of only two actually worth reading for the quality of the prose. It helps to have Mark Twain as your editorial adviser.

But as far as winning the Civil War, let's not discount the role of Grant's friend and later-war partner W.T. Sherman in bringing the war to the South and destroying the will of civilians, especially the very belligerent women of South Carolina, to continue the war. Sherman ought to be on the $10 bill.

- rhubarbs

March 11, 2008 at 8:50am

You must be a subscriber to post comments. Subscribe today.

Channy, Grant never drank during battles, it was only during the often long lull between battles (as they prepared for their next march) that he took to the bottle out of boredom and loneliness. He had tremendous concentration and will during battle, and was the only Yankee who could whip Lee's butt.

- blackton

March 11, 2008 at 11:43am

You must be a subscriber to post comments. Subscribe today.

Hey, easy now. When I was a kid I asked for a blue Union cap one Christmas and told my parents - both members of the Sons and Daughters of the Confederacy - that U.S. Grant was my hero. (I eventually came to my senses and claimed Roger Staubach as my hero, but still.) I have no quarrel at all with Grant, at least until he took over the White House. I will check out his memoirs, though - I have never read them but they've been recommended to me before.

Being a young, Union-favoring Civil War buff in Texas was tough business.

"Weren't the confederates traitors to the United States?" "Oh son ..."  

"But they fought for the right to own slaves. How wrong is that?" "Oh son ..."

"'War of Northern Aggression'? What doest that mean?" "Oh son ..."

"Why is Lee such a hero? He really messed up at Gettysburg." "Oh son ..."

"Holy cow! Did you read about Andersonville??" "Oh son ..."

- WoodyBombay

March 11, 2008 at 11:58am

You must be a subscriber to post comments. Subscribe today.

OK, Woody, I'll back off.  But, Grant, was a noble man, whether he sometimes had trouble with the sauce or not.

Remember what Lincoln said when somebody complained to him about Grant's drinking?  "Find out what brand of whiskey he drinks and send a barrel to each of my generals."

- ChanRobt

March 11, 2008 at 2:07pm

You must be a subscriber to post comments. Subscribe today.

Rhubarbs, I have not forgotten Tecumseh Sherman.  But, I hyperbolized credit to Grant alone for effect in my little scree above.

Besides, Sherman exemplifies my belief in what I call the Groucho Marx axiom:  Anybody who would want to be president you wouldn't want to have.

When he refused the nomination, he ought to have been drafted.

- ChanRobt

March 11, 2008 at 2:13pm

You must be a subscriber to post comments. Subscribe today.

SHARE HIGHLIGHT

0 CHARACTERS SELECTED

TWEET THIS

POST TO TUMBLR

SHARE ON FACEBOOK

Close