Times Figures It Out: Spitzer Pushed Staff\’s Effort to Smear Bruno

The New York Times is finally catching on to what we mere mortals already know just on the look of the thing:

Former Gov. Eliot Spitzer was deeply involved in his administration’s efforts last year to discredit the State Senate majority leader, Joseph L. Bruno, holding detailed discussions with senior aides, ordering damaging information about Mr. Bruno released, and calling an aide at home repeatedly to check on the progress, according to several people with direct knowledge of the investigation.

The governor has previously said he was not personally involved in the effort, suggesting only that he was vaguely aware that his aides had responded to a reporter’s inquiry about Mr. Bruno’s travels on state aircraft.

But testimony and other information gathered by the Albany County district attorney, P. David Soares, indicate that the governor’s participation was extensive and reflected Mr. Spitzer’s intense desire to damage Mr. Bruno, the people with knowledge of the case said.

The investigation was based on examination of e-mail messages, along with interviews with about a half-dozen senior administration officials, chief among them Mr. Spitzer’s former communications director, Darren Dopp, whom prosecutors decided last month to give immunity from prosecution.

Why, it’s nothing the Clintons didn’t do, after all.

But the question of the day is, as always, with the Times, why it took them so long to come to the conclusion everyone else had, months ago. Could it be that now the guy is out of office on the strength of the criminal charges, this stuff isn’t going to cost the Democrats anything?

The thing is, that what we’re dealing with is a well-established pattern for Democrats, and their 5th estate cheering sections.

If there is anything of justice going on here, it’s that with Spitzer’s replacement, Patterson, himself now being investigated for using Tax money to pay for sexual romps, the chances are quite good that Joe Bruno will be the next govenor of New York State by midsummer. At which point, the new York Times will doubtless begin to investigate the Governor’s office in an aggressive manner, as they would never do when  a Democrat holds that office.