Little sympathy for NY governor in sex scandal

By Edith Honan

NEW YORK (Reuters) - There wasn't much sympathy on the streets of New York on Monday for Gov. Eliot Spitzer, an anti-corruption crusader caught up in a sex scandal.

The New York Times said Spitzer was caught on a federal wiretap arranging to meet a prostitute at a Washington hotel last month. Spitzer neither confirmed nor denied Monday's report, but apologized for violating his obligations to his family and his "sense of right and wrong."

Elmira Shirkhin, 27, who works in sales, said she wasn't surprised. "It's what you would think politicians would do," she said, drawing a parallel to former President Bill Clinton's sexual dalliance with White House intern Monica Lewinsky.

"It's men and power. They think they can do anything and get away with it," Shirkhin said.

Sales manager Christine Whited, 24, wondered how politicians thought they could get away with such indiscretions. "Aren't they afraid of getting caught? They're in the limelight," she said. "Somebody who's in the public eye, I would think they would fear getting caught."

As New York's state attorney general before being elected governor in November 2006, Spitzer built his reputation going after white-collar crime on Wall Street. As governor, he vowed to clean up state politics.

"He did a lot of damage to Wall Street, now it's come back to bite him in the rear end," said Michael Mrakov, 41, a trading assistant, speaking in front of the New York Stock Exchange.

"He tried to clean up Wall Street, the crooks and everything, and he turned a lot of people against him."