Metro

Lonesome Gov’s sad solo act

This is how an administration dies. A slow, painful and agonizing demise.

Gov. Lame Duck waddled into the ornate Downtown Brooklyn ceremonial courtroom without a single close aide, confidant, minister or lifeboat to save him.

As doors opened on a brilliant day, a musty air of defeat swirled into the room as the temporary chief executive of the state of New York strode in, visibly stoop-shouldered. He was palpably, nakedly, dismally alone.

Gov. Paterson took yesterday morning to interrupt the gritty and unpleasant work of hashing out a budget in Albany, not to mention to escape investigations into his alleged criminality and flagrant venality.

On this day, he graced a room filled with Brooklynites puzzled by his surprising presence in their midst, to hold a town-hall meeting about the rotten state of New York’s finances.

But as soon as he slumped in and said “hello,” the governor mumbled a vague and snarky acknowledgment that he never really wanted to be here in the first place. And he might not be here much longer to kick around.

“If you’d told me years ago that I would be governor — and make these kinds of [budget] cuts — I wouldn’t believe it. Either one,” he muttered darkly.

Then, for no apparent reason, he lapsed into victim mode, the governor’s now tragically familiar default setting.

“I’ve been the target of rumors and innuendo,” he moaned. “That hasn’t stopped me . . . In the end, we’re up against the wall.” The metaphor was about the budget. I think.

Then, just when you thought it couldn’t get any weirder, it did.

Poor Paterson. He took a seat in front of a couple hundred spectators, plus an army of cameras, microphones and reporters recording his every heartbeat and fallen eyelash.

And he did nothing.

No aide was on hand to guide him to the next step. Most of them have already quit in disgust, been suspended, or gone into witness protection.

Audience members, assembled to catch the last days of David Paterson, squirmed in their seats as several pregnant minutes elapsed. Dead silence. The clock ticked. Cameras whirled. What should we do?

Finally, the moderator, Rennie Bishop, bounced into the room and sat in a chair next to the governor’s. The room exhaled gratefully.

Those who were selected to speak were polite, if a bit strange.

A woman called “Queen Mother” Dr. Eloise Blakely got up and, complaining about the high price of coffee or something, asked, “How do we sell Queen Mother Coffee?”

“I haven’t the slightest idea,” Paterson said with timing intended to generate laughs at the woman’s expense. And it did.

Suddenly realizing he’d just dissed a constituent, the good-time gov promised to get an aide to talk to the queen later, though I think he fibbed. He had no aides left.

Another woman complained, in tears, about being unjustly evicted from her home. Paterson nodded, and promised to get someone to talk to her later, too. Fat chance.

Then came the usual calls for taxing the rich and redistributing the wealth. Paterson didn’t bite, though. He may be crazy, but he’s not completely stupid, not even in this crowd.

Once outside, I faced a small crowd, people too polite, intimidated or ignored to speak up during the program. These real folks think it’s high time for a grown-up to take over the governor’s chair.

A woman from the city’s Coalition of Non-Residential Domestic Violence Service Providers was incensed that, as evidence mounts that Paterson may have tried to hush up his best pal’s alleged beatdown of a girlfriend, he’s cut funding to domestic-violence services. That case alone will cast suspicion on Paterson’s every decision from this day forward.

Sergio Silva said he thinks Paterson’s done, finished. It’s time to shut off the lights.

“He can’t resolve the little problems. How is he going to solve the big ones? asked Silva, an ironworker from Park Slope.

“Those tickets for the Yankees!” he fumed.

He was infuriated that Paterson allegedly used his office to snag complimentary tix to the World Series, something for which ordinary Brooklynites would maim.

“He has to resign,” Silva said.

By this time, though, the gov was back in default mode, singing his mantra of “rumor and innuendo and lies supposed to come out in The New York Times.” Aren’t we past that?

“I hope to be vindicated,” Paterson said. But his tone was more resigned than triumphant.

The party’s over.

This duck is cooked.

andrea.peyser@nypost.com