ALBANY — The wildest thing about the wild rumors sur rounding Gov. Paterson’s supposedly imminent resignation is that everybody in the state Capitol — indeed everybody in the state political community — is ready to believe anything about the governor, no matter how bad it is.
After a year and a half of Eliot Spitzer and nearly two years of Paterson, New Yorkers have come to expect little from their chief executives — except starring roles in prostitution and infidelity scandals and mockery on “Saturday Night Live.”
Have you heard about the governor regularly “double dating” with a beautiful younger woman other than his wife or about the real reason he was late on the scene at the tragic Buffalo commuter-plane crash or maybe the one about the wild sex and drug parties at the Executive Mansion?
All of those and even more disturbing stories have been circulated widely over the last 10 days by individuals close to the governor and political activists, largely because of leaks that originated, at least partly, with reporters who are pursuing them.
Which brings us to another wild thing: the fact that the mostly salacious and supposedly politically fatal rumors, which could easily be adorning the pages of The National Enquirer, originated with that font of journalist purity, The New York Times.
By sitting on their supposed blockbuster of a story for nearly two weeks, the Times’ scribes have created a paralytic frenzy in state government the likes of which have never been seen before.
Perhaps they’re bucking for the first Pulitzer Prize ever awarded for buzz.
It was left to Paterson’s newest chief political ally to offer a, uh, reasoned defense of the embattled Democratic governor, one free of conspiracy theories and bogus enemies.
“If The New York Times is working on or has a story, then you should confirm or print it,” Rick Lazio, the all-but-certain Republican candidate for governor, demanded of Times Executive Editor Bill Keller.
“If you do not, then you have a moral obligation to stop the drama and the psychological warfare on Gov. Paterson.”