Donna . . .

Chief Judge Judith Kaye administers the oath of office to Gov. David Paterson at right is Paterson’s son, Alexander (Newsday, J. Conrad Williams Jr. / March 17, 2008)

. . . asked me a question in a comment to my last post. My response:

I have not written much on Eliot Spitzer (I’ve left that to others) and I’ve said even less about David Paterson’s incredible ascension to the governorship. I have been working on a redesign of the website (everyone, keep an eye out for that!) and I’ve been working on a very long post (I am sorry to say that it is very, very boring).

My take on the drip, drip, drip of revelations about Gov. Paterson since he took office is that the media in New York City is probably the most racist in the nation. When the media in the South and other parts of the nation came to terms with their own role in this nation’s history, newspapers and other media outlets in the Northeast never had to.

It was good enough for them to condemn the South without any self-examination.

But, if you looked in the archives of many of these institutions, you will find things that would shock your conscience. We have a racist media in New York City with a rather corrosive history of covering race and minority communities in the city. I worked as a newspaper reporter in this region for 14 years, 11 of those years at the New York Daily News, which began the stories about Paterson’s background.

The media never minded that Paterson was Lt. Gov. because it was a powerless, largely meaningless ceremonial position. Its only significance is that the state Constitution endowed it with succession to the governorship.

But who could have foreseen Eliot Spitzer’s sudden demise? Spitzer was this knight in shining armor who was going to do great things, if not become president one day. Until we found out how deeply flawed he was. Spitzer’s fall was so swift, we did not have time to contemplate what was about to happen.

The media have reconciled themselves now to having an accidental governor and a black one to boot. Their objective now is to make sure that Paterson does not become a fixture in the governorship, to perpetuate himself.

All political offices are patronage positions. You get to give jobs to your friends and supporters. And, as governor of the third largest state in the nation, there are just so many more jobs to dole out. So that’s one level. There is also the symbolic aspect of the position. It comes with this tremendous political capital. Paterson himself is a magnetic, charismatic political figure who, given half a chance, could go on to be great.

There is too much at stake to let the good feelings that attended to his ascension to last.

Now that we’ve had our (albeit, accidental) First African-American Governor of New York, how do we make sure it does not happen again? The first thing you have to do is degrade Paterson’s political capital. Don’t expect this to stop. By the time the media is done with him, Paterson will become a national laughing stock.

If he even deigns to run for a full term as governor, his political stock would be so degraded he’s bound to fail.