Looks Like Client 9 Didn’t Exactly Land on His Behind.

Better buy his pops one ginormous Father’s Day gift: Eliot Spitzer

Since his fast-moving disgrace and subsequent resignation on March 17 over a prostitution scandal, former NY State governor and superdelegate Eliot Spitzer has been maintaining an incredibly low profile.

Indeed, many who watched his resignation, live, on television, may remember wondering what this once seemingly unstoppable leader, not yet fifty years old, would do with the rest of his life. Assuming he would refuse Playgirl‘s offer to pose nude—which apparently he, thankfully, did—what would his next act be? How would he make a living, given his pariah status? Where would he go?

Apparently, Spitzer’s gone the same place all kids go when they mess up: Home.

As The New York Observer dutifully reports,

Mr. Spitzer, who just a few months ago was said to contemplate White House ambitions, now ascends every weekday to the top of the Crown Building, according to sources familiar with the Spitzers. More precisely, the ex-governor reports to the 22nd floor of 730 Fifth Avenue, the French Renaissance-style masterpiece his father co-owns with the Winter Organization.

His father is Bernard “Bernie” Spitzer, the famed real estate developer worth an estimated half billion dollars, and head of Spitzer Enterprises, where Eliot now works.

It’s apparently the closest thing to a nine-to-five job Mr. Spitzer has had since his hypocrisy and lust transformed him from a left-wing hero into the left’s own version of the Rev. Ted Haggard—a man guilty of doing that which he so publicly condemned.

In an interesting way, Spitzer’s having landed this plush gig is not surprising at all. As the Observer, itself, reported, back in 2006,

Most rich politicians try to emphasize their man-of-the-people traits—real or imagined—like their ability to jam knishes (Nelson Rockefeller) or hot dogs (Michael Bloomberg) into their mouths. But Eliot Spitzer seems to have no political worries, and no personal neurosis, about his privileged upbringing. As he told a group of real-estate brokers earlier that morning, if he’d lost the 1998 election, “I’d probably be in real estate right now, which is what my dad does.”

Leaning into the podium with a comfort that isn’t quite charisma, he continued: “He tells me every now and then, you know, ‘Look, your downside risk is capped—you can always come back into business if you need to.’”

The Observer was, as is now obvious, massively pushing their luck when they added,

There’s no self-doubt apparent in the Attorney General, no internal struggle. He has all the interior darkness of Ronald Reagan.

But they nailed it on Bernie, who, clearly, was as good as his word.

So, what does the Little Spitzer do at Spitzer Inc.?

It’s not really clear. According to the article, calls to his office went unreturned. However, they did get some info from an unnamed source, close to the Spitzers.

“This is a whole new game for Eliot,” said the insider, who, like nearly everyone in this article, asked to remain anonymous, so as not to alienate the powerful family. “What I hear from my sources is that he walks around and makes suggestions, or discusses ideas. I don’t think anyone knows if any of these ideas will work. Time will see if there’s a niche for him there.”

In one way, he already had a niche with the organization: Complimentary tenant. Remember the dark-colored apartment building at 985 Fifth Ave. on 79th St., out of which Spitzer and his wife, Silda, were shown emerging on Resignation Day? Totally pwned by daddy. “Bernie’s whole life is Eliot,” said the Observer‘s insider.

Yet, to have a meaningful role in the organization, wouldn’t Spitzer still have to bring in business? Doesn’t his past now present certain, er, obstacles to doing so?

Perhaps, but

No one who spoke with The Observer, however, thought Mr. Spitzer’s taste for illicit sex was one of them. (As one prominent broker put it: “He may have been client number nine. But I’m sure there was a one through eight and a 10 through 100. We just don’t know who they are.”) Rather, the greatest obstacle may be the former state attorney general’s entirely legal yet awfully acrimonious relationship with Wall Street.

Mr. Spitzer is “going to have to do business with the people who he put in jail,” said the broker. “Big real estate transactions need big money.”

In other words, the apparent hump, if you’ll pardon the pun, is his legendary crusading, not his now infamous hooker-rama. Says one expert, with color,

“No one in the real estate world will, pardon my French, give a shit about the prostitutes.”

In fact, given the back-slapping, meat-and-potatoes culture of New York real estate, Mr. Spitzer might even find himself a star.

“Guys in our industry, if he started attending real estate board functions, they’d get a kick out of it,” said the consultant. “We live in this sort of perverted, celebrity-driven world.”

Already, though, it looks like Spitzer is getting serious work done: A Reuters piece notes that—perhaps akin to million-dollar-an-hour super billionaire John Paulson—he intends to capitalize on working-class America’s folly:

Former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer is looking at a number of options to possibly invest in distressed real estate, but does not yet have a formal plan, according to a source familiar with the matter.

Spitzer met with several former colleagues last month where they spoke about his interest in participating in his father’s real estate business and in distressed assets created by the subprime crisis, among other things, the source said.

An earlier report in The New York Sun on Tuesday cited a source claiming Spitzer had approached Washington, D.C.-based labor union officials to pitch his idea for a vulture fund and that he was looking to pursue distressed real estate projects valued between $100 million and $500 million. Vulture funds invest in distressed assets.

A spokeswoman for Spitzer said the former governor’s future plans are not yet clear.

Meanwhile, back in the world of ho’s, it turns out that the governor’s fall may ultimately play out as a case of a failed health system gone horribly wrong.

According to Tuesday’s New York Times, Mark Brener, 62, “the third of four defendants to plead guilty in the case against the high-end prostitution ring, which the authorities have said was patronized by the former governor…is expected to plead guilty this week to money laundering and prostitution charges, his lawyer said yesterday.”

However, in that piece—a detail I missed when the Times originally reported it, back in March—the paper notes this former tax specialist started Emperor’s Club VIP “to pay his late wife’s medical bills.”

Check that out. Which means if Spitzer had passionately and successfully carried the torch for universal health care, he might still be governor.

Finally, for those of you wondering why, if cops catch you leasing the services of a whore, you spend the night in jail, but if you’re the governor, you go and run a real estate empire, says the Times,

It remains unclear whether federal prosecutors intend to bring charges against Mr. Spitzer in the case. A spokeswoman for him declined to comment on Monday.

Let’s see if he gets off.