Thaindian News

New York, May 5 (ANI): New York’s hooker-happy former governor Eliot Spitzer has been preferred by a majority of state voters to be back in office than his beleaguered successor Governor Paterson, according to a new poll.

The latest poll from the Marist Institute for Public Opinion showed 51 percent of registered voters would rather have Spitzer in the governor’s mansion right now. Spitzer resigned in March 2008 following revelations he patronized high-priced prostitutes.

Strikingly, even though Paterson is the state’s first Black Governor, 53 percent of non-Whites said they would prefer Spitzer as the state’s chief executive, the Daily News reports.

The number of voters rating Paterson’s job performance as good or excellent plummeted to 19 percent, marking a seven-point drop since Marist last asked the question in March.

The poll showed 37 percent believe Paterson is doing a fair job and 40 percent believe he is doing a poor job.

Paterson, who publicly declared he would ask voters in 2010 to elect him to his own four-year term as governor, gets points for his work ethic. The poll showed 66 percent of voters say he’s working hard, but even that’s a drop from 77 percent in March.

Exposing serious weakness in his leadership credentials, 66 percent of voters said Paterson does not have what it takes to lead the state and 48 percent said he doesn’t get the critical issues facing New York.

A whopping 68 percent of voters said they disagreed with Paterson’s handling of the economic crisis and 71 percent don’t believe he’s changing the way Albany operates for the better.

Nearly seven in 10 state voters believe the state is moving in the wrong direction, making Paterson’s ambition of winning his own term very unlikely.

If former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, a Republican, challenges Paterson next year, the poll shows Paterson would lose by more than 20 points. In the hypothetical match-up, Giuliani leads Paterson, 56 percent to 32 percent. (ANI)