Why Spitzer's gal pal made out like a genius

By David Norrie and Shannon Colavecchio-Van Sickler, Times Staff Writers
In print: Friday, March 28, 2008

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He said

Move over, Britney and Lindsay. As if wielding bats on cars and playing musical chairs in rehab weren't enough, girls all over the country have a new role model for striking it rich in the fame game.

Ashley Dupre, the 22-year-old hooker who essentially won the Lotto by sleeping with former New York Gov. Eliot Spitzer, is now set to do very well financially. Who knows? She may soon have her own television show.

And Shannon, knowing you, I'm guessing you'll say she is a victim of a wealthy man and a society that has come to embrace trashy women.

It's the chicken-or-egg debate. Which came first: Dirty perverted old men with lots of money, or unscrupulous young women looking for an easy dollar?

Was Dupre like all those strippers who are only doing it to put themselves through college (yeah, right) or just an inflated version of the everyday woman who walks into a bar and lets guys buy her drinks all night just because she can?

With Playboy, Hustler and Girls Gone Wild all lined up to exploit Dupre even further, I think it's incumbent upon you, or any women's rights group, to make a public outcry to save any dignity your gender has left.

Spitzer proves you can't rely on men to stop thinking with the little head instead of the big one.

And if Dupre does go nude for a magazine and it has record sales, that opens the floodgates for the next young lady to go bigger and better.

Can we afford to have a generation of little girls playing with Barbie Dolls that tote bikini tops, record deals and hotel keys?

She said

Dave, this just shows you do not know me as well as you think you do.

I don't think Dupree is a victim at all. Nor do I buy the notion that strippers are necessarily victimized.

Nope, the victims in those cases — and not necessarily sympathetic victims — are the men.

Yep, your gender.

See, it's the men who sit in a strip club forking over cash for some idiotic, naive fantasy notion that the stripper might actually like them. Guess what, Mr. Businessman? You're just a hand waving a dollar.

And who gets the cash? The stripper.

And Eliot Spitzer?

That cheatin' man's a victim — totally not sympathetic — of his own ego, his own sense that he could "catch" other wrongdoers and never be caught himself.

Dupre's no victim. You're right, she'll probably make a quick buck and garner the kind of TMZ fame that's a notch or two below Survivor notoriety.

Meanwhile, she's got all the cash Spitzer paid her for their trysts, with no obligation to show him the time of day from now on.

And Lord save us if she starts a line of clothing or something that pre-teens suddenly covet.

Oh, and let me close by pointing out the real victims in this Spitzer-Dupree thing are Spitzer's wife and daughters.

They did nothing, yet their lives are pretty crappy and sad right now. And probably for a long time to come.

— Got a topic you'd like to see Shannon and David debate? E-mail it to tbteditors@tampabay.com.