Three days earlier, Hillary Rodham Clinton secured, without opposition, the nomination as Democratic Party candidate for U.S. Senate at a state convention in Albany.

Giuliani's resignation came some two weeks after a swirl of exposés about his personal life began dominating media coverage here, including front-page stories scandalizing the mayor. It developed into a soap opera–like media display of emotional press conferences and marital intrigues, and holier-than-thou moral condemnations by opinion columnists and talk show hosts.

Giuliani's decision to separate from his wife Donna Hanover, and Hanover's accusations of marital infidelity against her husband, became the top news story in the city.

"Donna rips Rudy on relationship with aide," "Hanover Returns Fire," "3 Kids Facing 'Earthquake' of Stress, Therapists Say," "A Woman Scorns," and "Giuliani's Marital Uproar Brings Winces and Sighs," were among the lead headlines in the city's newspapers day after day until Giuliani withdrew from the Senate race.

The mayor attributed his decision not to run to his need to get medical treatment for prostate cancer, for which he had been diagnosed several weeks earlier.

Prior to the public frenzy around the mayor's intimate life, politics in New York had been marked by sharp debates and conflicts on the policies and actions of the Giuliani administration. Giuliani aggressively pressed his defense of police methods that have led to repeated killings and victimizations by cops, attempts to restrict freedom of expression and other democratic rights, moves to curtail union organization and workers' ability to hold street actions, and other issues.

There have been an increased number of strikes and rallies by workers, protests against police brutality and killings, and demonstrations in defense of democratic rights. There have also been sharpening conflicts within the ruling class here, reflected in divisions not only between the Democrats and Republicans but within both parties.

For example, former congressman Joseph DioGuardi challenged the mayor when he announced as a candidate for U.S. Senate. DioGuardi said he would seek the endorsement of the Conservative, Right-to-Life, and Independence parties. All three parties have ballot status in the state. "We have two social liberals in the race," he said. "There's a clear need for a conservative alternative." No Republican candidate has won a statewide race in New York without Conservative Party backing since 1974.

The latest actions by working people included several mass protests and condemnation of the police killing of Patrick Dorismond, shot by cops who approached him trying to sell drugs as part of a sting operation. Dorismond rebuffed the undercover cops and was dead seconds later. Giuliani immediately released a previously sealed arrest record and portrayed the dead man as a criminal.

The mayor was pushed back in his attempt to stymie the right to union organization at the meatpacking and wholesale fruit and vegetable market at Hunts Point, which is fast becoming a centerpiece of food distribution in the city, employing thousands of workers.

Giuliani recently retreated on one of his attacks on democratic rights, which was to withdraw funding for the Brooklyn Museum after it staged a show the mayor deemed inappropriate. The attempt to muzzle free speech was met by protests by defenders of democratic rights and artistic freedom in the city.

The publicity surrounding the mayor's personal life represented a sharp shift from these kinds of political issues. Media reports, television shows, and public figures delved into aspects of the mayor's marriage, speculated on the mental health of the couple's children, and commented on the various wardrobes and attire of a woman who was termed the mayor's "gal pal." The emotional state of Giuliani, Hanover, and others who are or were alleged to have been personally involved with the mayor were the subject of media speculation.

The New York Daily News opened one "news" article with the view that "Rudy Giuliani and Donna Hanover don't quite match up to Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner. But Gracie Mansion [the mayor's residence] could soon look like the set from the flick 'The War of the Roses' as the mayor and his wife live under the same roof while fighting their way through a nasty separation."

The New York Times asked a series of questions on its front page about which spouse was to blame for the dissolution of the marriage and if it was "unfair of Ms. Hanover, or beneath her, to publicly accuse the mayor of having had a relationship with a member of his staff?" It reported on discussions on "street corners and Internet chat rooms" where "people said the drama of a political-marriage soap opera was riveting" and at the same time said they were "ashamed that their mayor and first lady seemed to have taken the news media's bait, lowering themselves to participate in a slightly more decorous version of 'The Jerry Springer Show.'"

In the end, Giuliani said he "used to think the core of me was in politics. It isn't. When you feel your mortality and your humanity...you realize that the core of you is first of all being able to take care of your health."

The collapse of the Giuliani Senate bid is another example of what has repeatedly emerged in recent years in the United States with the pornographication and soap-operatization of politics, as seen in the impeachment trial of U.S. president William Clinton last year. It is marked by the attempt to draw working people and middle-class layers into becoming "riveted" to gossip, sexual innuendo, and "exposures" of the dissoluteness and corruption of the "elites," and to suck them into the morass of the politics of resentment.  
 
 
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