Meanwhile, Mr Brown is these days in danger of becoming the champion of both the Labour left and the anti-European Tory press: a strange political base for the party's arch-moderniser.

ECONOMIST: Tony Blair and Gordon Brown can't go on like this

Cuomo concluded that some of Spitzer's closest aides, including Dopp, the governor's press chief, improperly conspired with the state police to dig up dirt on political arch-rival Joseph Bruno, the Republican majority leader of the New York Senate.

FORBES: Spitzer, Spin And Smear Tactics