Between August of 2006 and March of 2008, whenever I had an ethical, professional, or even personal question, I asked myself, “What would Eliot Spitzer do?”  I was positively in love with Eliot Spitzer.  He gave me an award when I was in high school for my feminist activism and for those two and a half years, he was probably my favorite man in New York.  I so admired how he stood up for people who were underprivileged even though he came from a place of great personal privilege and how he always stood for doing what was right. I also really liked watching him give speeches; he had such an electrifying energy and he just made me feel like I was part of something big and important (like New York State)!  This is completely embarrassing, but for awhile I had his picture hanging above my desk, and he consistently reminded me on hard days why I remained a feminist, a progessive, and a writer, when all of these things can honestly be rather difficult sometimes!

Needless to say, my admiration of Eliot Spitzer came crashing down last March and it became very clear that he actually stood for none of the things that I thought he did.  And I haven’t quite found a new role model to take his place.  I really love J.K. Rowling, but she seems to stay out of the public spotlight and doesn’t explicitly touch on political topics in her writing (although I would argue that the later Harry Potter books, particularly the fifth one, are very overt protests of what happens when governments are given too much power and they have major religious and spiritual themes).  I totally look up to Carrie Bradshaw, and I often find myself thinking, “What would Carrie Bradshaw do?” but Carrie Bradshaw isn’t a good person for a gal to model herself after, because frankly, as stylish and empowered as Carrie is, she is also somewhat of an overgrown adolescent.

As I prepare for my book to be published and to enter the spotlight in a very new way, I need a new role model, for professional, ethical, and style purposes (you have to admit, Eliot Spitzer did have style).  Any suggestions?  Who are your role models, career-wise, ethics-wise, or otherwise?