He was once untouchable

. - He was once untouchable. Eliot Spitzer barreled into the New York governor's office barely 11 months ago riding a record-setting wave of popularity. Time magazine had named him "Crusader of the Year" when he was attorney general and the tabloids proclaimed him "Eliot Ness."

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The "Sheriff of Wall Street" who had made corporate titans cower then pay up for their misdeeds was going to take the same no-nonsense approach to fixing one of the country's worst governments.

But then he got to work, and hasn't had but a handful of good days since. At the Capitol, he's been hit with scandal and derided as a rich brat who doesn't play well with others. "Eliot's Mess," mocked the tabloids.

The low point came two weeks ago when, battered in the polls and amid concerns that he was threatening to unhinge Hillary Rodham Clinton's presidential bid, he surrendered on his plan to give driver's licenses to illegal immigrants.

Instead of a rising political star, he is now seen as the standard for rapid political collapse.

"It is very, very unusual for someone to dive this far, that quickly," said Democratic strategist Hank Sheinkopf, who worked on President Clinton's successful re-election campaign in 1996 and handled Spitzer's ads in his first two campaigns.

Before he was elected governor, Democrats, Republicans, conservatives and liberals loved the two-term attorney general: This new, tough-on-crime, fiscally conservative Democrat who for eight years policed the world's financial markets to protect the little guy.

His father, millionaire real estate developer Bernard Spitzer, boldly told a magazine his son would be the first Jewish president. No one laughed. As far back as 2005, Fortune said he could be a presidential contender and in 2004, a gaggle of reporters and photographers tracked him at the 2004 Democratic National Convention.

At Spitzer's inauguration, he vowed to usher in a new era of vitality, reform, openness and government working for the people. He spoke of working with all, and all seemed to know that if that didn't work, he had the smarts, the political support and the popularity to smash the status quo.

And it worked, for a while. He led and scared lawmakers to unprecedented reforms of the budget process, ethics, and a bloated worker's compensation system that for decades cost employers too much while paying injured workers too little.

Then the status quo fought back.

Spitzer was beset by scandal involving two top aides who were tracking the travels of the governor's chief political nemesis, the Republican leader of the state Senate. Pointed arguments and angry accusations of skullduggery whirled around the granite walls of the Capitol.

Then came the immigrant license proposal ― a plan met with virulent public opposition. Edward Koch, the former New York City mayor who has seen political rise and fall firsthand, said Spitzer lost an enormous amount of political capital with the plan.

"He has not yet redeemed himself, but is on the path, hopefully," Koch said. "I say that because of his recognition that what he was proposing ― giving driver's licenses to illegal aliens ― was unacceptable to something like 75 percent of the public. And his apology was far from fulsome."

His tumble has been reflected in the polls. A week ago, a Siena College poll found 64 percent of New Yorkers had a negative rating of his job performance. In January, 75 percent of New Yorkers viewed him favorably. A year after he was elected with a historic 69 percent of the vote, New Yorkers by a 2:1 margin said they wouldn't re-elect him in 2010.

What happened?

"He just doesn't seem to realize he isn't attorney general," said political science Professor Jeffrey M. Stonecash of the Maxwell School of Syracuse University. "There's a big difference between book smarts and political smarts."

It's not the first freshman flop by a political firebrand turned governor.

In 1980, Bill Clinton was just the second Arkansas governor in the century to fail to win a second term after unpopular measures angered lumber companies and taxpayers. He later regained the office and served from 1983-1992. In football-crazy Texas, Democratic Gov. Mark White served a single term in the 1980s after instituting a "no-pass/no-play provision" that barred failing students from sports.

Spitzer has had to come back from political collapse before ― and experts say he has time to rebound.

In 1994, Spitzer finished last in a four-way primary for the Democratic nomination for attorney general. While others wrote his political obituary, Spitzer jumped in the family minivan and put on 70,000 miles building support and contacts among New Yorkers he admitted he misunderstood. It propelled him to unparalleled electoral popularity.

He's taking that approach again this time around, using a state airplane to travel and push his agenda. Last week he blocked a fare increase for New York city subways and buses, the kind of bread-and-butter issue political strategist Sheinkopf said Spitzer needs to concentrate on now.

"Three years is an eternity in politics," Sheinkopf said.