Pataki Planning Weekends in Puerto Rico?

It could be that George Pataki’s pidgin-Spanish support for a Vieques bombing halt during his 2001 reelection campaign wasn’t just a ploy for the Latino vote; it may also have been sound real-estate strategy. Last week a waitress at Trade Winds, a restaurant on the Puerto Rican island, told a reliable source that the former governor had just passed through with news of purchasing a house there. Apparently Pataki, who agreed in January to phase out his controversial, state-provided, $20,000-a-week security detail, wasn’t rolling with his usual entourage. “It’s the first time he’s been down here not surrounded by security guards,” the waitress noted. Then again, who needs bodyguards when there are “no mas bombas”? —Daniel Maurer