"Some say that the party is disintegrating," I begin. "They say that the upstate base is gone, headed for greener pastures in the South or the Sun Belt. That the party must remake itself. That in the past it's lived off of Democratic failures but now, after three terms of Republican Governor George Pataki, must respond to its own failures. What do you think?"

Mr. Weld leans back in his chair, stretches his arms and slowly brings his hands to rest on the back of his head. Taking a deep breath, he replies: "Whatever else I'm going to bring to this race in the next year, it's going to be a lot of energy and a lot of enthusiasm. When I'm running for office and when I'm in office, I love my job. The voters will see that over the next 14 months."

Asked how he'd tackle the state's exploding Medicaid costs, which are more than the larger states of California and Texas pay combined, Mr. Weld offered little more than boilerplate about tackling fraud. Asked where he would focus as governor with respect to New York's substantial tax and regulatory burdens, he said, "In some states the state income tax is a big thing. In some states the capital gains tax is a big thing. In some states, workers comp or health insurance and the costs of those. So I would break it down and go hunting. And consult the business community."

The election is, in fact, more than a year away, which gives Mr. Weld--a former federal prosecutor who's spent the past five years as a private-equity investor on Wall Street--some time to introduce himself to the 80% of New Yorkers who don't recognize his name. Moreover, Mr. Weld has experience--and here I'm not referring to the fact that at age 60 he's 14 years older than Mr. Spitzer, the front-runner and heavy favorite. I'm referring, instead, to Bill Weld's solid record running the neighboring state of Massachusetts, where he was governor from 1991 to 1997 until resigning to pursue (unsuccessfully) the ambassadorship to Mexico.

Mr. Weld says his ability to win in Massachusetts, which the Almanac of American Politics considers the most Democratic state in the nation, bodes well for his chances in New York, where 60% of the votes come from within a 100-mile radius of New York City. "In 1994, when I was running for re-election," he says, "I got 71% of the vote. Seventy-seven percent of the population in Massachusetts lives within the 495 belt, which is basically Greater Boston. And Boston is about the bluest city you'll ever find."

Nor is he intimidated by Albany's famously liberal state Assembly. "I worked closely with the Democrats because I had to," says Mr. Weld. "I had a 3-to-1 majority against me in both houses. But by [the time of my re-election] people had a pretty good idea of my style, the way I like to approach problems, which is pragmatic problem-solving. Not a lot of rubbing people's noses in things and assigning blame for pre-existing conditions. It might make you feel good but I'm not sure it gets an awful lot done."

And while he readily admits to having "a lot to learn" about the intricacies of New York state politics--"how the Legislature works, what the interplay between the governor and the Legislature is"--he rejects the carpetbagger tag, having been born and raised on Long Island and vacationed in the Adirondacks. "I've got the beauty of New York state in my bones. I've not spent much time in the western part, but I've traveled throughout the rest of the state my whole life. I moved to Massachusetts when I was 26, so I've always thought of myself as a New Yorker."

Mr. Weld tacks left on issues like abortion, gays and the environment, which helped New Englanders swallow his fiscal conservatism and would likely play well among New York's general electorate. He's described himself as "culturally more like an urban Democrat than a suburban Republican." As governor, Mr. Weld appointed the judge who wrote the 2003 court decision that legalized gay marriage in Massachusetts, a ruling he supported.

At a legislative hearing in 1992, Mr. Weld called late-term abortions "a price I would pay in order to have government stay out of the thicket." These days, he says his support for abortion does not extend to the partial-birth variety.

Mr. Weld says he's chatted up Conservative Party Chairman Michael Long and that "the door is still open. There's a lot of well-wishers trying to make that dialogue go off the skids on the issue of gay rights. At the end of the day, should that be the most important issue to the Conservative Party? I would suggest not." But social issues aside, the reality is that his odds of landing the Conservative nomination are quite long.

For starters, many Republicans have never forgiven Mr. Weld for his manner of exiting the Justice Department's criminal division in 1988 to protest what he believed to be Attorney General Ed Meese's ethical conflicts. Mr. Weld milked the departure for all it was worth to launch his first gubernatorial bid and earn kudos in the liberal Boston press. Not that he has any regrets.

"If little things mean a lot, and they do, then Ed Meese is the greatest guy in the world," says Mr. Weld. "But I didn't think he ever took off his White House hat when he got over to Justice. That may be fine in parts of the Justice Department, but it's not fine in the criminal division. So I thought I had to get out of there, and I'd do the same again."

Mr. Weld is up against more than voters with long memories, however. His bigger problem is the other fiscal conservatives who want the Republican nomination. They come without the liberal social agenda that the base finds off-putting. And perhaps more importantly, they face no steep learning curve. Among the most impressive is former State Assembly Minority Leader John Faso, who has not officially entered the race but has publicly expressed an interest in running.

Gov. Pataki is said to be backing Mr. Weld because he's independently wealthy, can finance his own campaign, and would go easy on the state GOP till, leaving more for Mr. Pataki to pursue his presidential ambitions. But Republican establishment types like state party boss Stephen Minarik are said to be Weld backers because only a liberal Republican can win statewide.

That may be conventional wisdom, but when Mr. Faso ran for state comptroller in 2002, he lost by only 3% in the closest race in the state that year. In any case, it can't be said that a pro-life Republican who believes in cutting taxes and controlling the size of government doesn't stand a chance statewide in New York.

But what can be said with some certainty is that whomever is chosen in the Republican primary next September will be playing catch-up. Polls have Mr. Spitzer winning nearly 60% of the vote and none of his likely opponents winning more than 30%. Reflecting on these numbers, Mr. Weld says he sees nothing but opportunity. "I don't brake for those degree of difficulty issues at the threshold of an otherwise compelling enterprise."

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