“I have a competition in me. I want no one else to succeed.”

— Daniel Plainview, “There Will Be Blood”

The candid admission by cinema’s hardest-working oilman appeals to a sentiment that isn’t totally alien to New York’s hardest-working politician, Eliot Spitzer. His taste for cutthroat competition is just as strong as when he first stormed into Albany.

At first glance, the retooled governor comes off as passive, mellow, and improbably polite. This year, he hasn’t handed down to the Legislature any Commandments. In public settings, he hasn’t spoken ill of Joseph Bruno. He released a budget that took pains not to offend any interest group. He’s even willing to grant lawmakers a pay raise without the strings attached.

Look closer and you’ll see that our governor has a master plan. His war on Mr. Bruno and the Senate Republicans hasn’t subsided; it just turned cold.

Instead of launching missile strikes into Bruno country, Mr. Spitzer is fighting by proxy, deploying his political troops and money to the arctic North Country, the site of a raging special election race on which the fate of Republican control of the Senate hinges.

Mr. Spitzer has yet to voyage there to campaign personally on behalf of the Democratic candidate, assemblyman Darrel Aubertine — the governor’s depressed poll numbers discourage such overt public involvement — but his presence is felt nonetheless, especially by union leaders who have infuriated the administration by endorsing the Republican challenger, assemblyman Will Barclay.

In dealing with the Legislature’s multitude of egos, agendas, and alliances, the governor is trying out a new tack.

David Margolick, writing in Vanity Fair on the governor’s travails, theorized that Mr. Spitzer feels, at least vaguely, that he’s “slumming” in Albany. It was his sense of distinction between his worth and that of the Albany establishment that tricked the governor into thinking he could lead by simply issuing commands to lawmakers.

Mr. Spitzer may still feel that he’s slumming. The difference now is that he believes he has figured a way to rise above the territorial and prosaic passions of the Legislature.

In other words, he is content to distance himself from the legislative process. He articulates the thematics of his agenda: Moderate, but not late-Pataki-years excessive, spending growth; some version of a property tax cap; a redistribution of Medicaid money; universal health care access, and a more centralized education policy. Lawmakers then legislate. And the details are just that.

The governor’s shift in thinking on the limitations and proper exercise of executive power could serve as a useful lesson to Barack Obama, whose promise of sweeping national change recalls Mr. Spitzer’s “Day 1: Everything Changes” mantra in 2006.

The governor doesn’t have a Plan B that he could turn to in the event that Senate Republicans survive beyond 2008. In his mind, he’s not thinking in terms of “if” but “when” Democrats seize power.

Time, he figures, is on his side. Mr. Bruno, whose exit would leave a power vacuum in his conference, will be 79 in April. Mr. Spitzer plans to be governor until 2012 or 2014, depending on if he runs for president. If Republican John McCain wins in November, don’t count out that possibility.

In the meantime, Mr. Spitzer is positioned to take advantage of the fragility of Mr. Bruno’s majority. Republicans are restricted. They cannot afford to break ranks with New York State United Teachers and the other major labor unions, whose money, foot soldiers, and organization are critical this election year.

The dependency has scrambled the Republican platform. They complain about property taxes but fear upsetting the teachers union by joining the governor in support of imposing a property tax cap on school districts.

My sense is that Mr. Spitzer predicts he will gradually rebuild his poll numbers, which cratered last year, so that by the time 2010 rolls around, he’ll be strong enough to deter a restive Andrew Cuomo from challenging him. “I dare him,” will be the message the governor sends to the attorney general.

In the administration’s view, Mr. Spitzer will have secured the Democratic base by pouring a record amount of money into public education, by supporting gay marriage, and by moving the state toward universal health care. He’ll be in a position to appeal to Republicans by taking a tougher stand against tax increases than Mayor Bloomberg did and by keeping budget spending below the average rate set during Governor Pataki’s tenure. One might assume that Mr. Spitzer would have downgraded expectations for himself after his “meltdown,” as Vanity Fair described his rookie year. Mr. Spitzer, however, hasn’t lost his confidence or modified his self-regard. He hasn’t thrown out his list of enemies. And he hasn’t smothered his dream of becoming the first Jewish president. He has instead begun whispering a new pledge: There will be a comeback.

jacob@nysun.com