"From those to whom much is given, much is expected. I have been given much: the love of my family, the faith and trust (of my constituency) the chance to lead this (institution). I am deeply sorry that I did not live up to what was expected of me.

"Over the course of my public life, I have insisted - I believe correctly - that people regardless of their position or power take responsibility for their conduct," he said. "I can and will ask no less of myself. For this reason, I am resigning."

So said Elliot Spitzer, governor of New York, on March 12 this year when he resigned from office five days after being informed that an FBI investigation had uncovered him as being Client 9 of the Emperor's Club, an alleged high level prostitution ring. His denouement was as sudden as his rise to political stardom had been meteoric. In the white heat of America media attention, the political life of a democrat who had built his reputation on the relentless pursuit of criminals involved in vice and corruption was over. One prostitute, one overheard conversation and the career of a potential future leader of the free world stopped dead.

Two and half weeks after the Spitzer sex scandal rocked American politics, the News of the World's exclusive 'F1 boss Max Mosley has sick Nazi orgy with 5 hookers' burst upon us and for the last three weeks those of us lucky enough to earn our money inside the world of professional motor racing have watched the video, listened to the jokes and read the stories as the details of this extraordinary scandal have been played out before us. If anyone thought the President of the FIA would resign, they were soon disabused, the former barrister quickly seeing the personal, political and legal dimensions of his predicament rather differently than most had expected.

The scandal involving Mr Mosley has hardly been any different from those which have gone before. With one exception; Mr Mosley is up for a fight and I doubt that the NoW had any idea what it was taking on.

Last weekend's Sunday Telegraph, for example, shows just how serious Mr Mosley is about meeting this scandal head on. The decision was taken to provide one, exclusive, print interview to a major broadsheet newspaper on the basis that it would receive dominant front page coverage and a further three full pages inside. These included giving Mr Mosley the opportunity to comment on each aspect of the scandal, laying out the basis of the legal argument which his lawyers plan to use in defeating the NoW and a comprehensive career biography which includes the work that he has done as FIA President to improve safety in the sport and on our roads.

The battle lines are now drawn and, for the moment, one cannot help but feel that we are about to witness a fierce battle which, as Mike Lawrence has pointed out on Pitpass, may well redraw the map of British law.

The only ground Mr Mosley has given, but it is surely very important ground given the looming FIA Senate meeting on June 3rd, is that he will not continue in office after 2009. He maintains this was always going to be the case. In making this announcement he has, at one fell swoop, helped garner the support of anyone who was unsure of which way to vote, because he is effectively saying that - for good or bad - I'll be gone soon anyway. Vote against Mr Mosley on June 3rd and you will be characterised as siding with a vindictive media giant at a time when the President has launched a vigorous and possibly landmark legal case. Vote for him and the harder decision will be best left to the London High Court when Mr Mosley's privacy case is heard in July.

The reaction of the motor sport community to the NoW's revelations have been interesting. Initially it seemed that the F1 media didn't really know what to say. The fascinating thing was not in what they were saying, but what they weren't. The initial feeling of shock - which we can assume was rather less than in the Mosley household where the Sunday Telegraph informed us that Mr Mosley's wife was 'not best pleased' - prompted a fair bit of knee jerk reaction. Everyone I spoke to at that stage felt he had to go. And yet, and yet.

The last time I looked the Presidency of the FIA did not require the holder to take a vow of celibacy. So the concept of the President having sex with a woman is not exactly an alien or unacceptable concept. He might even, for example, have sex with a man and that would be, in Western liberal democracies at any rate, perfectly fine. But a woman, or rather women, it was to be. The fact that it was five does raise eyebrows. That takes some figuring out, vis a vis physical permutations and the general feeling that if two's company, three's a crowd and six is, well, almost a bus outing.

But five women it was to be and again, in the UK at least, having sex with five women is not illegal. Indeed it might make some people very famous.

The alleged sadomasochistic element to the encounter raised the stakes yet further, as the practice of whipping and being whipped seems likely to be a minority sport, but again it is not illegal amongst consenting adults. And there's the basis of Mr Mosley's case; this was a legal activity, carried out by consenting adults in private. He also argues that, had it remained private, it would not have hurt anyone. As things stand, however, it has hurt people - certainly his wife and sons - but the hurt was caused principally by the publication of the NoW story and video. His assertion is that the NoW invaded his privacy for no good reason.