Originally Posted - October 1, 2006

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The public is a fickle bunch.

While Michael Schiavo (left) and his supporters cry that government has no business in private family affairs, government has planked their fat butts square in the middle of a martial dispute between Jeanine Pirro (right) and her wandering husband, Al.

What's wrong with the public? They think it's all right for a husband to kill his wife without government interference but a wife doesn't have a right to think about trying to get evidence that her man is cheating on her?

In the Schiavo affair, there wasn't any guess work if Michael Schiavo was diddling around on his wife. He did it right out in the open, fathered two children, didn't need any paternity test unlike Al Pirro.

And Florida government refused to enforce their anti-adultery laws, looked the other way and insulated Michael Schiavo, placed him in a cocoon, free from criminal prosecution for alleged abuse, exploitation and other assorted violations of the guardianship laws, false statements and failing to comply with subpoenas and court orders.

Are there double standards being practiced here? Does it make a difference that Pirro's female and Schiavo male? Is this government interference being exercised in New York a sexist and political issue like Pirro says?

Seems so.

Seems like much todo about nothing in the Pirro case. Considering all the embarrassment, political and personal harm that Al Pirro has caused the candidate and her family, it's not surprising that she had him followed and was trying get hard proof that he was once again cheating on her.

At least she wasn't arranging for a hit on him like Michael Schiavo arranged for his disabled wife, using money earmarked for medical care to instead pay for a legal and judicial hit to arrange for death by dehydration.

Where's the long overdue federal investigation into the Schiavo case, the alleged misuse of Medicare and Medicaid funds, the conspiracy in the premeditated murder of an innocent disabled person?

Instead government is focusing tax dollars on Jeanine Pirro's thoughts?

While Jeanine Pirro vented to her good friend and confidant, former NY police commissioner Bernie Kerik, that's all that happened, an exercise of free speech and expression between two friends. Exasperation, a feeling a betrayal and frustration expressed by Jeanine Pirro. There was no illegal wiretapping, no tape recording of any conversations between Al and his honey. Lisa Santangelo, wife of Al's lawyer, supposedly a "family" friend. The only wiretapping done was that of the government, in trapping Kerik and Pirro's conversation.

The only crime that has been committed in this whole, ahem, Pirro affair, is by the person who leaked the documents of the sealed Kerik investigation and maybe by Al himself.

And gee, considering the timing of the leak and the federal connections involved, why are we suspicious that Pirro's opponent, Andrew Cuomo may be involved in some manner?

The WNBC/Marist Poll of New York indicates that while most voters have heard or read about the federal investigation into Pirro's discussion to secretly bug her husband's boat to determine if he was having an affair, only about one in three says it bothers them. Only 11% think she has done something illegal.

Unbelievably, 66% of the voters survey don't think she is being singled out unfairly but that she's being treated like any other candidate. That shows you that the public expects dirt, dirt and more dirt in political campaigns.

But on the other hand, 74% of the registered voters in New York State think Pirro should stay in the race.

The poll shows that while Pirro is trailing Cuomo by 54 to 31%, the announcement of the investigation didn't budge the figures one way or the other. Marist polled 402 registered voters on Thursday, the same day that Pirro held a news conference in Manhattan to demand that a federal investigation be initiated into the leak.

In this particular case, government has no business in the martial dispute between the candidate and her husband. In our opinion, the government should focus any investigation on Al Pirro, not Jeanine.

She's a tough cookie, has demonstrated that she's a tough and experienced prosecutor, an advocate for victims and a champion for the rights of children, women and families. She's tackled tough cases, tough issues, she doesn't back down. That's exactly what we want in the attorney general's office.

The office of attorney general is that of New York's chief law enforcement officer. We need a strong person, not a whoosh job like Democrat Cuomo, in that office to deal with issues such as Medicaid fraud, identity theft, sexual predators, Internet crime and yes, public corruption.

We're more interested in the identity of who leaked confidential documents that could have potentially jeopardized other investigations, we're interested in that person's motives and whether that person or persons did so on their own volition or were engaged to do so by allies of Pirro's challenger. Conspiracies to derail elections are illegal.

Pirro is being castigated for even thinking about trying to get the goods on her adulterous husband. Have we stooped that low in America so that we now penalize people for "think" crimes, penalizing people for having bad thoughts.

Sounds more and more like Orwell's 1984.

There's something wrong with this picture when the government and President Bush can engage in a warrantless spy program on Americans, an egregious abuse of presidential power, monitoring the phone calls and e-mails of millions of innocent Americans. This same government, who is engaging in illegal spying, violating the Fourth Amendment and other constitutional protections guaranteed to every American, is pointing an accusatory finger at Jeanine Pirro for even THINKING about trying to find out if her felonious husband is once again cheating on her.

Doesn't government have anything better to do than trying to police thought crimes and worrying about what's going on in America's bedrooms?

Seems like the government is engaged in double standards---do as I say, not as I do.

If Jeanine Pirro thought Al Pirro was a suspected terrorist, George Bush and Alberto Gonzalez would help her with the bugging of his boat, no questions asked.

There's something wrong with this picture. 10-1-06

© 2006 North Country Gazette