It’s not often our politicians in Albany all get something right. But when it comes to the competing accusations they are hurling against one other over a state ethics-panel probe, they’re all spot on.
The panel is the Moreland Commission, and it is scheduled to issue a preliminary report on ethical lapses of state pols by Sunday.
But legislative leaders are fighting the Moreland Commission’s attempts to gather info about lawmakers’ outside income. They say the constitutional separation of powers blocks the panel — created at the governor’s behest — from policing the legislative branch.
Cuomo pooh-poohs this excuse, and he’s right to do so. He notes that numerous lawmakers are cooperating with the panel. That, he says, makes a mockery of the idea that Âopposition here is based on principle.
The governor implies that those legislators who aren’t cooperating with the panel are just trying to keep hidden embarrassing — perhaps even incriminating — information.
Who can doubt that?
But the lawmakers are just as correct in their criticism of Cuomo. They claim, for example, that the Cuomo administration convened the Moreland Commission less out of any desire to clean up corruption in New York than to pressure members into passing some of the governor’s legislation they have opposed (e.g., public financing of political campaigns).
They further accuse the Democratic governor of trying to push the Moreland Commission to target selected pols, especially Republicans.
Strikes us as a case of pots calling kettles black … and vice versa.