Double Dipping, In the Bubble of Media Protection

How sweet it must be.

Today's Democrat and Chronicle leads with a story about elected officials "double dipping" -- collecting a state pension while simultaneously collecting a public salary.

It even names names -- some names -- such as David Gantt and other "state lawmakers."

Yet the paper never mentions Rochester's most prominent double dipper:   Mayor Bob Duffy.

The soon-to-be Lieutenant Governor under . . . Andrew Cuomo.   The Andrew Cuomo who campaigned, as Attorney General and as candidate for Governor, against double dipping!

According to the Rochester Business Journal's Book of Lists for 2009, Duffy is the second-highest paid elected official in the Rochester area, with salary as Mayor of $127,600.   That's on top of collecting a state pension of $70,255.   But at the Democrat and Chronicle, that's considered just too impolite -- or perhaps uncivil --to mention.

Per standard operating procedure, the D&C months ago did a one-off story on the Duffy double dip.   One media cycle.   That gives the paper a figleaf excuse that it's "covered" it.   More importantly it allows Duffy, as beneficiary of the D&C's protection to the end, to be able to refer ever thereafter to his double dip as "old news."

The gutter press at work.