One man’s Gay American is another man’s Indicted American. Errol Louis in the Daily News:

Over the last three years, federal prosecutors have pursued 55 major political corruption cases in New Jersey and indicted or convicted the mayors of Irvington, Paterson and Asbury Park, as well as former Essex County Executive James Treffinger.

Earlier this year, the mayor and a top aide from Hainesport (pop. 4,100) went to prison for stealing $339,000 from the tiny town. A former Hudson County executive, Robert Janiszewski, pleaded guilty in 2002 to taking more than $100,000 in bribes from public contractors.

Next month, Anthony Russo, a former mayor of Hoboken, is scheduled to face trial on bribery and extortion charges. In West New York, more than a dozen people, including the police chief, pleaded guilty or were recently convicted in a startling corruption scandal. The police chief, Alexander Oriente, testified that he took payoffs from mobsters and from Rene Abreu, a fund-raiser for a pol named Albio Sires, the former mayor of West New York.

Abreu was convicted of mortgage fraud last week after a four-month trial on fraud and extortion charges. Former Mayor Sires is now speaker of the New Jersey state Assembly.

Placed against this background, McGreevey’s new pose as a gutsy, brutally honest politician seems absurd. He was named repeatedly last month in a 47-page federal indictment charging one of the governor’s pals with extorting $40,000 in bribes and campaign contributions from a dairy farmer in Middlesex County, McGreevey’s home turf.

Sleeps with guys, sleeps with the fishes, whatever.

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