Huntington's "Tuesday Night Massacre"

This past Tuesday, Huntington Supervisor Ed Smyth and his confederates did something both reprehensible and illegal: they used their government power to target and hurt their perceived political opponent, Councilwoman Brooke Lupinacci and her two Council staffers.

By "firing" the entire Council staff - but secretly promising the six staffers for the other Council members that they would be re-hired - with raises - Smyth violated the law that government services must be provided honestly.

And by conspiring to rig the hiring process for the six to violate the civil service laws, he is violating not only the civil service law, but numerous conspiracy laws.

Smyth's actions resemble nothing so much as the infamous "Saturday Night Massacre" perpetrated by a beleaguered Richard Nixon in 1973, when the Watergate scandal was just beginning. 

With law enforcement investigators - Special Prosecutor Archibald Cox - issuing subpoenas upon the White House, Nixon reacted by demanding that the investigations be blocked, and Cox fired.  When Attorney General Elliot Richardson refused to fire Cox, Nixon fired Richardson. Then when the next in line, Deputy Attorney General William Ruckelshaus refused too, Nixon fired him too. Finally, the next in line, Solicitor General Robert Bork, agreed to fire Cox, and then he announced plans to resign himself.

Nixon's desperation and thuggish conduct cooked his own goose.  The public reaction was outrage at Nixon.  And the Impeachment process began 10 days later.

Nixon would later be Impeached - and be formally charged with criminal charges. And he would resign in disgrace.  Only a pardon from his successor kept him out of jail.

Ed Smyth is an angry and desperate man, because Councilwoman Lupinacci - a former white collar criminal prosecutor - filed charges with law enforcement regarding the allegations of bribes, kickbacks, gangster-like threats of violence (including against this newspaper) and grotesque conflicts of interest involving land development schemes by members of the Town Board.

The FBI and NYS investigators are now all over Huntington.

Lupinacci had every right to refer serious allegations of criminal conduct to the FBI, the District Attorney, and the NYS Attorney General.

And she had a right to not face hostile government power targeting her and her staff for doing the right thing. And to demand decency in our Town government.