Jeanine Pirro has met with Gov. Pataki and decided to stay in the New York Senate race.

Earlier this week, New York Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno urged Pirro to switch her candidacy from the Senate race to the Attorney General's race. Crooks and Liars reported, via today's New York Post, that Jeanine was holding an "emergency summit" with Gov. Pataki (who has been one of her few important consistent backers)to discuss it.

My view: Jeanine in the Senate race is political suicide.

by TChris

"Tough on crime" posturing has been the fallback position of most politicians, Republican and Democrat alike, for more than two decades. It's nonetheless odd to hear Jeanine Pirro criticizing Democrats in the New York State Assembly for failing to enact sexual predator legislation that would detain convicted sex offenders indefinitely after they've finished serving their sentences. Pirro is running for the United States Senate, not the New York Assembly. Her obvious attempt to paint Sen. Hilary Clinton as just another Democrat who "coddles" criminals is disingenuous, given that Clinton isn't a state legislator and doesn't vote on proposed state legislation.

Arianna has news of Democrats searching for the "Anti-Hillary" candidate in 2008. In Hollywood, Al Gore is a hot topic.

"He's been strongly against the war since the beginning," a big Dem donor who is hoping to convince Gore to run told me, "and with gas prices going through the roof and killer hurricanes wreaking havoc, he's the gold standard on global warming, alternative energy, and the environment. What's not to like?"

And Lawrence Bender, who after producing "Kill Bill" is now producing what I hear is a killer documentary featuring Gore and his fight to get our country to take action on global warming, told me that the former VP "would be a hell of a candidate. Unlike 2000, he's now clearly very comfortable in his own shoes. Bold, passionate, committed, and very funny. It's been amazing working with him."

I can see it. While I wasn't crazy about Gore's centrism in 2000, I agree he's had a major turnaround. I appreciate especially his outspokenness about Iraq. The important thing is for Dems to be united in 2008 and to have a clear message. Gore seems to have found his message. Hillary seems to be playing both sides.

Just another reason, besides those pesky FBI background checks, never to run for office: Even your underwear, including dubious allegations about your purchases, is not off limits.

Page Six reports on Jeanine Pirro's purchases of expensive underwear from Victoria's Secret, based upon information offered by the manager of one of its stores in Rye, New York.

I really doubt Jeanine Pirro frequently buys "expensive" lingerie at Victoria's Secret. The store doesn't even have real designer brands. Check out Neiman Marcus, Saks, Bergdorf's and Bare Necessities if you want to know what brands women with money (over the age of 30) buy: It's Wolford, Wacaol, Donna Karan Intimates, La Perla, Dolce and Gabbana, Hanro, Le Mystere, Cosabella and the like.

I certainly don't want Jeanine Pirro to be elected Senator, but I think Page Six got taken on this one. Jeanine is one of the best-dressed women on tv. Whether she selects her own clothes, or more likely, whether her personal assistant brings her things for her approval, Victoria's Secret is unlikely to be a place she drops $600 every few months. As for returning items without a receipt, provided the sales tag is still on it and it hasn't been worn, Neimans and Saks allow it all the time - even months later. They would rather keep a frequent well-paying customer than haggle over the cost of a bra. Victoria's Secret ought to get with the program if it wants to play in the big leagues.

Markos at Daily Kos wrote yesterday that Jeanine Pirro has not sewn up the Republican nomination for the New York Senate race. Ed Cox previously has said he's still in the race. Monday, he issued this press release, which shows he considers himself a serious contender.

Cox's schedule will be a combination of private meetings with party leaders, as well as appearances at public and political events for the Republican and Conservative Parties. He will also be taking time to meet with local media in each location.

In addition to Jefferson County, Cox is slated to visit Wayne, Livingston, Wyoming, Erie, Broome, Ontario, Onondaga, Monroe, Steuben, Genesee and New York counties as well. By the end of the week he will have visited nearly half of New York's 62 counties this summer.

Many will say Jeanine made a mistake in choosing to run for the Senate instead of for New York Attorney General. She's a prosecutor and the AG's spot would have made her New York's top cop. Instead, she's positioning herself in a no-win situation: She's too centrist for Republicans, and not as popular as Hillary. It's early, but this is shaping up to be a fun race to watch.

The New York Post takes a cheap shot at Jeanine Pirro today by blaring on its front page an exclusive interview with Albert Pirro's out-of-wedlock daughter and her mother.

Why is Albert's daughter or her mother's opinion of Jeanine and Albert relevant to the discussion? I can see that Albert's past, including his tax fraud conviction, and his present, including his work as a prominent lobbyist, are germane because there have been questions about how much Jeanine knew about his unlawful tax return which she signed, and because he lobbies on issues she will confront as a Senator.

But the media should leave the now-adult daughter (and her mother) out of this. Since the mother and daughter have never met Jeanine, I don't think they contribute anything to the discussion of whether Jeanine should be Senator. In other words, they are unfair game.

Jeanine Pirro's first week on the campaign trail didn't wow the media back home in New York. But they do contain some valuable tips for turning it around. The best one: She needs to bring in an issues trainer on national issues. Jeanine's focus has been on crime, crime and crime her entire career. If she wants to run for the Senate, she needs to learn about the economy, health care, budget deficits, jobs and more. As the column points out, she should have done this before she entered the race.

Also unimpressed with Pirro is Newsday. In an editorial today, the paper says:

Jeanine Pirro has attacked Hillary Clinton saying New Yorkers elected her to be Senator and she should be giving them her undivided attention and not spending time running for another office.

"New York deserves a senator who will give her all to the people of New York for a whole term, full time, and not miss votes to campaign in the 2008 presidential primaries," Pirro said.

What about Jeanine? Isn't she still Westchester DA? How many days will she be out of the office campaigning? It was every one of them this week. Didn't the voters elect her expecting that she would give the DA's job her full attention?

Maybe Jeanine should resign her job. Why should Westchester county pay her - including providing a driver and security detail - if she's not busy prosecuting crooks or running the office?

Smart move by Jeanine Pirro. She brought her husband Albert and her kids to a campaign appearance in White Plains today.

Jeanine Pirro's controversial husband made his first appearance of the Senate race Friday when he stood a few yards away from her podium on the last stop of her introductory state tour. Pirro, the Westchester district attorney who is seeking the Republican nomination to challenge Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, did not introduce her husband, Albert Pirro, or mention him in her speech.

Bump and Update: Crooks and Liars has some video from the speech contained in a new ad - "Jeanine Pirro's Positive Vision for New York - without a script, she is speechless."

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Original Post 8/10 3:15 pm

Jeanine Pirro officially announced her candidacy against Hillary Clinton today. John Nichols of the Nation, writing for CBS, says Hillary lucked out. But the most reported news of her speech at the Waldorf Astoria is that she couldn't find page 10 , causing a 32 second pause.

Michael McKeon, who provided the text and said later that she had been writing until the last minute and left that page in another room. Not unexpectedly, New York Democratic Party officials, who sent an aide to monitor Ms. Pirro's speech, seized upon that long pause as an excuse to tweak the Republican as minor league.

"Today's announcement speech of Jeanine Pirro shows she may not be able to take on her primary opponent, let alone Senator Hillary Clinton," Denny Farrell, chairman of the state Democratic Party, said in a statement. "The speech was long on attacks and literally silent on specifics for New Yorkers - 32 seconds of silence that spoke volumes."

I've made a separate category for the Hillary Clinton - Jeanine Pirro Senate race. A reader asked me why and suggested it didn't have anything to do with crime. Here's the answer:

Albert Pirro

The Washington Post reports Jeanine Pirro has launched her Senate campaign website for her run against Hillary Clinton. She has over 100 photos on it, but not a single one of her husband, Al Pirro, who went to prison in 2001 for tax evasion. (Hillary has lots of pictures of Bill on her site.) Pirro's bio page doesn't even mention Al.

Some analysts are saying that because both have "bad-boy" husbands (Pirro's also defended a paternity suit in 1997) it will not be an issue in the race - they cancel each other out on that score. Pirro's advisor explains the lack of pictures of husband Al to the Post by saying "This campaign is about Jeanine Pirro and her experience, qualifications and willingness to serve as New York's full-time senator."

I think Jeanine's making a mistake. She ought to acknowledge his past, his presence in her life and explain it. Otherwise people are going to start digging to find out what she's hiding. Like I just did, out of curiosity. Here's what I found, right on his company's website. Shouldn't people know that Candidate Pirro is married to a big-time Republican lobbyist?