Everything is relative I guess…

From a piece in the New York Post today, much gnashing of teeth and ranting and raving about Court of Appeals Chief Judge Jonathan Lippmann’s apparent end run on a judicial pay raise:

As The Post’s James Fanelli reported Sunday, last month he doubled, by diktat, state judges’ annual expense allowances, from $5,000 to $10,000 — an unauthorized de facto pay hike.

Most judges just take the expense allowance, declare it as income and spend it as they see fit. Others use the accounts as slush funds to expense iPods, “meditation retreats,” air purifiers and other nonessentials.

Some even have their portraits done — no surprise, given how seriously some New York judges take themselves.

There are obviously some interesting accusations in the piece, but is it just me or does a $5,000 raise seem a bit trite?  Or, at the very least, the tone of the piece seems out of sync with the alleged offense.

In any case, that $5,000 looks puny when you put it next to, say, $22 million for instance, doesn’t it?  Apples and oranges, I know, but still…