Her comments stemmed from Salt Lake County Republican Chairman James Evans' allegation that Anderson may have violated the law and he should be scrutinized as vigorously as former Republican County Mayor Nancy Workman, who was forced out of her re-election bid last year by a criminal prosecution she eventually beat.

Anderson now is in the hot seat, which is fueled by Republicans touting a double standard.

Whether Anderson did anything wrong is questionable. He followed an Olympics tradition by traveling to Turin, Italy, the next host after Salt Lake City for the Winter Olympics, with an entourage whose expenses are being covered with donated funds.

But who can blame Evans for pushing the issue after last year's public prosecution of a prominent Republican whose political career was effectively ended by the probe?

And Risbon is in a tough spot. Numerous elective county office-holders are up for re-election next year, including two of the three full-time posts held by Democrats - district attorney and county clerk - which happen to be the two offices most vulnerable to Republican accusations of a double standard.

It's Risbon's job to win elections for Democrats in Salt Lake County and by agreeing with Evans that Anderson should be investigated she is trying to protect the integrity of the party.

Because this really isn't about Anderson, and Evans has all but said that. This is about Democratic District Attorney David Yocom, whom Evans is urging to investigate the mayor, and the obvious Republican theme for the 2006 elections: That Democrats engage in selective prosecution.

Yocom created the bull's-eye that will be on the backs of every Democratic candidate in Salt Lake County next year, not only by his ultimately unsuccessful prosecution of Workman, but his tenacious stalking of other Republicans in the county while, some in the GOP would say, treading lightly on the alleged sins of county Democrats.

Seven months after Workman lieutenants Alan Dayton and Gerrie Shaw failed to timely file a statement of organization for their Republican political action committee, Friends of Salt Lake County, Yocom informed them he was planning to file misdemeanor charges.

That created rumblings throughout the county that Yocom waited until after the Workman administration signed off on new offices for the D.A. before he let it be known he was going after the Workman brain trust criminally.

Eyebrows were further arched by the fact that several Democratic candidates in the county had filed their required reports late, with no reprisal from the D.A.

And the "objective prosecution" argument was not helped by the fact that Yocom was acting on a request for an investigation forwarded to him by Democratic County Clerk Sherrie Swensen sent originally by then-Salt Lake County Democratic Chairwoman Nicole Adams and written by previous Salt Lake County Democratic Chairman Joe Hatch.

Can anybody blame Evans for doing the same thing?

Yocom offered a plea bargain to Dayton and Shaw, but it became moot when the Salt Lake County Council, with a Republican majority, neutered the ordinance by taking out the penalty. That action was approved by eight of the nine council members, the only "no" vote coming from Councilman Jim Bradley, whose administrative assistant at the time was Yocom's son, Jason.

Yocom also had pressed for civil suits to be filed against former Republican County Commissioners Brent Overson and Mark Shurtleff for what he considered misuse of public funds, but Workman refused to authorize the litigation.

Republicans point to those incidents while still grumbling that Yocom's office did little in response to sexual harassment allegations against a longtime Democrat working as an official in the county clerk's office. That official was eventually allowed to retire, Yocom's son was hired to take his place and the county eventually paid $90,000 to settle the case with the alleged victim.

I'm not trying to impugn the motives of Yocom's actions, Bradley's vote or Swensen's hiring of Jason Yocom, a proven competent administrator. But can you see where the Republicans have some ammunition going into next year's county elections and why Democratic Chairwoman Risbon may have reason to try to defuse that ammunition by calling for the investigation of Anderson?

The irony is that all the attention given to Anderson's trip, which was not unlike the all-expense-paid junket to Taiwan taken by a number of Republican legislators that Evans doesn't seem to be concerned about, is made legitimate by the recent actions of Salt Lake County Democrats and Anderson, arguably, is a victim of his own party.