Ethics Lands on Ballots

[hang a left]

Ethics Lands on Ballots
By Mark Z. Barabak, Times Staff Writer


Even as clouds of scandal hang over Washington, charges of political wrongdoing have surfaced in state capitals in Ohio, New Mexico, Tennessee and elsewhere across the country, touching members of both parties and elevating ethics as a campaign issue in nearly a dozen states.

Already, some say, the effect can be felt in the November race for New Jersey governor, where Democratic Sen. Jon Corzine is locked in a closer than expected contest with Republican businessman Doug Forrester.


Cliff Zukin, a Rutgers University political scientist, said that given President Bush's unpopularity and New Jersey's strong Democratic tilt, the close race is "hard to understand unless you take the ethical climate of the state into account."

A poll last month by Quinnipiac University in Hamden, Conn., found that 53% of New Jersey voters considered government corruption a very serious problem, compared with 23% in May 2001 — before Sen. Robert Torricelli and Gov. James E. McGreevey, both Democrats, were chased from office by scandals.

snip>http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-ethics16oct16,0,5451360.story?coll=la-home-headlines

[ShockediSay]

1. Politicians are crooks

until proven innocent.