I Love My Corrupt State

[Greenday]

Just the latest in New Jersey corruption: http://www.nj.com/mercer/index.ssf/2...ck_arrest.html

The mayor of Trenton, our state capitol, was arrested this morning on corruption charges. He took $119,000 in bribes for a fake construction project. During his time as mayor, he fired a ton of people then handed out high paying jobs to friends. His first business administrator resigned after just one month because he said the mayor was corrupt. Another resigned just before pleading guilty to embezzlement charges. His housing director quit after it came out that he had been convicted of a theft charge. His chief of staff? Arrested carrying heroin and attacked the cops arresting him. His half-brother, who the mayor had gotten promoted at the city water plant, was arrested for stealing. His law director resigned because the mayor wasn't complying with open-record laws and he was also giving contracts to companies who were making large donations to his campaign.

I was listening to NJ101.5 on the way home today and they listed other stuff that I can't remember. I know there was more political donation stuff.

What drives me nuts is that this is pretty typical of officials in my state and it doesn't phase us anymore. My mayor back in 2005 was arrested on corruption charges. Very nice guy, I liked him a lot but it just doesn't shock me. It's like we now expect people to be doing this.

[TheHuckster]

Rhode Island has the same exact issues, and it's seriously crippling us. Generally speaking, our governors have been relatively clean in recent decades, but it's the mayors and some of the congressmen who have been lacking serious ethics: taking bribes to vote on certain issues, or adopting some nepotism with who they choose to contract projects, which typically are not in the taxpayer's best interests.

The worst was a massive credit union scandal in the early 90s, which cost the state hundreds of millions of dollars. The ringmaster of the racket served only about 10 years and the state couldn't recover what was lost. The economic effects of that are felt to this day.

It doesn't help that Providence has had a notorious mob history that mirrors bigger cities like Boston or Chicago. In many ways, although major crackdowns occurred in prior decades, the mob is still here.

[Greenday]

Well, we had a gay governor who was in the closet about it to the point where he had a wife and two kids. He had given his gay lover a position doing basically nothing while gaining a six figure salary plus full benefits.