Free Republic

A Gannett New Jersey study finds the number of government employees with two or more public jobs that paid more than $100,000 together swelled by 20 percent last year. Those multiple job holders had a collective salary of $107.8 million. My colleague James W. Prado Roberts reports there were 6,271 multiple job holders including one woman who had 12 jobs. Sen. Stephen Sweeney asks "Is it really right for part-time workers to be in the pension system?" Does the question really have to be asked? To take a look at the double-dippers click here.... http://php.app.com/NJpublicemployees/results2.php

New Jersey is a leading liberal state By Adrienne Lu Inquirer Trenton Bureau Paid family leave. The abolition of the death penalty. An apology for slavery. Any way you look at it, New Jersey appears to be forging a new path for liberal public policy-making nationwide. "What New Jersey has enacted into law, I think, puts us in the forefront of states," said Ingrid Reed, director of the New Jersey Project at Rutgers University's Eagleton Institute of Politics. The evidence seems to grow every day. The Garden State is one of only a handful to recognize civil unions for gay...

TRENTON, N.J. — The New Jersey Assembly approved legislation Thursday to abolish the state's death penalty, making Gov. Jon S. Corzine's signature the only step left before the state becomes the first in four decades to ban executions. Assembly members voted 44-36 to replace the death sentence with life in prison without parole. The state Senate approved the bill Monday. Corzine, a Democrat, has said he will sign the bill within a week. The measure would spare eight men on the state's death row, including the sex offender whose crimes sparked Megan's Law. A special state commission found in January...

Even New Jerseyans can't stand living in New Jersey, according to a new poll that said nearly half of adults residing in the Garden State want to pull up stakes. The Monmouth University/Gannett New Jersey Poll, released Wednesday, found 49 percent of those polled would rather live somewhere else. New Jersey already is suffering from an image problem and bears the brunt of jokes because of its corruption and pollution problems. But 58 percent of those residents polled said the heavy financial burden of just living in the state is no laughing matter, and that's why they want to leave....

TRENTON, N.J. (AP) - A law enforcement official says 11 public officials from across New Jersey, including a mayor and two state lawmakers, have been arrested in a federal corruption investigation. The official says the arrests are related to insurance contracts for local governments. The official says two Democratic state lawmakers, the mayor of Passaic (puh-SAY'-ihk) and the chief of staff to Newark's City Council president are among those arrested.