BODY POLITIC

FARBER SHOULD RESIGN AS ATTORNEY GENERAL

If the nation wasn’t laughing at New Jersey because of the Statehouse shenanigans last week, just wait until Zulima Farber’s story gets told to a wider audience. For those not politically inclined, Ms. Farber is New Jersey’s Attorney General and doing her best to carry on the tradition of the office. Unfortunately, the recent tradition from that office has been pathetic and Ms. Farber has done nothing to suggest that her reign will be any different.

For the most part, Governor Jon Corzine’s cabinet appointments have been extremely qualified and not particularly partisan in nature. Initially, Ms. Farber’s appointment as the state's top law enforcement officer was met with skepticism by Republican lawmakers because she was primarily a political operative for former Governor James McGreevey and delivered many votes in Essex County for our current Governor. McGreevey even floated her name in regards to an appointment to the state supreme court, but that went nowhere. She did land the consolation prize in the Corzine administration as his nominee for the chief law enforcement officer.

This wouldn’t have been so bad, if she had a clean record. It turns out that Ms. Farber’s past includes a record of 13 offenses for driving without a license and she even failed to show up for a court appointment. Her past record of ignoring the law should have disqualified her, but her recent actions in regards to assisting her boyfriend with the law should seal the deal. By intervening on his behalf with a state trooper, and by rushing to the scene of the stop, Ms. Farber showed poor judgment.

The Attorney General should have let her boyfriend work out justice on his own. There are too many coincidences to ignore. The Mayor of the town in which the car was stopped showing up at the scene, the tickets being rescinded and the car allowed to be driven home. Would any of this have happened had it been me or you with an unregistered motor vehicle?

New Jersey law enforcement has just suffered through four years of Peter Harvey, and we don’t need another AG that ignores the law. As an astute political operative, Ms. Farber should know that she has become baggage for the Governor, and for his sake, she ought to leave before she becomes a greater disgrace to the adminstration.