I am surprised at the big gap between Oregon and Washington. At 35, Oregon has .68 convictions per 100,000 residents, but Washington (at 30) is 1.52 per 100,000. Are the Washington US Attorneys that much more active or do Washington officials have (comparatively) sticky fingers?

This is not state campaign finance, this is federal public corruption prosecution; it is the same state to state. That is why I am surprised Washington has a much higher rate than Oregon. Even though Washington ranks low (30 out of 35), its rate is still high compared to Oregon.

Oh come on.

This just means the feds haven't been very aggressive here.

This kind of complacency is a bad thing and Oregon may not be Louisiana but we have real problems, particularly at the local level.

What Jim and other critics of local Oregon governments fail to distinguish is the difference between policy disagreement and corruption. They don't like developer subsidies for things like South Waterfront or other Portland City Council giveaways. Fine. But there's a difference between that and corruption.

Corruption exists in Oregon, but we are cleaner than other states.

Hey folks, let's not kid ourselves - government with low corruption does not automatically mean good government. We consistently underfund practically every aspect of government expenditure in Oregon, from law enforcement to education. Oregon's schools just got a D+ from one major ranking study, in the bottom 10%. We can't manage to keep state troopers on the highway 24/7. Besides, I suspect it's an illusion. A system of part-time, poorly paid legislators like ours virtually guarantees that they'll be independently wealthy, perpetually destitute, or completely owned by some industry or another.

I'm wondering if the numbers might be so low b/c corruption is not prosecuted in Oregon. Perhaps, corruption is so pervasive, maybe even exceeding collusion, that it simply never gets on the federal radar screen. I read a good deal of local news and the interval is not long in which I don't see some allegation related to the schemings of some quasi-public figure taking advantage of "the system." From the Transit Mafia to the rumors of Bend as a "Deadwood" run by the construction industry, there's likely at least a modicum of government corruption.

Maybe?

Come on Paul, you wouldn't really argue that this figure and study is a sufficent condition to argue Oregon is actually a less corrupt state than more than half the states in the union, would you? Now I have to fret that such a good comment about the inanity of a thread about the non-story about the endorsement that never happened by an organization that is not really significant (I'm a reasonably thoughtful liberal/progressive Democrat who finds the PDA to not be at all relevant.) could have been a fluke.

I am curious if the authors of the Corporate Crime Reporter report actually studied how many unprotected acts of Republican-on-Democrat and Democrat-on-Republican prosecutions took place. The "prosecutor's fallacy" teaches us we need to consider such types of prior statistics in analyzing these kinds of simplistic tabulations.

Lestadelc: Having lived and been active in grassroots politics in both states over the years in question, I would say the answer is mainly that WA U.S. attorneys were more active. I won't go into why, it's not at all flattering to Oregon.

Paul, here's an observations about VBM and why it actually says something about the deception that our corruption rate is supposedly lower in Oregon. We simply have decided certain types of corruption are OK if sanctioning them would get in the way of indulging our self-interests. Dan Meek has already provided one example. (A. Rab's dumb comment would come as a true revelation to former Democratic Alabama governor Don Siegelman as he sits in a federal prison serving a 7-year term for a state campaign finance "violation" conviction engineered by the Rove hit team.)

Here's another: It is still a crime in Oregon for anyone, including a politician, to politic within two hundred feet of a poling place where almost no one actually marks a ballot anymore. It is not a crime for a politician or her representatives to spend unlimited amounts of money to repeatedly contact you in your home to cajole you into voting for her over those two weeks when you have a live ballot and a pen in your hand. As an ethics official told me: It will be a cold day in hell when the kind of people we Oregonians pick to be our leaders pass any ethics or elections laws that they would actually be subject to, or that would interfere with our inherently self-indulgent attitudes in present day Oregon. And given the demographics, that mainly is a reflection on Portland metro area Oregonians.

Come on, someone needs to start another inane and irrelevant thread where the dumb and clueless that dominate B.O. can actually work themselves into a lather over irrelevancies. In this quickly deteriorating election year I really need to have my faith in Paul's analytic skills restored.

..."based on referrals to the U.S. DoJ...."

Who can make a referral to the U.S. DoJ? If A.G. Hardy Myers or D.A. Schrunk are relied upon to investigate public corruption for referral to the Feds, then Oregon is suffering from (ahem!) lingering Goldschmidt bias.

I don't know why Karen Immergut has been so quiet, unless Oregon really is different.

Gronke may believe it, but I don't.

Well, here's my sample size of one:

I chair a suburban planning commission where there is a fair amount of residential and commercial development. It would seem to me that, if we had a culture of public corruption in Oregon, I'd at a minimum be dimly aware of it. You know, the "wink, wink, nudge, nudge" sort of thing, at least. And by corruption, I'm talking about bribes, favorable contracts, sweetheart real estate deals. Actual cash.

The fact is, if someone so much as hinted at a bribe for a land use action, I'd drop over dead of shock. It would be so completely outside the realm of my expectations that it would be like seeing a unicorn.

Now, to be sure, I agree with the old saw that "it's what's legal that's a crime." Cozy campaign finance relationships, revolving door lobbying, et al are a problem. But if your definition of public corruption is what's not allowed that gets done, I agree with the study: Oregon's pretty clean.

Pat.

I don't doubt for a minute Pat's good intentions here, or factual recitation. I'd like to dissect this comment a bit to show where we miss the mark in Oregon and on B.O. too often:

And by corruption, I'm talking about bribes, favorable contracts, sweetheart real estate deals. Actual cash.

Few in public life takes anything close to what could be characterized as a bribes anymore. It's too easy just to get one of your own who'll do favors elected, if you're an interest financially situated to give bribes, particularly in the NW. By the way, the preferred form of bribery `round here are political friends running fundraisers amongst constituents who have just one or two favors to ask during the session (like the chance to actually draft legislation as Dems and Repubs in our legislature make a practice of). And particularly in a state with no limits on campaign contributions as well and where it is an article of faith amongst the B.O. crowd that personal contributions are inherently more "uncorrupt" than corporate contributions. (Personal contributions under $10 excluded.)

Also, I wouldn't bet that most of the non-petty crimes in the cited report were actually prosecuted as outright bribes. Patterns of quid pro quo with months or years between acts and the "garbage can" theory of RICO are much more than norm. (Just ask Don Siegleman about that.)

But if your definition of public corruption is what's not allowed that gets done

Honestly, that's not a realistic definition. There are all manner of acts of misfeasance, nonfeasance, and malfeasance (check your Black's Law Dictionary) that, in conjunction with other actions that could be perfectly legal in isolation, are punished as corruption elsewhere. Tom Potter's laughable justification for getting caught in a prima facie violation of the state ethics laws by accepting Blazer's tickets provide an example. His argument in essence was he WAS doing it to advance the Blazer's private interests because he felt it was good for the City. The GSPC staff cited the law there was no factual question he broke, and the political appointees of the GSPC staff flat out refused to act. Corruption ain't what it used to be amongst the kind of people we like our leaders to appoint to enforce our laws.

I agree with the old saw that "it's what's legal that's a crime."

Yep. In a smaller state like Oregon, there's not a chance the pols and their most important supporters are going to pass any corruption laws they would have any chance of being caught violating. Don Meek gave example #1.

GMA,

Download the PDF of the actual report (not the summary on the website) and you will find a list of what crimes were counted for those statistics. State campaign financing laws were not listed (they did list federal campaign financing laws). The fact that Oregon allows unlimited donations for state office is not relevant for those numbers. Also, checking google, they got Siegelman on federal corruption charges, not state campaign finance laws.

It is important to draw a distinction between out and out corruption (what the report was trying to measure) and a political culture that is too comfortable with back scratching, political rewards, etc. While the report’s methodology is far from perfect, it does indicate what a lot of us agree on: Oregon is fairly free of traditional notions of corruption. For other states this is not true. Actual bribery and other forms of traditional corruption is a more common occurrence. The anger over things like campaign donations giving access, plum appointments going to backers, etc. is a distinct problem and should not be confused with traditional corruption. It is important to draw a distinction because the two problems require different solutions.

Successful strategies for fighting traditional corruptions tend to be a combination of harsher penalties for accepting bribes (and soliciting bribes, etc.) while raising the pay of those most susceptible to participate in petty corruption. This two-part strategy is effective because it raises the risk of being corrupt, while decreasing the need to be corrupt. For example, the nation of Georgia has had some success in cleaning up its federal police after George Soros gave a grant to raise officer pay. However, this strategy would be less effective in fighting “new” corruption.

For this “new” corruption (though I hesitate to apply “corruption” as the term) the best solution tends to be increased transparency and a vigorous political opposition. Generally, the opposition will be from another party, but that is not always the case. For example, Michael Dukakis came to power fighting against the entrenched interests of the Massachusetts Democratic Party and Sarah Palin has found electoral success running against Alaska’s Republican establishment.

Do you agree with Meeks that we need contribution limits for state offices?