'02 phone scandal still ringing Dems' ears

[babylonsister]

'02 phone scandal still ringing Dems' ears

By: David Mark
Aug 1, 2007 06:53 PM EST
Democratic Gov. Jeanne Shaheen and U.S. Rep. John Sununu
Sununu ended up winning his Senate seat over Democrat Jeanne Shaheen by 51 percent to 47 percent, a 19,151-vote margin.


MANCHESTER, N.H. -- Only after Richard Nixon's landslide reelection in 1972 did the Watergate scandal break open in a meaningful way, setting off a series of events that forced the president's historic resignation and sent several conspirators to prison.

And not until after Republican Sen. John Sununu's election in 2002 did the more lurid details of political skullduggery in the Granite State -- a now-famous phone jamming scandal -- become public.

That's in no way meant to draw parallels between the two political figures: While Nixon's cronies, goons and hangers-on perpetrated the Watergate break-in and ensuing coverup, election illegalities and chicanery in New Hampshire were done by independent Republican apparatchiks, not Sununu's Senate campaign.

But New Hampshire Democrats have not forgotten the election cheating from nearly five years ago, which they contend cost them a Senate seat. With Sununu up for reelection next year in one of the mostly highly targeted Senate races, those long-ago events loom large in the minds of party activists.

For many state Democrats, the phone jamming scandal is as much a motivating factor as the Iraq war and Sununu's general support for Bush administration policies.

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http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0807/5205.html