THE TUMULT

Another political bombshell, another politician stepping aside, and suddenly New Jersey's political world is in tumult like never before.

Gov. James E. McGreevey's abrupt exit from the political stage throws the 2005 campaign for governor wide open, and even before McGreevey made it official yesterday afternoon, both Republicans and Democrats were burning up phone lines and convening strategy sessions to handicap life after McGreevey.

The biggest question on their minds: Would U.S. Sen. Jon Corzine (D-N.J.) jump into the void and come to the party's rescue? If he does, he would become the immediate favorite, "the 2,000-pound gorilla," as one political strategist put it.

If he doesn't, expect next year's race for the governorship to turn into a bloody free-for-all. Half-a- dozen Democrats and a crowd of Republicans are champing at the bit to run.

Richard Codey, Senate president and soon-to-be acting governor; U.S. Reps. Robert Andrews (D-1st Dist.) and Frank Pallone (D-9th Dist.); and George Zoffinger, president of the New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority, are all on the list of Democratic possibilities.

The Republican field already was crowded even before yesterday's turn of events, with 2001 GOP gubernatorial candidate Bret Schundler leading a group of five who already have filed to run. Others who are weighing their options include state Sens. Tom Kean Jr. (R-Union), Diane Allen (R-Burlington) and Leonard Lance (R- Hunterdon).

"Today, everything has changed in New Jersey politics," said millionaire business executive Doug Forrester, another Republican seriously eyeing a run. "I think we need to seize the opportunity to go in a different direction." A WILD RIDE McGreevey's departure is the latest, and most dramatic, swerve in the wild ride New Jersey politics has taken over the past few years.

In 2001, acting Gov. Donald DiFrancesco quit the race amid ethics allegations. In 2002, U.S. Senate candidate James Treffinger quit the campaign, and later went to prison on campaign finance charges. Later in the same race, U.S. Sen. Robert Torricelli dropped out after being "severely admonished" by Senate colleagues for taking gifts from a campaign supporter.

And more than two dozen local and county officials have been indicted or jailed on corruption charges over the past two years.

McGreevey has had problems of his own, and for months, Democratic leaders have been mulling whether to dump him from next year's gubernatorial ballot.

They worried about McGreevey's sagging job-approval ratings and all-too-frequent scandals involving friends and aides.

The talk escalated last month after the indictment of Democratic fund-raiser David D'Amiano on extortion charges and the arrest of McGreevey's top campaign donor, Charles Kushner, on charges of luring a cooperating witness in a federal investigation into a videotaped encounter with a prostitute. In the D'Amiano case, prosecutors had the governor on tape uttering the word "Machiavelli," which they said the fund-raiser had established as a code word for his plot. (McGreevey was not charged.)

Yesterday, the speculation about a future without McGreevey turned to reality.

Party leaders agree that if Corzine wants to run, the nomination would be his, and officials said that top Democrats reached out to him yesterday to ask him to run. The former Goldman, Sachs & Co. executive is a rising star in the Senate, a popular politician among the party rank-and-file, and as a multimillionaire, could finance his own run.

"Jon Corzine clears the field," one Democratic power broker said yesterday, and he predicted he would sweep into office in November 2005, no matter the GOP opponent.

Corzine, who was in Los Angeles fund-raising for Democrats, issued a statement dousing the talk - for the time being.

"Any speculation about my own political plans in light of the governor's decision is entirely premature," Corzine said. "I am focused today on electing John Kerry to the White House, and on regaining Democratic Party control of the United States Senate."

Officials who spoke to Corzine said he told them he would make no decisions until after the Nov. 2 election. As chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, Corzine is raising money to help Democrats win back the U.S. Senate.

Had McGreevey decided to resign immediately, New Jersey voters would choose a replacement in a special election Nov. 2. His decision to resign Nov. 15 means that Codey will fill out the remaining year of McGreevey's term.

Presidential politics was one factor in that decision.

A Kerry campaign official said the candidate's advisers told McGreevey aides that they wanted to avoid an unpredictable special election this fall.

Kerry has a comfortable 20-point lead over Bush, according to the most recent Star-Ledger/Eagleton- Rutgers poll, but the official said a special election could create a backlash against McGreevey and hurt the presidential ticket. The official said the Kerry camp feared that Democrats would have to spend money in New Jersey, a state that they believe is now solidly in the Democratic column.

"It creates an unpredictable scenario in New Jersey," said the official, who requested anonymity.

Republicans cried foul and demanded McGreevey immediately quit.

"He's denying voters the opportunity to have an elected governor," said Republican Bill Palatucci. He said McGreevey's admission sheds new light on why McGreevey named Golan Cipel his counterterrorism aide. "He lied to us in office four months after 9/11 about why he was nominating someone to be head of homeland security."

Schundler went so far as to say that McGreevey and the "party bosses" are trying to pave the way for a Corzine candidacy.

Schundler wondered aloud whether "the Democratic bosses who run New Jersey" helped orchestrate the airing of the Golan Cipel affair as a way "to clear Jim McGreevey out of the way so they can run Jon Corzine for governor next year and keep themselves from losing control of the most powerful governor's office in America."

As Corzine makes up his mind, other Democrats are weighing whether they have a shot.

Codey would have the power of incumbency as acting governor for a year leading into the election, and strategists say if Corzine does not run, he would be a favorite for the nomination.

While those close to Codey said he has long wanted to be governor, Codey himself said yesterday he had hardly begun to think about it.

"Let me tell you very candidly, that's the last thing on my mind," the Senate leader said. "I'm not worried about it. I've got to think about what I've got to do to get ready for November 15th."

One obstacle for Codey is that he is at odds with key political power brokers, such as former Sen. John Lynch and South Jersey Democrat George E. Norcross III.

Andrews ran in 1997 and lost to McGreevey in the primary. But Democratic leaders soured on him when he all but vanished from the political scene after losing the nomination instead of helping McGreevey in the general election.

Reached at the beach on vacation yesterday, Andrews said he is focused on winning re-election this fall. But after that, he said, "I'm going to take a serious look at '05."

"I can do this job well," he said. "The state has a crisis of confidence right now. We have big problems."

Also throwing his name in the hat, officials said yesterday, was Zoffinger, a former banking executive who leads the sports authority.

Zoffinger deflected questions about his gubernatorial aspirations, saying, "In the last 24 hours, there has been a lot of discussion, none of which I'm prepared to talk about today. I'm here to support Jim McGreevey." PRESSURE ON THE GOP As for the Republicans, they worry a Corzine candidacy will squash their hopes of winning back the governorship.

"It puts further pressure on the party to come up with the very best candidate we can find," Republican strategist Steven Some said. But he said he hopes Republicans can parlay the tumult of recent years into victory.

"The people of this state have been through a lot, in terms of ethics and corruption and resignations and scandals," he said. "The Republican Party needs to find a person who can rise above all that and can say they are not part of the problem that created all that, but they're the solution."

Some is a supporter of Forrester, who ran against Torricelli in 2002, but lost when Torricelli dropped out and U.S. Sen. Frank Lautenberg jumped in.

Forrester has run a series of TV and radio ads timed to the McGreevey scandals, and yesterday was no different. He went on the air with a 30-second ad criticizing the Democrat-passed budget. It ends, "New Jersey needs a government as good as its people."

Forrester, Kean and Schundler are just the most high-profile of the GOP hopefuls so far.

Former U.S. Rep. Robert Franks, who lost the GOP gubernatorial nod to Schundler in 2001, is talking about a run. If he wins the nomination, that could set up a rematch of the 2000 U.S. Senate race, Corzine vs. Franks.

Four lower-profile Republicans already have joined Schundler in filing to run next year: Assemblyman Paul DiGaetano (R-Essex), Bergen County business executive Robert Schroeder, Morris County Freeholder John Murphy and Bogota Mayor Steve Lonegan.

And like the Democrats, Republicans have a man others fear, a potentially imposing gubernatorial candidate who has refused to say whether he is weighing a run: U.S. Attorney Christopher Christie. He has spent the past two years crusading against political corruption, and some see him as the perfect candidate to run a campaign about restoring integrity to the governor's office.

Palatucci, a personal friend and political ally of Christie's, said many people phoned yesterday asking him about it.

"My phone was ringing off the hook with people urging him to consider it," he said. Christie declined to comment.