* As I told you the other day, GateHouse has a new survey of state legislators on various issues. It would’ve been helpful if GateHouse had given us a breakdown by chamber and by party, but no such luck. Here’s the narrative…

Of the 134 lawmakers who responded to the survey, 116 say he should resign right away, or nearly 87 percent. And 108 legislators — more than 80 percent of those responding — say the General Assembly should pursue impeachment soon. […]

On impeachment, 25 lawmakers said they either were unsure or wouldn’t comment. Many of those are senators, who could serve as the arbiter on impeachment if the House begins that process. […]

90 lawmakers, said they support a special election for the Senate seat. That’s about two-thirds of the 134 survey respondents. […]

But legislators are split on executive authority, with 56 saying the legislature should try to curb the governor’s power because of Blagojevich’s scandal and 53 saying “no.”

* There are some basic toplines…

Should the governor resign immediately?
116 lawmakers say YES
6 lawmakers say NO
2 say UNSURE
10 say NO COMMENT
43 did not respond

Should the legislature start impeachment proceedings immediately?
108 lawmakers say YES
1 says NO
8 say UNSURE
17 say NO COMMENT
43 did not respond

Should Illinois have a special election to pick Barack Obama’s U.S. Senate replacement?
90 lawmakers say YES
14 say NO
21 say UNSURE
9 say NO COMMENT
43 did not respond

Regardless of what happens with Blagojevich, should the legislature take steps to curb the power a governor has in this state?
56 lawmakers say YES
53 lawmakers say NO
17 say UNSURE
8 say NO COMMENT
43 did not respond

There are no crosstabs, but click here to search for your own legislator. You can’t search by votes on each topic, which is quite maddening, and there also doesn’t appear to be a way to download the entire xls file.

* Meanwhile, the New York Times looks at various ways of discerning which state is the most corrupt…

Where is officialdom most crooked? Last week, many guessed it must be Illinois, after news that Gov. Rod Blagojevich was taped making brazen personal demands in exchange for his selection of a Senate successor to President-elect Barack Obama. […]

But bloggers from competing hotbeds of wrongdoing proclaimed that theirs were the worst officials in the land, thank you. New Jerseyans seemed especially sure that their leadership came out on top in the race to the bottom.

Not so. And not so for Illinois, either.

There are several ways to gauge levels of government corruption, all of them a bit, well, corrupt. We present three methods here in the interest of keeping the arguments going.

* Here are some of the charts. Click each for the complete lists…