- As New Jersey Goes...

I was driving home from my office in Greenwich yesterday. It was a warm pleasant afternoon and I had the top down and the radio on. I was rolling along at about 40 miles per hour, in heavy commuter traffic on Rt. 9 (the one from the Springsteen song) when a man pulled up beside me in a white truck.

He was younger than me, I figure about 35, and had the clean cut look of a cop or a soldier. In truth at first I thought it was my friend Vinnie the port authority cop, but I knew he’d be with his kids at that hour. The man blew his horn at me a few times but not in anger… more as a benign notice. He was rolling down his window and was clearly trying to get my attention.

I turned down my radio and looked over at him to see what he wanted. He leaned out of his window and said to me… “Hey thanks for Paying my Mortgage!” and flashed me a big smile with a thumbs up. I smiled back and waved, then when he pulled up ahead of me I could see the McCain - Palin sticker on his car, and I knew exactly how he meant it. He was just trying to let me know that even in deep blue NJ I wasn’t alone.

I’ve often said that as NJ goes, so goes the nation. Mostly I meant it in a derogatory way, but I think this is probably the case as well. Come November we’re going to have a Republican governor. He’s not a conservative exactly and is still a machine politician (who in NJ isn’t?) but he’s marginally better than the alternative. He may do all the same stupid things, but at least he’ll know that he isn’t supposed to be doing them.

For the common people in NJ. the Obama cool aid is wearing off and they no longer care that the “news” media is telling them to drink more. This is the turning of the tide I think. And just like in NJ, a change of controlling party in DC isn’t going to make things any better, but at least it will stop actively making it any worse.

Entitlement spending will still bankrupt us both in NJ and DC. The civil servant’s unions will see to that, and no politician currently on the scene is prepared to stand up to them. Until it looks like that’s possible, I’ll continue to assume that our fate is sealed. But with someone running the show other than a delusional ‘wealth redistribution’ democrat, it will probably take a little longer to do it. We can’t keep the state or the country from going off the cliff, but at least we can get the driver’s foot off of the gas.