Thursday, October 8, 2009
- NJ's Big Issue This Election
Chris Christy is a machine Republican who, if you want to speak realistically, isn't going to be able to get anything done as Governor in Trenton. But that doesn't mean I'm not going to vote for him. I will, and you should too.
The biggest problem with New Jersey is that the people who hold elected office are bought and paid for by the people who run the state employee's unions. They work hand in glove with the politicians of both stripes to award themselves excessively beneficial contracts, benefits and pensions. They do far better than NJ's private sector workers. Not because they do a better job ... they are government workers after all. They do better than the private sector because they get to make the rules and set their own terms.
They negotiate with people who aren't spending their own money, and have no pressure to generate a profit. So when the unions push for more, they are doing so knowing full well that the person across the table cares more about getting votes than keeping costs low. Votes are easy for a union, so they get little push back from negotiation. It's sort of an institutionalized corruption. Votes go in and pork laden juicy union contracts come out. And it's all done on the taxpayer's dime.
It should be illegal for public sector labor to unionize. there is no profit pressure after all, and no allegations of abuse. There is no reason to have a union for public sector workers except to distort the economics of the labor contract that would otherwise have to be negotiated in a free market. But since it isn't, we have the highest taxes in the country, and the worst environment for business of any state.
When Corzine was elected governor, he had his chance to decide who he would stand up to...either the taxpayers or the unions. The two are diametrically opposed to one another, so this was the direct choice he had to make. And paragon of strength that he is, he chose to fight with the taxpayers, so he doesn't deserve your vote.
I don't know if Christy will stand up to the CWU and the other state employee unions. And I don't know if it matters if he does. (He's probably got his hands tied by the courts anyway.) But I know what Corzine is going to do. He's going to continue to represent the interests of someone else.
So I'm going to vote for Christy. I have no illusions about the man. But he can't be any worse than Corzine.
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4 comments:
How do we get people in office in Trenton who AREN'T machine politicans? I am certainly ready for somebody who isn't beholden to the unions. IIRC that was Corzine's appeal when he was running because he was independently wealthy.
It's an excellent question, but the fact is, we don't. The political machines aren't designed to get people into government, they're designed to keep people out. Which people? Anyone who isn't going to play ball and toe the line. Anyone who isn't going to make sure that they, the machine, continues to be the center of things.
In effect it's a shadow government, and all that kabuki in Trenton is just for show. We know they aren't actually serving the interest of the voters and taxpayers of NJ, they haven't in decades at least. They say they are of course, but have you noticed that it never actually seems to works out that way? NJ taxpayers always get the same treatment no matter who is running things.
And the people who are in Trenton aren't important to the process at all in their role as elected officials. The only way that some of them might matter is as a part of that shadow government, the political machines. The governor is no more critical to policy making in NJ than the plastic groom on the top of a wedding cake is involved in a marriage.
The answer to this problem is to deconstruct the political machines. Ordinarily you expect the press to do that kind of thing, but in the age of Obama the press has become more of a decentralized propaganda office for the Democrats than anything else. And I don’t’ see that changing anytime soon.
So I have my expectations for Christy set at the proper level, but on the unlikely chance that he can actually sneak some half way decent policy through in the middle of the night somehow, I’ll vote for him anyway.
Then how do we break the machine? If we have to start at lower levels and dismantle it from the bottom up, then we must.
Well in my mind, we can’t. We need to wait for it to collapse under its own weight. The problem is that the public is woefully uneducated about the problem. More people in NJ believe the economic trouble we’re having is caused by ‘corporate greed’ than uncompetitive regulation. And since it’s a philosophical problem, there is no teaching it to them. Anything I say to liberal is dismissed as irrelevant because they believe they understand my motives for saying it. We can’t rely on the press to educate people because they view themselves as needing ‘access’ to do their jobs. And you don’t pee in the cheerios of someone that you will want to get an interview from three weeks from now so they are in effect neutered.
But economic hardship is a great teacher. Eventually things will get so bad in NJ that they’ll learn a lesson.
The fact is, the machines are not about making things better for anyone except the insiders. All the policies they favor involve forced redistribution of money that someone else has earned in some cases it’s from the private sector to the public sector, and it’s other it’s from one part of the private sector to others. But it’s all about power not money. The currency of the political machines is votes not cash... the money is all just a means to an end. It’s a way to buy the votes to keep in power. So if you really want to break the machine, move. Get a job in another state. Earn a living and pay taxes somewhere else. Deny them your contribution to the scam like many people are already doing.
Based on the current rate of decay, I’m putting the date of that collapse somewhere between 8 and 18 years from now.
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