Admitting Mistakes and Avoiding Repetition

Comes now Assemblyman Joseph Cryan, Chairman of the Democratic State Committee, respecting massive fines assessed against the DSC for campaign reporting violations. Sayeth the Chairman:

"We don't like making mistakes, but when we do we admit to them and learn from them so they won't be repeated."

Admirable sentiments. With much broader application than to campaign reporting violations (the DSC reported millions in contributions and expenditures a mere 457 days after the reports were due). Specifically, to Government.

The Chairman also happens to Chair the Assembly Human Services Committee. This last week, Human Services Commissioner Kevin Ryan testified before the Committee that despite hundreds of millions in additional spending, DYFS appears to have made little progress improving the child welfare system. Actually, the upshot of the testimony appeared to be that despite the huge outlay of taxpayer money, the problems actually worsened, such that the State faces the very real possibility of having its system placed in federal receivership. (About the legal merits of that lawsuit, based upon the oxymoronic concept of "substantive due process", the less said, the better.)

Isn’t this getting a tad old? Over the last four years, we poured billions into urban public school construction, only to be told that the job was "just beginning" (we Legislators were NEVER told that, I can assure you) that the money is all gone, that no one has a clue where it went, and that we will now need to borrow another $12 billion. On the McGreevey-Codey watch, we were told we would "fix" DYFS, only to be told, now, hundreds of millions later, that the problem is worse, that no one has a clue where the money went, and the hundreds of millions more is necessary. Our erstwhile AG’s term in office did little more than provide full employment opportunities in the political corruption section of the US attorney’s office. Important state programs, such as homeland security, became nothing more than fountains of pork, lavished upon Democratic districts.

Nationally, the Dems like nothing more than to use the word "incompetent" when describing the Bush administration. Locally, they should look closer to home.

What better word describes the NJ Administration over the course of the past four years? We find ourselves not on the brink of fiscal catastrophe, but plummeting into the abyss. Pensions costs, health benefit costs, property tax reform, transportation projects, school funding, ALL remain unresolved and, indeed, at crisis stage, and all of which crises were entirely predictable. The Democrats raised EVERY tax, EVERY fee, often being profoundly dishonest in their justifications for same. Unhappy with the resulting billions, they borrowed at an astonishing pace, demonstrating almost breathtaking fiscal irresponsibility. And they lavished goodies upon their friends, exemplified by the former Governor’s hugely irresponsible distribution of taxpayer money on such pressing state projects as the Seton Hall Athletic program. No Administration ever demonstrated more blatant contempt for the hard pressed taxpayers than did the McGreevey-Codey team.

Governor Corzine should take Chairman Cryan’s admonition to heart: admit the mistakes of taxing, borrowing, and spending too much, and don’t make them again.

Alas, the prospects look bleak. The Governor’s very first pronouncement, on the TTF, represents a giant leap backward, handing a debt-anchor to a state barely able to keep its head above water.

The Gov further directed his cabinet officials to prepare for staff and budget cuts of 5, 10, or even 15%. But here’s the prediction:

The Administration will actually prepare such plans, and, perhaps, release them to the public. While they might be "honest", in all likelihood, they will propose the most visible and painful cuts possible. (The first refuge of a local government, facing difficult budget times, is always to cut parks, fire fighters and cops) The resulting outcry from unions (whose members face layoffs), municipalities and school districts (who, except for the privileged Abbott districts, will face aid cuts), arts programs (facing cuts or abolition), etc., will be predictably shrill, the Gov will pronounce those cuts unacceptable in a "progressive" state, and demand large tax increases to keep the governmental gravy train rolling.

I sincerely hope I’m wrong. But I gave McGreevey (and Codey) the benefit of the doubt, and – although I still believe them to be nice enough fellows – their governmental policies were unmitigated disasters. And the Dems haven’t learned their lesson. Despite a bankrupt state, they STILL can’t restrain themselves from fiscally outrageous spending on foolishness like governmentally subsidized stem cell research centers. We simply don’t have the money. And, if we did, we should spend it on crumbling roads, railroads, and bridges – or cutting taxes – not corporate welfare.

It would be nice to see some vision emanating from the Governor’s office; a vision of a freer, more prosperous, less expensive, fiscally responsible, debt-free New Jersey, with a smaller, "competent" government, doing only what it must, but doing it well. Alas, neither history nor our new Governor’s initial pronouncements bode well.