Not an Echo

In response to one of my earlier posts, a writer inquires:

"Where were you and you brothers when Governor Whitman and a Republican Legislature "cut taxes" by enormously increasing debt (that would come due....about now) and then increasing the size of government and the State budget-for eight years? You and your "brothers" allowed credit card spending with the repayment shifted to many years later. No pension payments were required of State, and local governments until last year. Her appointments were as bad as McGreevy's as was her grasp of running State Government. I must have missed the Republican criticism during those years, but all the things you accuse Corzine of attempting to do, Whitman accomplished over the course of her Administration.

I do, however, agree with many of your proposals to cut wasteful spending. Plenty of blame to go around."

A perfectly fair criticism, for the most part.

Not of ME, I respectfully contend, but of the GOP generally. Alas, when Republicans had the chance, we failed to reform government so as to prevent precisely the sort of massive fiscal malpractice we witnessed during the McGreevey-Codey years. And, alas, much of that malpractice found its genesis in the Whitman/DiFrancesco years.

In fairness, Whitman’s first term represented – especially in retrospect – a somewhat muddled, haphazard, half-hearted imitation of what Republicans actually believe, fiscally. She DID cut taxes. Twice – in 1995 and again in 1997 – spending actually declined over the previous year’s expenditures. Although not a model of fiscal integrity, Whitman’s first term held spending in check – in relative terms. Her second term – and the continuation thereof under DiFrancesco – was a fiscal horror show.

In my own defense, I voted against all but one of the "Republican" budgets, against the insane pension bond boondoggle and against the school construction bond scheme. I even voted against a TTF revision because it didn’t restrict new borrowing; I was the only Member of the Assembly who did. (Prompting one of my colleagues to heckle, "you want anything built in your district?")

A few Republicans stood up to our own Party leaders when they decided to embark on fiscally reckless paths. Virtually every one of them comes under the heading of "conservative". As I recollect, 8 Assembly Members voted against the pension bond, including your humble correspondent. If memory serves, only one of those was a Democrat: Joe Suliga. So the Dems have no right to bellyache.

Unfortunately, the Republicans can conceive of no bad idea which the Democrats can’t perfect. These last four years, under McGreevey and Codey, rank among the worst, most recklessly irresponsible administrations in the history of the United States. We are now reaping the benefits of years of Democratic misrule in the form of higher taxes, higher unemployment, and population exodus. It’s almost enough to make one feel sorry for Jon Corzine.

Nonetheless, as the writer effectively points out, it simply will not do to nominate another yes-but-less pale Republican endorser of failed Democratic policies. If the voters perceive that the only difference between Republicans and Democrats is the identity of the folks who get the fat government contracts, they have no incentive to vote at all. To quote St. Barry, the GOP must offer a choice, not an echo.

That means no namby-pamby Republicans who refuse to say where they’d cut spending, or who fear to tick off powerful constituencies. The only way to bring about real reform is precisely by annoying virtually everyone who gets the slightest benefit from taxpayer funds. Simply put, any candidate who even bothers to answer the NJEA questionnaire merits no consideration whatsoever.

In every single poll ever taken, the people say, by margins of at least 2-1, that they want lower spending rather than higher taxes, and that they’re willing to accept fewer services in return. THAT is the program upon which the next Republican candidate should run, such that no more correspondents can look toward the GOP and say, "see, you’re no different than the other guys".

Our candidate might not win; the Big Guns of Big Government will let loose with all they’ve got. But if we’re going to bother with elections at all, there might as well be a difference in government if the Good Guys win.