Culture Clash

This last weekend, my wife, the two younger boys, and I, piled into the over-stuffed car for a weekend sojourn to points south and west. Although an intestinal malady rendered the trip problematic at first, it proved an educational experience, worth the brief inconvenience.

Traveling west on Route 78 into Pennsylvania, we encountered not merely a state border, but a cultural border as well. Although PA trends marginally blue, that unfortunate tendency owes its genesis to Philadelphia and Pittsburgh. Move a few miles away from those urban purgatories and one might as well be in North Carolina.

First, we stopped at Cabela’s. A stand-alone superstore, twice the size of most Walmarts or Home Depots, it specializes in all things dangerous: guns, knives, arrows, bows. My sons, needless to say, were absolutely delighted. Benjamin spent his time lobbying for a rifle, Robert for a new bow and a supply of arrows. Given circumstances, we limited ourselves to a few camping accessories, but with the ironclad promise to return and spend some time in the projectile area of the store.

Oh, sure, some NJ stores carry guns, prominently display ammunition, and celebrate shooting sports, but a store like Cabela’s almost certainly could not exist in NJ (even though I'm told they intend to open a similar store in Rutherford). The restrictions and hassles necessary to purchase weaponry in NJ tends to undercut the (legal) market.

Indeed, consider: on the way in, school buses stood parked outside. In PA, a class trip consists of visiting a gun store!! Any New Jersey principal who even suggested such a thing would find himself immediately cashiered.

In late afternoon, after the obligatory stop in Gettysburg, we arrived at our ultimate destination: Winchester, Virginia, home of Fort Shenandoah, and the North-South Skirmish Association.

If a Loretta Weinberg Hell exists, this must be it. Thousands of men – and a few women – walking around armed to the teeth. EVERYONE has a gun. No, that’s not right; everyone has LOTS of guns. Real guns. Guns that punch holes in things. Of course, most of the weaponry on display might be useful if the Confederates ever get uppity again (or the Yankees, depending upon one’s perspective), but most of these folks possess more modern implements as well. And the kids are brought up well, too. Dozens of them toted BB guns off to target competitions.

This is the "gun lobby" in its element.

Many of the cars bear political stickers of one form or another. On a whim, during a walk, I went looking for a Kerry sticker. I found only one: "Kerry. Unfit for Command". These folks take their politics seriously, too. Every single one of them votes.

Which, in part, explains why New Jersey finds itself increasingly isolated from the rest of the country.

The people there eagerly share their favorite New Jersey horror stories, of perfectly innocent, law abiding folks caught up in the web of New Jersey’s idiotically anti-gun laws. One man opined that he would travel 200 miles out of his way to avoid setting foot in NJ, lest his sporting passion run afoul of Jersey’s draconian statutes. Many of the men and women associated with nominally NJ regiments no longer actually live here, having relocated to more freedom tolerant states.

As if on cue, on the day I returned, the Assembly agenda included several profoundly silly proposals to further restrict the rights of honest citizens, purportedly to address the issue of gang violence.

One increases the penalties associated with owning an "assault weapon". For the uniformed, the definition of an "assault weapon" is "a gun with enough accessories to make it scary looking". The predictable result of this proposal will be to throw otherwise perfectly innocent people into jail for owning the "wrong" gun while doing absolutely nothing to prevent crime. (After all, a person willing to risk the possibility of the death penalty to commit murder or mayhem is unlikely to be deterred by the possibility of an increased sentence for using the wrong equipment) On the margins, NJ’s profoundly anti-freedom laws will chase ever more folks to freer states.

Another proposal bans the sale of ammunition. In the wrong hands, the definition of "ammunition" might include a souvenir bullet from Gettysburg. And heaven forbid that anyone permit a CHILD to possess such a thing!!

If we really want to attack gang violence -- and as long as we we’re gutting constitutional guarantees -- why not simply provide that anyone wearing gang colors be instantly incarcerated? (If that happens to snag a few suburban teens, is that not a price we, as a society, should happily pay to prevent gang violence?)

Most liberals (an interesting word, given its root, "liberty", the precise opposite of what any good liberal believes) like government and hate guns. They employ any excuse to expand the former and attack the latter. These latest restrictions on freedom had nothing whatsoever to do with gangs; gangs simply provided a handy excuse for further restrictions on freedom. Indeed, to a liberal, essentially every societal problem can be solved if we’re only a little less free.

Here’s an easy prediction: few, if any, "gang" members will feel the sting of the punishment imposed by these firearms restrictions. But lots of other folks will. New Jersey will NOT be any safer – restrictive gun laws are almost always indicative of an unsafe society – but it will be less free. The liberals will continue to scratch their heads over the violence in society, which persists despite their best efforts to restrict freedom.

Dear Christie

Dear Christie:

Thank you very much for offering me the opportunity to join "It’s My Party, Too". I think this letter is the first time you’ve ever made the slightest attempt to communicate with me, so I am truly honored. Of course, we served together for, what, six years? And, in that time, I never once heard the dulcet tones of your melodious voice on the other end of the receiver. Nor did I ever receive anything even approaching a personal letter. In fact, during our service together, I don’t remember you ever making even the slightest attempt to reach out to the conservatives in the GOP, so this letter represents something of a milestone, and I thank you for it.

I must, however, respectfully decline you offer to join your PAC. First, I don’t have a lot of money. This results, in no small measure, from the crushing tax burden imposed upon New Jersey residents by a massive governmental edifice, about which the last two (elected) Republicans to serve as Governor did less than nothing. In fact, they made it immeasurably worse. I note that both of these two former Governors are on the advisory board for IMP.

Now, IMP asserts a belief in fiscal responsibility. Oh? Tom Kean – advisory board member – ran for office in 1981 pledging to do for New Jersey what Ronald Reagan was then doing for the Country. Instead, the first thing he did upon assuming the office was to impose a massive tax increase. Later, when the Reagan tax cuts produced a huge economic boom, instead of cutting taxes back to their previous level – or eliminating the income tax entirely – Kean went on a spending spree, more than doubling the size of state government in eight short years.

At the same time, he (re)appointed such legal luminaries as Robert Wilentz to the Supreme Court. He did precisely nothing to combat ever rising property taxes or to make tax increases more difficult. He did nothing to evict the courts from making expensive policy decisions. His absurd spending left the state with a massive deficit that the Democrats used as an excuse to raise taxes even further.

The next Republican to sit in Drumthwacket, during her campaign, called tax cuts "election year gimmicks" before an election eve conversion. Giving credit where it’s due, her first term's budgets – while not sufficiently austere for me – were veritable exemplars of restraint, compated to what came before and after. Unfortunately, having been reelected, she abandoned whatever spending restraint she might once have favored. She, and her IMP-like successor, embarked on a spending spree only a Democrat could love.

At the same time, she set horrible precedents, by borrowing for operating expenses, raiding the pension fund (and other dedicated funds) for spending, borrowing without the people’s consent, the use of gimmicks and one times, etc. Essentially nothing about this Administration could be properly defined as "conservative", and "responsible" would not be the word any rational observer would employ to describe her outrageous fiscal policies.

Indeed, this "fiscally responsible" Governor – at a time of record surpluses and revenues – actually proposed to increase the gas tax – so that we could borrow more. Fortunately for the people, a whole cadre of Neanderthal Republicans – Guy Gregg, Scott Garrett, Rick Merkt, Marion Crecco, Guy Talarico, and yours truly, to name a few – loudly and publicly objected, scuttling the foolish idea.

Let’s see, massive tax increase despite record surplus; is that "fiscally conservative"?

Too, this Republican Governor – instead of adopting real property tax reform – chose the idiotic rebate scheme, easily susceptible to perversion or elimination. (Both happened) She held one press conference on tax limitation measures, and, then, the proposal evaporated into the ether. She appointed perhaps the only candidate worse than Chief Justice Wilentz to replace him. She did essentially nothing to combat judicial policy ukases and showered money on corrupt cities, run by Democrats.

And, on social issues, she allied herself with the 2% of the population which believes that partial birth abortion constitutes good policy. She made NO efforts to deal with the Legislative sponsors of the proposed ban, or even discuss her thoughts. Indeed, her veto message for that bill offered some very positive ideas and, had it been so much as discussed a few weeks earlier, might have formed the basis for a mutually acceptable proposal. But, typically abjuring dialog with the Legislature, she cast a veto which almost cost her an unloseable election against a complete nonentity, turning a Democratic nobody into an inevitability.

In her own home state, the GOP – dominated by precisely the sort of Republicans IMP supports – has lost seats in 8 consecutive Legislative elections. Once a dominant force, with overwhelming control of the State House, the GOP in New Jersey is, today, little more than a minor annoyance to the Democrats, one they can essentially ignore. (Part of this, of course, arises from blatantly unconstitutional Legislative districts, imposed by the Supreme Court, much of the membership of which this Republican Governor appointed.) Many of the IMP-ish "Republicans" in the Legislature joined with the McGreevey-Dems to support the fraudulently named "Millionaires’ Tax". Not my definition of "fiscally responsible"; do you differ?

The record made by the last two Republican Governors of New Jersey stands as a mute example for the rest of the Country: elect people who endorse IMP, and end up like New Jersey, mired in deficits, drowning in debt, taxed into oblivion. In the years since the second Republican took office, more than 300,000 American citizens fled New Jersey for less expensive pastures elsewhere. That is NOT a record of which to be proud. Nothing less than an abject apology and plea for forgiveness suffices.

We know that IMP members have essentially no patience for those benighted souls who don’t think abortion should be a sacrament. But, on their own terms, IMP folks, here in New Jersey, failed miserably. Their economic policies produced unparalleled fiscal catastrophe -- and Democratic Governors and legislative majorities. If they possessed anything in the way of a vision for New Jersey at all, it cannot be distinguished from that of the Democrats. It’s difficult to imagine how a McGreevey Administration, had it taken office in 1997, could have done any worse than the allegedly Republican Administration it would have replaced. Indeed, a Democratic Administration might have encouraged the Republican legislative majorities to actually act like Republicans, if only out of crass partisanship.

New Jersey is a fiscal and economic basket case, in no small measure because IMP-type "Republicans" proved themselves to be anything but fiscal conservatives. Leaving aside social issues – strange as it may seem, some folks (like three-fourths of the country) consider endorsement of partial birth abortion extreme – the IMP folks simply cannot be taken at their word on fiscal issues. When they wielded power, they spent like drunken sailors, (unconstitutionally) borrowed like maniacs, and massively increased taxes (or tried to, only to be stifled by the conservatives they excoriate).

We have a word to describe such folks: LIBERALS.

Our Party – and our State – have witnessed the baleful results of liberal Republican governments. Our state is an economic disaster, our local Party an irrelevance. Indeed, about the only areas of the state in which the GOP is NOT a joke are those represented by precisely the sort of conservatives your letter attacks: folks who really DO believe in low taxes, less spending, home rule, and have cast the votes to prove it.

So, no, I will not be sending in any money. Such political contributions as I can afford will be made to folks like Scott Garrett, a man of whom every Republican should be proud. THERE’S a fiscal conservative. (As you may recall, he voted against the lunatic pension bond scheme the last Republican Administration proposed, and was accordingly punished for acting like the fiscal conservative you purport to endorse.)

Nonetheless, I DO appreciate the letter. It’s nice, after all these years, to finally hear from you.

Boycott Lessons

Interestingly, if typically, the media, in covering the rallies today, consistently omitted a crucial word: "illegal". That is, these rallies were NOT for "immigrants’ rights". Very few folks object particularly to those immigrants who came here legally, play by the rules, and work toward citizenship. But a huge majority of the people – properly – objects to offering any benefits to those who flout the rules, living here without bothering with the niceties of immigration laws.

One woman, quoted on the radio this AM, asked: "who’s going to cook your food, mow your lawns, watch your kids?" Most of us, I think, will take our chances while we (a) cook our own food, (b) cut our own lawns, and (c) mind our own kids. But even assuming that we were inclined to tolerate some illegal immigrant babysitters, are we willing to pay the huge costs associated therewith?

One of the other people interviewed for the radio news was a Pooh Bah from a New Jersey urban school district. Asked how this strike would affect his schools, he reported on one school which boasts an enrollment of 350, of which 310 failed to show up this morning.

Hmm. Consider that. Now, it’s simply not possible to conclude that ALL of those absences were illegal aliens. Some might be playing hooky; some might be sick; some might be here legally, but absent in sympathy with their illegal classmates. But it’s a fair bet that a substantial number of these absent kids should not be in a New Jersey classroom in the first place.

The district at issue being an Abbott district, it spends -- depending upon how one does the math -- between $20,000 and $30,000 per year per kid educating the children of illegal aliens. Being generous with the figures, it seems that the MAJORITY of the kids in this school, at least, are illegals. As illegals tend to cluster in urban areas, it’s a fair bet that a goodly number of the kids, upon whom we, the taxpayers, are spending uncounted billions, should not even be here.

THIS, then, is the nature of our constitutional obligation to provide a "thorough and efficient" education? The constitutional mandate applies to every kid from Mexico or Colombia whose parents manage to find their way into Paterson or Passaic? Small wonder New Jersey’s native born population declines steadily, while it’s immigrant population – much of it illegal – balloons. Speaking strictly logically, if one were a parent in Mexico, wanting the best possible – or, at least, most expensive – education for one’s children, why not run the border and move to Perth Amboy? The chances of getting caught are slim and, even if you’re caught, they probably won’t send you back. And your kids instantaneously qualify for an education costing $25,000, paid for, courtesy of the New Jersey Supreme Court, by the poor saps who actually play by the rules, and pay their hugely inflated tax bills.

Illegals in NJ urban zones cost the taxpayers a bloody fortune. Even a hard working, otherwise law abiding couple with three kids sets the taxpayers back a cool $75K or so, just in educational costs. That’s one hell of a price to pay for a cheap short order cook.

My thought, then, is that we should strongly encourage all illegals to boycott public schools. Permanently. The savings would provide our taxpayers with billions in sorely needed property tax relief.