asbury park press

The new year will give us a new President and a newly elected Congress. Only 61 individuals are newly elected to it though. The remaining 474 are simply returning to continue their work (two are going from the house to the Senate). But in this session, all of them are expected to bring about that muct "touted change" that many of them promised along with President-Elect Obama.

How much "change" they will actually bring and what kind of change they will be responsible for has yet to be seen but early on, there exists one change that they will effect right away.

While the nation and the world have entered economic trouble, the 535 collective members of the House of Representatives and Senate will have the opportunity to see their salaries change with an increase of as much as $4,700 a year.

The pay raise is automatic and turns out to be about a 2.8% increase and although it may not sound like much, when one considers the circumstances of the times that we are in, accepting such a pay raise would be criminal.

I say criminal because there do not exist many American institutions that can determine their own salary at their own whim. And there are even fewer institutions that would dare to give themselves more money when they have less money to spend.

On top of that, given the fact that elected federal office holders already make a touch more than $169,000, most Americans feel that that is quite suitable. In fact many Americans might consider it to be a great deal more than suitable. Seeing as how Congress currently has an approval rating of 18.4% and a disapproval rating of 73.4%, I would say that most Americans think that $170,000 for the bad job they are doing is totally inappropriate and way too much.

So why should they get almost $5,000 more for their poor approval?

Even more disturbing, how can they look voters in the eye and claim to understand that the economic climate is rough but that it is necessary for them to shoulder additional costs that Congress had a hand in creating in the first place.

While Congress approves bailing out almost every faction of the private sector that requests help, how can they also accept more money too? Is that the type of change that the elections of ’08 meant, more spending and higher Congressional salaries?

The amount of money we are talking about in regards to the pending pay raise may be minuscule when compared to a 7 or 800 billion dollar bailout but it is still more money being spent. It is still more money being paid by taxpayers and it is still more money than each member of Congress requires. But more than that , accepting a pay raise during the time we are in is a horrific symbolic gesture that essentially tells the American taxpayer “screw you, were in charge and we are going to do what we want, when we want and how we want”. Never mind the out of work salesman who has no conglomerate that can slip congressman or senators a hefty campaign donation and then request federal assistance for themself. Never mind the additional taxes that Democrats will be requesting taxpayers to pay or the out of work taxpayer who can’t afford to pay their property taxes this year. By accepting a pay raise, Congress will be making it clear that they have absolutely no concern for the people whose money they spend.

With Democrats in total control of government, if the 2.8% pay raise goes through, than their hold on power will be short lived. If Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi do not put a stop to increasing their salaries than folks, they are not just greedy, they are downright stupid and should not be in office in the first place.

Having control of government makes Democrats responsible for what happens in government, totally responsible. Accepting a pay raise at a time like this is something that they will have to be held accountable for and they will.

But there is still a chance for them to savwe face. If they act responsibly and derail any efforts to increase their salaries, they can spare themselves the blame and avoid the resulting repercussions of their greed and irresponsibility.

That is one reason why President-Elect Obama should publicly urge the House of Representatives and the Senate to show the American people that they have their priorities in order and that they are aware of the tough times we may be in and demand that they forgo any raise.

It is also why POLITICS 24/7 has issued a national petition.

It is a “Declaration of Rejection of a Congressional Pay Raise ”

As a free society, we cannot simply wait for our representatives to act. We must make our desires known before they act.

In the case of irresponsible government action we cannot wait for irresponsibility to be enacted, we must avoid it from happening . So we have initiated a petition to Congress. It is a petition that calls upon them to reject any increases in their “salaries, staffs and office budgets, as well as personal expense limits, and currently allocated per diem expenses. If such a vote or votes come before Congress at any point between January 2009 and January 2011, we demand that they reject it and that a new vote repealing such increases be brought to the floor of both the House of Representatives and the Senate”.

Simply click here for the "DECLARATION of REJECTION of CONGRESSIONAL PAY RAISE" Online petition and make it clear that will tolerate spending more on Congress than they are worth and that you certainly do not intend to tolerate their greed.

After signing it you must still do two things. Pass this petition on to others. Just cut and past the following link into an email

http://www.gopetition.com/online/24301.html

Then send it to friends, family and business associates and urge them to do the same.

Once you've done that, the second thing you must do is contact the two U.S. Senators representing you in your state and your congressman. Do so either by phone, snail mail or email. No matter how you want to do it, just do it!

If you are really ticked off over this potential pay raise, write your local newspapers too. Send letters to the editors voicing your disapproval of any hint of raising congressional salaries at a time like this.

BE SURE TO SIGN THE PETITION

9 SYMPTOMS OF CONSERVAPHOBIA

conservaphobia: noun. The fear of the American conservative political movement, often based on unfounded stereotypes and distortions.

You might be conservaphobic if:

• You've never really listened to Rush Limbaugh because you're already sure that you disagree with practically everything he's ever said.
• You refer to liberal Catholics, Protestants and Jews as "people of faith" but conservative Catholics, Protestants and Jews as the "religious right" or "radical religious right". (Maybe you have a thing for alliteration too.)
• You think all white Republicans are racists and all black Republicans are sellouts.
• You are a champion of first amendment rights except in public school classrooms and in front of abortion clinics.
• You're glad you're not a Republican because after all, they want to starve school children and senior citizens.
• You actually think that "liberal" and "progressive" are synonymous.
• In your opinion, a government donation to the poor is somehow more effective than yours would be.
• You only listen to and respect the views of "open-minded" people who think like you do.
• You blame society's problems on "religious fanatics" and "corporate greed", never on the irresponsible behavior of individuals.

Recently, State Senator Sean Kean (R-Monmouth) and Assembly members Mary Pat Angelini (R-Ocean) and Dave Rible (R-Wall) endorsed Chris Christie for the Republican nomination for Governor.

I normally find myself in agreement with those lawmakers, usually.

 However in this case I do not approve of their premature endorsement of a candidate who not only hasn't articulated his positions on the issues facing the state but is not even a declared candidate for the nomination.

New Jersey Republican leaders seem to be yearning for a savior. So much so that I believe they are willing to throw out the baby with the bath water.

In their intense desire to win an election they seem to be placing little importance on the principles that we need a Governor to bring to Trenton along with their victory.  On top of that thinking being wrong based upon its shallowness, it also ignores a basic truth.  It ignores the fact that our party should not be built around any one individual.  It should be built around our principles and the ideas that Republixcans bring to the table.  Rather than focus on one person to lead us to victory, Republican legislators should be providing Trenton with the ideas that could win the day for us.  Without those ideas, there is no need to win. 

So I suggest that Republican elected officials focus on that job.  Focus on bringing change through the legislative solutions they propose.  I want them to do their job and let the candidates running for governor do their job.

Once the candidates  have done so, or at the very, least begun to do so, then come out and endorse one of them.  Don't just endorse someone for political expediency.  Have some sincerity in purpose.  Endorse someone for their ideas, their thinking, the direction they propose to take us.   Not for their name. 

I want to know these things before I approve or reject his candidacy. I want to know where he stands on issues before we say...."here take our nomination, take all that we believe and do as you wish with it to become Governor".

With Republican elected officials simply endorsing Christie before he has stated a position on any issues or even become a candidate, they are not helping matters. They are simply saying, "we don't know what you stand for but we need you". That type of courtship does not help us build a strong ticket for Governor in November. In fact it could lead to trouble.

 Years ago when New York was my political arena, before becoming the Republican nominee in his second attempt to become Mayor of New York City, Rudy Giuliani told me that losing against Dave Dinkins the first time around, taught him a lot.

You see, the first time he ran, Rudy expected Republicans allover the nation, to roll over and roll out the red carpet for his candidacy. At the time he felt that Republicans needed him more than he needed Republicans. That wasn't exactly the case.

While waiting for Republicans throughout the city to come and kiss Rudy's ring, another Republican courted them for their support. With money and conservative opinions, Ronald Lauder garnered enough support to wage a strong primary battle against Rudy. It was a battle that probably caused Rudy to lose the election by one percentage point

Instead of making his rounds and earning support from the party whose nomination he wanted, Rudy felt that it was incumbent upon them to come to him.

Not all of them did.

Many felt at home with the more conservative candidate who respected them enough to ask for their support, not expect their support.

Had Rudy maintained a little humility and earned the support of all Republicans, he may have avoided the bloody and expensive primary battle that he found himself in and by avoiding that battle he might have won the war and been elected mayor four years earlier than he was. In fact he probably would have been able to serve three terms instead of the two he was limited to by the term limits which voters adopted in the same election that finally saw Rudy win City Hall.

Four years after losing the 1989 mayoral race, Rudy admitted that the way he conducted himself, the first time, was inappropriate. He told me and a couple of county chairmen that he learned his lesson and that he knew he needed every Republican as much, if not more than they needed him.

With that lesson learned, Rudy went on to win the Republican nomination for Mayor with ease and ultimately became one of the greatest mayors New York has ever known.

Now, here we are in New Jersey and another famed prosecutor is on the verge of saving Republicans from defeat.

If Chris Christie believes like Rudy did in 1989, Christie could find himself in the same position as Rudy.

With some Republican elected officials simply endorsing Christie before he has stated a position on any issues or even become a candidate yet, they are not helping matters. They are actually saying, "we don't know what you stand for but we need you". That type of courtship does not help us build a strong ticket for Governor in November. It simply helps to create an arrogant  mentality in Christie that allows him to believe that we owe him the nomination and that the job of Governor is his merely because he may want it..

Truth is, we owe nothing to Chris Christie other than our thanks for his undeniably successful tenure as New Jersey's U.S. Attorney for the past seven years.

So stop wooing Chris Christie. Let Chris Christie start wooing us, the voters. Let Chris Christie join the other official candidates and earn our support.

The most recent example of Republican leaders hastily rushing to endorse someone, long before the primary election for a Republican nomination took place, was at the end of last year, when hundreds of Republicans from county chairmen, mayors, freeholders, councilmembers and state legislators rushed to endorse Rudy Giuliani for President.

We all know how successful that was.

So stop trying to part the sea for Chris Christie. We need to let him articulate his positions on the issues and demonstrate why he would be a better Governor than Richard Merkt, Steve Lonegan, Brian Levine or any other potential nominee.

A good start for Christie would be to stop stalling. The longer he waits to make a decision, the more suspect people become. They begin to wonder, does he want the job bad enough? Is there some closeted skeleton that is making him apprehensive about running?

Whatever the answer, Christie needs to make it official, one way or the other.

Until then, I suggest that everyone stop hoping that Chris Christie can walk on water. Stop making him believe that he is the best thing since sliced bread merely because he is Chris Christie. Help us win back New Jersey so that we can turn things around. Help strengthen our ticket in November by making Chris Christie put his very best foot forward and earn the nomination that he may want.

We are not helping ourselves by rolling out a red carpet for Chris Christie while waving a white flag of surrender for what ,we as Republicans, stand for.

We need to let Christie articulate his positions on the issues and demonstrate why he would be a better Governor than Richard Merkt, Steve Lonegan, Brian Levine or any other potential nominee. We need to make sure that Chris Christie represents the Republican ideology and approach to government that we stand for.

So before Republicans officials hand over our mantle to someone, let them prove themselves to be worthy of holding it. Let the candidates campaign for the nomination so that the right ideas may help win day rather than just some empty suit with a well known name.

December 16^th, marks the 235^th anniversary of the Boston Tea Party.

235 years ago the residents of the American colonies had enough. They could no longer quietly tolerate the oppression of a ruling authority that dictated too much. They were tired of the majesty’s demands upon them and it all came to a head in Boston when the cry of “taxation without representation” resulted in a tea party that was anything but sedate or civil. Back then, American colonists were developing a sense of independence that wanted government out of their lives. They wanted to make their own wages without a ruling authority limiting how much of it they could earn. They wanted the right to have a say in the way their territory was run. This spirit led to the Declaration of Independence and eventually it led to the birth of what the world would came to know as the freest, most innovative and powerful nation in the universe.

Today, we still hold that impressive title but many of us see it being lost.

That greatness is a bi-product of freedom. A freedom that has allowed individuals to flourish well beyond the limited framework that any one established authority could set it’s people on. The diversity of thinking, and goals has created the greatest pool of ideas known to man.

Our freedom and individuality has been the key to our greatness but unlike the people of colonial America, today, Americans are giving up their freedom and relinquishing their individuality to a controlling authority that they want to give greater control to.

Instead of demanding “no taxation without representation” we are accepting of the practice.

If you live in New Jersey but work in New York, in addition to a litany of federal taxes and state taxes, you have to pay a commuter tax. Does paying that tax give New Jerseyans the chance to vote for leaders and representatives in New York? Heck no! But without any representation for them in New York, they are forced to pay taxes to New York.

This scenario is not limited to New York. It exists almost everywhere in the nation but that does not make it right. It is simply an indication of the spirit that has been lost since days of old.

Further indication of this is made in other areas of government.

Instead of that sense of responsibility that the colonists had, today we look towards government for everything. Where the colonists wanted less of the majesty’s governance, we want more of the federal bureaucracy’s governance.

Have a business that isn’t successful? Let the government bail you out.

Want to start a business? Let the government give you a grant to do it.

Lost money on a business deal or investment? Let the government give you the money back.

Let the government do everything and pay for everything, right?

Wrong!

The money the government gives you is not theirs to give away. It is your money, it is our money. It is the tax dollars we let them take from us and the more we refuse to do for ourselves, the more money they take from us.

Economically, that doesn’t sound like a bad thing but in reality it is anything but a good deal.

When the bureaucracy of government does something, they do so in a way that costs much more than any individual or private sector institution can. So by letting the government do more, is allowing more money to be wasted. If you needed a hammer would you buy one for 8 bucks at Home Depot yourself or would you buy the same one from the Pentagon for 108 dollars?

The government needs to get out of our business and Americans need to recapture the independent spirit that founded this country and made us the great nation that we are.

We need to start doing for ourselves what we have come to expect government to do for us. Our reliance on a controlling authority has taken control of our lives away from us. That reliance has created a dependency that has led to the growth of government and that growth has created the need for more money. Money that is raised by increasing the taxes that the people have to pay.

The Boston Tea Party may not have been a cozy afternoon gathering but it was a good thing. It signaled our deep rooted yearning for our God given freedom and believe it or not, freedom is still a good thing.

235 years later Americans are far removed from that fact. Instead of demanding less government and more personal freedom, we ask for more government and more government action. Instead of protesting excessive taxation we just held an election that endorsed more taxes and “spreading the wealth around”.

Maybe we will have to lose some of our freedom in order to realize what all the hullabaloo in Boston was about.

Slowly we already have lost some of our freedoms but apparently not enough. Not enough to select candidates who want to limit government. Not enough to force representatives to stop trying to solve problems by restricting our freedoms and creating more problems.

Just how much freedom we must lose before we begin to miss it, is quite important.

That freedom made us the great power and people that we are and the more of it that we lose, the further from greatness we shall fall.

So today, before charging the spouses gift on that past due credit card, take a moment and reflect on the participants of the Boston Tea Party. A bunch of colonists who saw more value in their freedom than any Christmas gift. A group of soon to be Americans whose desires for a better life led them to renounce the authority of a government for the sake of their freedom and the eventual freedom that we have come to take for granted and whittle away.

A man took a trip out West after a harrowing IRS audit. He stopped in a bar, and after a few drinks, stated to no one in particular, "IRS agents are horses' asses."

One of the locals spoke up on hearing this: "Mister, you'd better watch what you say. You're in horse country."

POLITICS 24/7 has often stated that not only is state government too big but that there are too many governments in the state. Based on the relatively small size of New Jersey, why there is a need for more than 650 municipal governments, is beyond me. Drive down any road in New Jersey and you will find yourself entering a new and different town every 3 or 4 minutes.

As stated here in the past, the proliferation of governments in this state is actually a major part of the problems that we face in the state. The affordability crisis we are enduring is in large part due to the costs of operating all these governments. It costs a lot of money to operate and employ all these fire departments, police departments, borough halls, staffs, permit departments, and so on and so on. It also creates an atmosphere ripe with the opportunity for corruption.

Between the patronage, construction and service contracts, the ability to “spread the wealth around” runs rampant. But the wealth that is spread around is that of the taxpayers. While their wealth is taken away from them, those in charge of spreading it are doing so among their own friends, families, mistresses and fellow power brokers.

The existing arrangement has helped to make government one of the largest employers in the state. It has also helped to define New Jersey as one of the most state corrupt states in the Union, a title often in dispute with Louisiana but recently surpassed only by Illinois. The arrest of Illinois’ Democrat Governor, Rod Blagojevich, for trying to sell President-Elect Obama’s newly available senate seat, along with other sleazy intentions, has helped take the title away from us. But we are still among the three most corrupt states at the top of that list.

Bridge commissioners, state contractors, council members, freeholders, county executives, judicial officials, cabinet members, party chairmen, state senators, assembly members and more have all been getting arrested, indicted, and sentenced in astonishing numbers.

Just today a former assembly candidate pleaded guilty in the same bribery scandal that took out his opponent for the assembly seat that he ran for, a former Assemblyman.

For the past seven years, potential Republican candidate for Governor, former U.S. Attorney Chris Christie, has largely been responsible for exposing and successfully prosecuting the government corruption that has caused much of the public to lose their faith in public servants.

Having first hand experience with combating corruption, Christie knows about what he speaks of and today, speaking before an event sponsored by the New Jersey Business and Industry Association and Cherry Hill Regional Chamber of Commerce, the former crime buster stated that the reason for all the corruption in New Jersey was because “we just have too much government.”

Now that what we at POLITICS 24/7 have known all along has been confirmed by an expert in the area, what do we do about? Well first of all, New Jersey needs to embark on the initiatives of others like Senator Joe Kyrillos of Monmouth County. Senator Kyrillos has been pushing for consolidation. The type of consolidation which would make some of New Jersey’s less populous towns merge with larger neighboring towns.

This measure was actually proposed in legislation first sponsored by a former assemblyman, Republican Michael Arnone. In the late ‘90’s, Assemblyman Arnone saw the need to curtail the spreading of governments in New Jersey the same way that we try to prevent the spreading of the flu.

Like a disease, the inordinate number of governments, along with their increasing size scope and staffs, have infected the state with a governing class that survives by doling out plumb, patronage positions and entering into corrupt contracts filled with kickbacks.

Does consolidation solve our problem? Nope, it sure doesn’t. Greed and other less attractive qualities that are sometimes a part of human nature will always exist.

However, with less governments available for corruption to breed in, the less corruption will be born. For me, Chris Christie’s remark is promising. If he truly believes what he said, it may bode well for his possible candidacy.

Small government conservatives will certainly appreciate the direction that his comment would take us in.

Now if he can only expand on that remark. If he does run for the Republican gubernatorial nomination, will he help to do more than offer lip service to state consolidation?

Will he provide the initiatives of Senator Kyrillos with the type of support that is needed to influence liberal lawmakers to pass such measures?

Whether Christie runs or not, we need more leaders who are willing to solve our problems by acknowledging what the problems are and in New Jersey the problem is government.

In international news, 60% of the people in the country of Jordan say they find Americans to be rude. Actually, that's not so bad, when you consider 60% of people in other Middle Eastern countries think we're Satan. ...We're moving up!

-Jay Leno