NJbiz craps itself in TTF editorial
/How are average citizens to understand the TTF crisis when professional journalists, writing on behalf of the business community, getting paid to do so, can't tell their arses from their elbows? In a July 3rd editorial, the "masters of business" who run NJbiz wrote:
But what left us nauseous as we considered the bill, to extend the restaurant metaphor, was the process by which a sales tax cut suddenly took the place of the equally bad, but vetted in daylight, plan to cut taxes on retirement income and eliminate the estate tax.
The new plan, hatched at midnight, was the product of negotiations between Gov. Chris Christie and his new friend, Assembly Speaker Vincent Preto — last seen getting clobbered by Christie and Senate President Steve Sweeney over Atlantic City — and in secret, which is not a hearty endorsement for democracy.
You could make the case that phasing out the estate tax — which is part of both “agreements” — has a business benefit that might encourage the wealthy to stay in New Jersey after retirement.
Maybe they filed that editorial in a hurry? Maybe they were drunk when they did it? Maybe they have been drunk all week -- because they certainly haven't been paying attention. Anyone paying attention would know that the tax cut common to both plans is the tax cut on retirement income, NOT the phase out of the estate tax.
What the heck is going on? Are you trying to confuse people? NJbiz started its editorial by writing:
You know what they say about never wanting to see the kitchen of your favorite restaurant? Well, every so often, the public gets a look behind the scenes of how Trenton puts bills together, and it's no surprise few visitors to the State House ever visit the little restaurant within.
Well boys, with the misinformation that you're serving up, you just took a dump in the mixing bowl.
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Another source of misinformation in the discussion over how to pay for the repair and maintenance of our roads and bridges appears in the SaveJersey blog. Over the weekend, one representative of "GOP youff" presented what he called "15 Reasons to Oppose the Gas Tax." Of course, the writer is a functionary of the notorious Morris County GOP machine. You know, the guys who hatched a solar scam that ripped-off taxpayers for $80 million. Talk about dirtbags! The whole deal is currently the subject of a federal, state, and county investigations.
The column reveals an appalling lack of knowledge of basic conservative economic theory as well as out-and-out misinformation. The writer serves up warmed over Marxism with a garnish of populism to make it palatable. Has he never read the conservative position on progressive taxation? Does the writer really not know the conservative economic reasoning behind the user tax -- of which the gas tax is a prime example? Did he forget that President Ronald Reagan employed the gas tax and other user taxes?
The writer has no understanding of how haulage (trucking) is taxed in the continental United States and the Canadian provinces. Worst still, when people who do know attempted to correct him by posting the data under the column, this knowledge was repeatedly pulled down. Better to go with the lie if it fits the bullshit?
Besides, is this flower of "GOP youff" really so weak that he needs his editor to wipe his arse? Would an open exchange of information harm his self-image to the point of catalepsy? Is "GOP youff" really not up to it?
Is it a question of "GOP youff" taking an infrastructure, largely built by their grandfathers and great grandfathers, for granted? Maybe they haven't served in the military -- or haven't been to places in which things like passable roads, electricity, and running water are looked upon as miracles, instead of birthrights.
These youngsters have had it so good for so long that they have no memory of needing to pay for it. They think it comes for free. When it is pointed out to them that New Jersey still charges drivers the 1988 price to upkeep the roads they use, they cry, "So what, we don't want to pay more."
When it is pointed out that other states charge drivers more than 50 cents a gallon of gasoline for the upkeep of the roads they use, while New Jersey charges just 14 1/2 cents a gallon, they cry, "We have grown up in an era of free music, free videos, free information -- we want more free shit."
There's also the inner stress of being both young and a member of the GOP. In contrast to the 1980's -- when to be a young Reaganite was cool, the future -- today's "GOP youff" have to be among the most uncool people on earth. We're surprised that they can convince anyone to reproduce. Their come-on is the apology, for which they are justly despised by their peers. Lacking the ease of their convictions that older party members possess, they don't relate to the adult party either.
The noise they make fails to account for the smallness of their numbers in any primary setting. Take Senator Jennifer Beck's District 11 for example. 48 percent of all registered Republicans are aged 60 or over. Just 20 percent are under age 45. There are just 469 young (under 25) Republican voters in the district. That's compared with 11,329 aged 60 or above.
66 percent of Republican super voters (3 of 4 or above) are aged 60 or over. You could accommodate every young GOP super voters (52 in all) in the back room of some diner.
While we won the argument within our generation -- Ronald Reagan won the youth vote -- today's "GOP youff" are abysmal. Among those under 25 year olds to register to vote in District 11 since November 2014, "GOP youff" managed just 261 young Republicans out of 2,228 new registrations under 25. So what's all this noise about?
In-between apologizing to their peers for their existence, the public voices of "GOP youff" are loudly attempting to tell the rest of us in the party what to think. Time to go back to school. Learn Reagan, learn Buckley, read your party's platform for crying-out-loud. Call Professor Sabrin and ask him if you can take his class. Don't fall into the trap of being a Marxist just because you never learned what being a Republican is.
