There is no "moral obligation" to root for Phil Murphy
/Yes, we know that it sounds "cute" for a Republican to claim that he wishes the new Democrat Governor success and then to lay out a list of Republican options for the Governor to take to "help" him achieve that success. It sounds cute until you consider how it undermines confidence in the claims politicians and political parties make during the course of their campaigns.
Was it all just bullshit? Were the claims made and the warnings given regarding the clearly articulated policies of Phil Murphy just so many lies paid for and distributed by the Republican Party and its candidates? Or do Republicans sincerely believe that those major policy pronouncements that fell from Phil Murphy's lips were all lies to his own constituencies and that he has no intention of pursuing any of them?
If you want to give people a reason to give up voting -- if you want to suppress turnout into an even deeper gutter than it already is -- then pursue the line that it is all an illusion that doesn't matter in the end. You'll do it. You'll get them to give up on voting altogether.
Look, either the two parties mean what they say at election time, or it is all just a pantomime put together for the entertainment of the media and the manipulation of the electorate. Is it all one big corrupt filthy gang at the end -- are all those Trump voters right?
Certainly, both parties are broadly the same when it comes to their embrace of globalism and crony capitalism. Both will not hesitate to employ government to pick economic winners and losers. Both work against the interests of the working class -- in support of products made with modern day slavery, suppressing American job creation or exporting American jobs, and growing the gray economy through an immigration system that makes it difficult to come here legally but easy to do so illegally. Looking at the chumminess of the parties when it comes to fashioning lobbying firms, or law firms, or consulting businesses -- they certainly do appear to be in each other's pocket. So are they really less competitors than cooperators in the goal of picking the taxpayers' pockets?
One needs only to gaze upon a creature like John McCann -- the very embodiment of this corrupt culture -- who the Bergen Record newspaper reported was "the right hand man" of the Democrat county sheriff as he was launching his supposedly "Republican" campaign for Congress. The MC McCann chose for his kick-off was the liberal daughter of a former Democrat Assemblyman -- part of a bi-partisan "show-us-the-money" political family that lives up the bunghole of Democrat Loretta Weinberg and company.
And yet, the differences between the political parties are real enough for many. Guys like Steve Lonegan know that what the Republican Party stands for is supposed to be in marked contrast to the policies pushed by Democrats like Phil Murphy. So do legislators like Mike Doherty and Steve Oroho. Where Mike Doherty is a big picture conservative -- coming up with big plays like the Fair School Funding Act -- Steve Oroho is a transactional conservative who moves the ball forward, negotiating a phase out of the Estate Tax, turning a property tax hike into property tax relief, shaving 43% off a user tax increase while winning a series of tax cuts in exchange for supporting the remaining 57%.
These Republicans understand that Democrat Phil Murphy means to turn all New Jersey into a sanctuary state. They know he means to and are resolved to oppose him in that. They know that Murphy meant it when he said he wanted to raise taxes by $1.3 billion. They have done the math and know that his promises add up to $8.5 billion in new spending. They know that Murphy's policies will grow the burden of government, suppress the economy, kill jobs, drive away capital, undermine the social safety net, and make us less safe. They know and they will oppose him every step of the way -- watchful for the moment when they can force a compromise, negotiate something to the advantage of taxpayers and job creators.
Despite its outward coarseness, the Christie era was marked by an aggressive bi-partisanship achieved by party bosses who control political "families." This era is ending as it began, with a rich globalist Wall Streeter holding the ultimate power.
That Chris Christie was as conservative a governor as he was had more to do with his first primary and his subsequent quest for the White House, than with any personal philosophical leanings. Now the dam will break and the ruinous legislation -- ruinous for anyone who is working (or trying to) and trying to keep out of foreclosure -- will flow forward. Now is the time for opposition.
The inequitable way in which the state's political establishment (through its failsafe, the unelected judiciary) misuses the revenue from the income tax, should unite both Right and Left in opposition to seeing the working poor being made to subsidize rich corporations and wealthy professionals in cities like Hoboken and Jersey City. The corrupt political establishment that has relegated New Jersey into the last place to start a business now has a "face" in the venial, corrupt form of corporate globalist Phil Murphy. Murphy's cash-for-favors background and his history as a Wall Street and foreign banker make him a perfect foil.
An intelligent, well-read opposition will know what to do with Phil Murphy. There is a real opportunity to put together a non-traditional coalition to meet Murphy's loose and weakly calculated policies with policies that work. But it will need to employ the language of opposition.
No less than Ralph Nader has pointed the way forward, in his 2014 book, "Unstoppable: The Emerging Left-Right Alliance to Dismantle the Corporate State." Dismantle... not partner with. We need to employ the language of opposition to block corporate globalist Murphy and to put forward popular policies that he will be forced to accept.
