Obama Rolls the Dice and Craps Out in New Jersey

He wouldn’t have had to roll the dice to crap out. All he would have had to do was eat some of that Northeastern beef that was recalled.

11/3/09

The day zer0 & the rats got a swift kick in the @ss from real working Americans

Hey Nancy, Now THATS a victory

Obama rolls the dice and craps out in Copenhagen.
Obama rolls the dice and craps out in New Jersey.
Obama rolls the dice and craps out in ....

"Seven, Seven...take the line...pay the don't!"

The biggest question to Chris Christie is how hard, and how dirty, is he really willing to fight the Democrat legislators in Trenton. I heard him speak to this on talk radio interviews, and I hope he knows what he is getting into.

Basically, property taxes are sky high, and certain townships in NJ have raised them into the stratosphere. Imagine, you Texans and Georgians, of paying $12,000 annually in property tax for that modest 4 bedroom, 2 bath house in a decent neighborhood.

What Christie has to do is play smash mouth with the Democrats, and right away. He cannot wait. He has to go for the throat in the beginning. If that means shutting down every school and the state government for awhile, he has to do that.

The teachers union must be bloodied - badly. They have to learn the past is the past, and there will be cuts in salaries and pensions. Now.

The same goes for the other 81,000 state workers in NJ. Christie mentioned the only groups that are safe are first responders (fire depts, police, EMTs, etc). I have absolutely no problem with that. It is the administrators, the teachers, and the bureaucrats that have to punched in the face (politically speaking) to get NJ out of the tremendous hole it is in.

More like the rookie threw too hard - “No number - over the lumber!”

Can’t cut existing pensions from currently retired . Need to convene a Constitutional Convention for that . Even then Supreme Court would not allow it .

Isn't that distressing?

If Christie can cut current salaries, he will reduce future pension liabilities because employees retire based on their highest three years of salary.

I really wish, however, there was a way to reduce the pension currently being paid - because the liability is unaffordable.

If you reduced the pension currently being paid how are those people supposed to survive? They planned retirement. The current situation is no fault of theirs . They were at the right palace at the right time.
Remember , Life is a craps shoot also.
The pension formula was years of service over 60. It was scaled back to years of service over 55 in the 90’s and was raised back to years of service over 60 a few years ago.
I agree there is DEAD WOOD in the profession but the percentage is probably about 5%.
I can’t agree with a blanket statement that all teachers are incompetent.

You can't cut or reduce current salaries. Salaries are negotiated by individual districts along with benefits . One district might start at $50,000 and the district it borders might start at $35,000. All based on the tax structure and properties in the town involved .

Christie mentioned the only groups that are safe are first responders (fire depts, police, EMTs, etc). I have absolutely no problem with that.

I moved to NJ from CA and am amazed at how overstaffed NJ is with firemen, police, ambulances. These Democrat voting government workers are staffed at luxury levels.

The GOP should just keep looping a video, all year round, of Obambi saying “Corzine is CRITICAL to my agenda.”

You can't cut or reduce current salaries.

I am sorry - but you are totally off base. You can cut ANYTHING if you really want or have to. NJ is fiscally broke, by the way.

Salaries are negotiated by individual districts along with benefits . One district might start at $50,000 and the district it borders might start at $35,000. All based on the tax structure and properties in the town involved .

Even the clueless Daggett had a good idea on how to tackle this.

Daggett said the state should broaden its sales tax in order to cut property taxes. "We are highly weighted toward property taxes that are a huge burden on homeowners across the state," he said. "It's also unfair and unbalanced in the sense that the sales tax, which was originally put on goods, has brought in declining revenues because of the shift . . . to a service-based economy." The most important component of the package is the imposition of a cap on municipal, county and school district budgets based on the Consumer Price Index (CPI). If a budget exceeds the cap, homeowners in the town will not be eligible for the new property tax cut, a provision that will serve as a hammer to control government spending. “We cannot hold down property taxes without addressing the employee salaries, health care and pension benefits that are the real cost drivers of state and local government spending,’’ Daggett said. “This provision gives local governments and school districts the weapon they need to finally say no because this program carries a big stick: If you exceed the cap, you forfeit the property tax cut for your citizens.’’

That brake on the out of control municipalities would be HUGE if they enacted it. Can you imagine what would be taking place at the local levels? There are too many townships in NJ - each levying excessive property taxes, and each paying for their own fire depts, schools, and bureaucracy. They need to be combined. But that isn't even the crux of the problem. There are 616 school districts in NJ! I know someone very high up in the state govt involved with the dept of education, and even he knows this a colossal scam on the taxpayers! He told me so. To my face.

So here we are, with 81,000 state workers in NJ (not even counting the folks sucking off pension dollars from the taxpayers). You know how many US Marines the entire country has, here and deployed worldwide protecting America? 180,000. Think about that.

Moreover, each township, and each school district, have used the adjacent ones to play a shell game for salary increases. "Gee! The township next to us gave their workers a 5.5% increase! We want that too!"

Enough.

Christie vowed to "turn Trenton upside down" if elected Governor. I hope he does, to include going to the courts if he has to, to stop this fiscal black hole. "They" meaning government, have reneged in the past. Going to collect Social Security at 65? Sorry, it is 67 now. The military promised, in writing, health care for life for veterans and their families? Did "we" (meaning the Govt) promise that? You bet. But, sorry, "we" have changed our minds. That happened. High three? High one? The US govt has changed those rules before too. The precedents are there. None of this is written in stone. We have courts that have approved the murder of innocent children by sticking scissors in their heads while outside the birth canal. Crazy. If courts are not even constrained by that, then any court can also rule on pension reform. I also know that if Trenton realizes how broken the state really is, that current state salaries are anything but safe from cuts.

I know families (several as a matter of fact) that were forced to sell their homes because they could not afford to pay the property taxes. I know other families who wanted to buy a certain home in NJ - and were about to, until they learned what the sky high property taxes were. This is criminal, and it has to stop. Now.

If you reduced the pension currently being paid how are those people supposed to survive? They planned retirement. The current situation is no fault of theirs . They were at the right palace at the right time. Remember , Life is a craps shoot also.

I agree. There are no guarantees - and let those who "planned" their retirement live and die by that craps shoot rule you cited. I know a lot of people who "planned retirement" and had to formulate a new plan in the last 2 years. It wasn't their fault either that their 401K collapsed, or they had to sell real estate at a loss, or they lost their job or business. State workers in NJ who are the primary reason the state is in the fiscal mess it is in have to accept responsibility somewhere in this process. Those direct deposits to their ATM accounts don't come from the planet Mars, and they better start realizing that fact.

As far as teachers go, most of them are liberal, most of them vote Democrat, and they are not nearly as talented as they believe. The school boards are filled with liberal curriculum (have you seen the "ethics" class syllabus they teach?) and I have little sympathy for them. I bet there are a lot of good one, but those are the ones who have to start speaking out. They are ones swimming in the same pool as the liberals I am not that impressed with them, but furthermore, they are the biggest drain in terms of property taxes. The ax should fall on them the hardest.

I don't know if you know someone close to you who is a retired, or current, state NJ worker. But I am here to tell you there is tremendous anger and resentment towards them where I live.

“I don’t know if you know someone close to you who is a retired, or current, state NJ worker. But I am here to tell you there is tremendous anger and resentment towards them where I live.”

Why is there anger and resentment toward a state NJ worker? They weren’t FORCED into taking the job . There was ample opportunity for the people who hold the resentment to become a state worker or go into the education field. Everybody makes decisions in life and if some resent others maybe they chose the wrong job or profession.
I myself hold no resentment or anger toward the heads of large corporations etc. including energy that are making millions more than I could have dreamed of earning .. I feel they were at the right time at the right place. I had the same opportunity to go into those professions as they did, and I didn’t!
If you don’t pay a good salary to someone who spends a lot of $$$ for 4-5 years of college to attain a position you will end up like Florida where in some counties high school graduates are now subbing in the schools because they can’t get anybody with a degree or 60 credits to “babysit” for the going rate.
Resenting ANYONE who makes a good living is no different than the Obamamessiah mentality of “ spreading the wealth around “ because someone makes more than someone else.
Want to see anger and resentment toward a whole country ? Look in the POTUS eyes, listen to what he says , and read what he has written.
BTW, the teachers don’t initiate or develop the curriculum, the state does . The teachers teach what they are told to. They also have their students tested by the state on those specific standards they are required to teach .
Corzine got a rude awakening. The NJEA is the state leading union. They overwhelmingly backed him in the election. Matter of fact they seem to back Demorats or Rinos 99% of the time . He lost. There are a LOT of teachers that are conservative or Republican but they don’t expose themselves because of possible repercussions on the job site .They express themselves in the voting booth .

Why is there anger and resentment toward a state NJ worker?

You're kidding, right? I will answer as directly as I can: Out of control property taxes.

They weren’t FORCED into taking the job .

Exactly. This sentence of your argument supports my exact position.

There was ample opportunity for the people who hold the resentment to become a state worker or go into the education field.

There is ample opportunity for anyone to enter any profession. That has about as much merit to this debate as the price of moon rocks in Madagascar. Moreover, it seems like you almost are arguing a "I got mine" line of reasoning. That only makes your position all the more tenuous, and it reflects the exact attitude of arrogant entitlement that is the crux of the problem with state workers in NJ who have busted the bank account, but want to preserve the unworkable status quo for as long as they can get away with it.

Everybody makes decisions in life and if some resent others maybe they chose the wrong job or profession.

I am not expressing jealousy in any matter, fashion, or form. I am expressing justifiable outrage of the excesses of a NJ state worker salary, pension, and benefit system that is bleeding taxpayers and families dry - and one that is fiscally unsustainable.

I myself hold no resentment or anger toward the heads of large corporations etc. including energy that are making millions more than I could have dreamed of earning .. I feel they were at the right time at the right place. I had the same opportunity to go into those professions as they did, and I didn’t!

Good for you. NJ property taxes are still too high, and state workers (both retired and currently employed) are still the problem.

Christie was just voted into office in what is nothing short of a political revolt by the taxpayers of NJ. There are 700,000 more registered Democrats than registered Republicans in NJ - and Christie still won by a large margin. They know something has to be done, and state workers are the source of this cancer.

Still don't believe me?

Poll: New Jerseyans support merging local public services to lower property taxes

New Jersey's population drain

SPECIAL REPORT: Property taxes are stealing our way of life

Blog Comments - NJ Property taxes are stealing our way of life

Look at the key points that DailyJounal.com highlights:

__________________________________________________

-- New Jersey has the highest property tax burden in the nation, an average of $7,045 per household last year. Nearly 45 percent of all taxes raised in the state are from the property tax, the second-highest rate in the nation. The national average is 29 percent.

-- Lower- and middle-income homeowners pay a greater share of their income toward property taxes than high-income homeowners.

-- Local government costs in New Jersey have grown twice as fast as the inflation rate in the past decade.

-- $23 billion in property taxes were raised last year, with about $18 billion going toward public employee salaries.

-- New Jersey pays the second-highest average salaries in the nation for teachers and police officers. It's third for all government workers.

-- Property tax loopholes allow wealthy landholders and corporations to pay virtually nothing on thousands of undeveloped acres.

-- New Jersey has lost more than $9 billion in household incomes in the past five years as residents leave the state.

___________________________________________________________

I realize to rationally discuss the immense problem of state workers salaries, benefits, and pensions is to gore your own ox, but seriously - what part of this don't you "get?"

If you don’t pay a good salary to someone who spends a lot of $$$ for 4-5 years of college to attain a position you will end up like Florida where in some counties high school graduates are now subbing in the schools because they can’t get anybody with a degree or 60 credits to “babysit” for the going rate.

Here we go again, with the vaunted mythical superiority of NJ teachers. I'll let you in on a secret - the teachers in NJ are by and large no better than the average teacher anywhere in the nation. By the way, is trashing another geographic region of teachers the only way you can prove the superiority of NJ teachers? The NJEA now believes their own hype and spin about what terrific educators they are.

Resenting ANYONE who makes a good living is no different than the Obamamessiah mentality of “ spreading the wealth around “ because someone makes more than someone else.

No! Again, are you joking? It is resentment if it is someone's money earned in the private sector! State worker money comes from taxpayers who are burdened to such a degree they are leaving the state of NJ in droves

They left homes, families, and in some cases, places they loved. But they also left high taxes, big utility costs, skyrocketing rents and a host of other expenses that made life unbearable. Some made gradual plans, others made quick getaways. They sold their houses, packed up their vehicles and got out of Dodge. Most never looked back. These are the stories of one-time Central Jerseyans who, by their accounts, are living better, happier lives because they're out from under the soaring price tag of calling this state home. More are joining them every day as the exodus from a state with a reputation for political corruption and over-regulation continues to eat away at its income revenue.

There are a LOT of teachers that are conservative or Republican but they don’t expose themselves because of possible repercussions on the job site .

Great. So, they are cowards. That is nothing to brag about. If they would have stood up to their own union, even in a small numbers and with true conviction, then perhaps we wouldn't be in the mess we are in.

Face it - you are arguing to be part of the problem. Are you this entrenched to want to preserve an unworkable status quo because it benefits you personally?

Let us hope the election of Christie means he will go so far as to shut NJ and Trenton down in order to bust up this perverse joke on the taxpayers of NJ.