A New Jersey Mayor Who Hasn't Raised Taxes in 10 Years!
By Gordon Bishop (11/20/07)
Steve Lonegan is his name and he's made history in New Jersey and perhaps even the USA for holding property taxes flat for some 10 years.
Lonegan, who is partially blind, is the Mayor of Bogota, New Jersey, a quiet little bedroom suburb in Bergen County only a few minutes from New York City – the Big Apple!
Lonegan should be Governor of New Jersey, not Jon Corzine, who has increased taxes and the State budget by some $5 billion dollars in less than three years.
Lonegan is a true fiscal conservative.
New Jersey’s tax-and-spend liberal Democrat loves to spend other people’s money, namely, the Garden State’s struggling taxpayers, who already have the highest property taxes in the nation and the highest motor vehicle insurance.
Some 40,000 residents are moving out of New Jersey this year to warmer climes and less costly states south of the “Jersey Joke,” the Garden State’s other name.
Lonegan led the charge that killed a $450million referendum on New Jersey’s election ballot in early November.
What was that mountain of money for? “Stem-cell research.”
Why, the taxpayers wanted to know, should New Jersey’s heavily oppressed citizens have to invest in stem-cell research, which is a private sector capitalist venture?
New Jersey happens to be the “Medicine Chest” of America. Global conglomerates like Johnson & Johnson, Merck and dozens more in the State’s multi-billion dollar pharmaceutical industry certainly have the means to pay for stem-cell research.
But asking these multi-billionaires to pick up the tab for a $450 million research program was not on Governor Corzine’s political agenda.
Giving away $37,000 dollars for every one of New Jersey’s 21 Democrat Party leaders at the County level was Corzine’s way of saying, “Thank you” to those who voted him into office.
New Jersey is one of the most corrupt political regimes in America. The U.S. Attorney for New Jersey (Christopher Christie) has indicted more than a dozen elected officials for taking money under the table from special interests. They were mayors, state legislators and other local officials, as well as those who gave money to the crooked politicians.
Right now, Chris Christie is so popular in New Jersey he could run for Governor and knock out Corzine in the next gubernatorial election by a landslide. I’d be the first to hop on the Christie bandwagon.
Mayor Lonegan, the de facto leader of New Jersey’s marginalized conservative wing, woke up the State’s sleeping voters and saved the taxpayers $450 million by not supporting a capitalist venture to reap more money for the State’s extremely profitable pharmaceutical industry.
Montclair State University political scientist Brigid Harrison had this to say about New Jersey’s popular anti-tax leader:
“He clearly won on the stem-cell issue.”
Lonegan alternated between downplaying individual glory and saying the defeats show conservatives can win in New Jersey.
Lonegan, author of “Putting Taxpayers First,” credits the loyal conservatives for challenging the tax-and-spend liberal Democrats who control the State Legislature and the Governor’s Office.
“Though our grass-roots activities, we took on big government, the powers of Jon Corzine (and his leadership), and the voters spoke out,” Lonegan said. “They’ve had enough of big-spending, big-borrowing, big-tax government. This dispels the theory that this is a hopelessly liberal State. This is a State where a conservative message resonates.”
New Jersey’s liberal University pollsters, of course, gave no credit to New Jersey’s most popular fiscal conservative.
“Lonegan was really not consequential in what happened,” said Monmouth University pollster Patrick Murray. He said the referendum questions went down because voters didn’t like legislators putting their responsibility (on taxpayers) to solve the State’s property tax problem and didn’t want the State taking on more debt when it is struggling to pay its bills.
So much for New Jersey’s liberal academic institutions, whose faculties are more than 90 percent liberal. In that sense, New Jersey is helplessly and hopelessly liberal – and on the brink of bankruptcy.
That’s the liberal legacy: Spend – don’t save for a rainy day.
New Jersey today is a Socialist State.
Gordon Bishop
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