OFFER LEGISLATURE MERIT PAY LINKED TO THE ECONOMIES THAT THEY MANIPULATE

ASSEMBLYMAN RICHARD MERKT

Assemblyman Richard Merkt recently proposed to slash the salaries of New Jersey lawmakers by 10%.However, the Assemblyman is a candidate for the Republican gubernatorial nomination and the proposal could be viewed as an election gimmick. Then again, everything that any lawmaker does can be seen as a election gimmick.

In light of the recent pay raise of federal legislators, Merkt’s proposal is a noble one and worth looking at.

So his point is well taken. Times are tough and our representatives should be willing to make sacrifices and at least pretend to be empathetic to the people whose lives they affect.

Besides, lawmakers are partially responsible for any state’s economy including the one we are currently in here in Jersey so they should be more directly effected. I say they are partly responsibly because not everything is their fault. Nature, world events and human stupidity outside of Trenton politics, all play a part. But our lawmakers are elected to both steer us and our state economy in the right direction and to help our state better cope with the situations that we are dealt.

That being the case, it can easily be said that the current state legislature has not done a good job.

New Jersey has led the way in economic trouble over the past few years and under the direction of Governor Jon Corzine, the state legislature has been ill equipped at handling the situation. In fact, together the Democrat controlled state legislature and Democrat Governor have made matters worse.

Together they raised taxes, increased fees made it harder to do business in New Jersey and expanded opportunities for government corruption.

It could be said that Republicans bare no responsibility for this situation since they do not control any branch of state government. I can agree with that but it still doesn’t get Republicans off the hook.

Both parties have failed the people of New Jersey to one degree or another.

Democrats have failed to do anything right and Republicans have failed at convincing anyone that they could do better.

Given these circumstances, I have a more interesting proposal than Assemblyman Merkt’s.

How about we link state legislative and executive salaries to the economy and taxes of the state that they run.

Currently New Jersey State Assembly members and Senators make $49,000 a year.

I say let us reduce those salaries to a base of $41.000 a year and then use the following standard.

1. For every percent or portion of a percentage that any given legislature raises income and property taxes, their salaries are decreased by 2%. For every percentage or degree of a percentage that they decrease income and property taxes their salaries can be raise by half of one percent.
2. For every percent or portion of a percentage that they raise a sales or service tax, their salaries also decrease by that same percentage. Conversely, their salaries can be raised by half a percent for every full percent of a decrease in such taxes.
3. For any new tax created, their salaries are reduced by 2% plus the equivalent percentage of that new tax.
4. Every toll increase passed during any legislative session is matched by a reduction in legislative salaries that equal to the percentage of that increase.
5. And finally, state legislative salaries are further reduced by the same number of percentage points that the state’s unemployment rate is whenever it exceeds 4%.

To make it fair. Newly elected legislators would not be held accountable for the taxes and economic situation that any previous legislative session, which they did not have a hand in, was responsible for, and so they would start with the base pay of 41K.

Of course, such measures would not prevent rich people like Governor Jon Corzine from raising fees and taxes, misappropriating funds and offering sweet heart deals to sweethearts like Carla Katz. After all, Corzine took a $400 million golden parachute from Wall Street and doesn’t even accept his salary for Governor but this system could help to make less well off lawmakers work a little harder to address our problems and to fight the wealthy Governor. Having their own pockets linked to what they pick out of ours could just help to make them finally work together for the benefit of themselves as well as us. Maybe such a pay scale system will help to really create a sense of bipartisanship?

Perhaps if the lawmakers of New Jersey had their financial well being directly linked to the state’s financial well being and our own financial opportunities, maybe tax increases and increased fees for everything from driving to landscaping and joining a gym will be viewed as a last resort. Like it should be.

Perhaps by immediately linking their decisions directly to their own incomes, they may better empathize with the financial impact that they bring to bare on those they are representing .

You could say that it is not fair to those who vote against penalizing taxes or policies that drive businesses away and raise the unemployment in the state. That might be so, but, those who simply voted against something are still culpable. They have more than a responsibility to vote against such measures. They have the responsibility of leadership and the responsibility of making their case and doing it so well that a preponderance of people in the state as well as the legislature are persuaded by their arguments. They must convince people why others are wrong and they are right. Failing to do so is a failure that they share in common with those who support regressive economic policies.

So Assemblyman Merkt’s proposed 10 % reduction in salary is nice.

It is certainly going in a direction far better than the 2.8% pay increase that Congress is willing to take, at of all times, now. But the gesture Merkt is making could be made more meaningful and be more enduring. By linking legislative salaries to their actions we are adding a new incentive to politics and a new level of innovation……..political merit pay. If you do a good job and keep a good economy going you get paid better.

Is this crazy?

Maybe it is. Maybe it is as far fetched as a State Senator taking money from a no show job given to him by a school funded with state money that the same State Senator helped procure with tax payer dollars that he helped get through the state legislature. Maybe this political merit pay scale sounds just as crazy as that same corrupt State Senator getting his state funded pension after ripping the state off and being convicted.

But just like former *Senator Wayne Bryant, it may sound crazy but it could be true if like Wayne Bryant, we just did it.

__________________________________________

*Wayne Bryant pressured officials of University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey  to create a no-show job  that  allowed him to lobby himsef’ for taxpayer funds. Bryant also chaired the Senate Appropriations comittee which Funneled large sums of taxpayers dollare to UMDNJ.

 

Be Sure To Sign The Petition To

REPEAL THE CONGRESSIONAL PAY HIKE

Sign the Online Petition – Repeal The Automatic Pay Raise That Congress Is Receiving

Pass The Link On To Family, Friends and Co-workers

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

 AND DON’T FORGET………….

BE SURE TO SIGN THE PETITION URGING THE NOMINATION

OF SENATOR BECK FOR LT. GOV.

I was talking to a friend of mine’s little girl the other day.

I asked her what she wanted to be when she grew up and she replied, 

“I want to be President!” 

Both of her parents are liberal Democrats and were standing there. So then I asked her, “If you were President what would be the first thing you would do?”

She replied, “I’d give houses to all the homeless people.” 

“Wow – what a worthy goal.” I told her, “You don’t have to wait until you’re President to do that. You can come over to my house and mow, pull weeds, and sweep my yard, and I’ll pay you $50. Then I’ll take you over to the grocery store where this homeless guy hangs out, and you can give him the $50 to use toward a new house.” 

Since she is only 6, she thought that over for a few seconds. While her Mom glared at me, she looked me straight in the eye and asked,

“Why doesn’t the homeless guy come over and do the work, and you can just pay him the $50?” 

And I said, “Welcome to the Republican Party.” 

Her folks still aren’t talking to me.

 Submitted by Dick, Williamsport, Md

CORZINE TAKES NEW JERSEY FOR A RIDE….On the Hindenburg

 

Governor Jon Corzine

Governor Jon Corzine has declared that he is slashing New Jersey’s budget by as much as $812 million in order to close in on the state’s $2.1 billion budget gap.

Wow, a whopping $812 million dollars. That will do a lot. Well not really. But I guess Governor Corzine knows what he is doing. I mean after all, he is a Wall Street genius and we all know how smart those Wall Streeter’s are and he did have a golden parachute that earned him $4oo million dollars after he got pushed out of Goldman Sachs.

So maybe his $812 million in budget cuts are smart. I am not too sure though.

 When Jon Corzine first came to Trenton, in just six short months he increased taxes in New Jersey by almost $2 billion dollars. This happened after he ran for Governor promising to “control spending”.

Now Corzine is up for reelection and we have a budget deficit slightly larger than the total amount of revenue he raised in tax increases when he first took office.

I think we can safely say that Governor Corzine did not “controls spending”

Ponzi Schemer Bernie Madoff

In fact Governor Corzine has not controlled anything in New Jersey. What he has done is try to take his Wall Street experience and apply it to government. The problem is that his finance experience depends upon bailouts and golden parachutes. He has even delayed a presentation of New Jersey’s own annual budget till March in the hope that the federal government will come to his rescue. I bet you didn’t know that when we elected Barack Obama, he became the de facto finance chairman for New Jersey.

When it comes to budgets, Jon Corzine attended the Bernie Madoff School of Finance. It is located right next to the Jim McGreevey School of Ethics, where ,by the way, Governor Corzine also got a degree.

Disgraced Ex-Governor Jim McGreevey

His major in finance and minor in ethics both came in handy during his secret negotiations with his former girlfriend Carla Katz, as the two hammered out a lucrative state contract that greatly benefited the Communication Workers Union that Katz presided over. For the Governor’s efforts, Katz and the CWA made out like bandits and taxpayers got suckered out of more money than investors in Madoff’s ponzi scheme. More than a year later and we’re still trying to figure out how that deal happened and the courts are figuring out exactly why Corzine and Katz refuse to release the details.

But all is well. The Governor has promised to make $812 million dollars in cuts to the budget. Some of the cuts include $11,000 from adolescent illiteracy, $4 million from The turnpike and parkway, $15 million from aid to municipalities and $75 million from public schools.

Never mind the over 83 aides that the Governor has earning a hundred thousand dollars or more a year. Never mind the countless patronage positions that exist in every school district, municipal government, state agency and legislative staff. Never mind the endless array of programs that government should not be involved in in any fashion. No, none of those things add up.

Let’s face it. Like everything else Jon Corzine has said or dne, it is meaningless. It is just like his first gesture when he

Jon Corzine

 initially took office. With generosity and sincerity of purpose, Jon Corzine made it clear that he would not accept the $175,000 annual salary that comes with the job. Oh boy, thank you Jon. That is so,….. it is so,……. so kind of you. I mean with a personal fortune in excess of $400 million dollars those few thousand must really be a great sacrifice for you.

Sarcasm aside, it was a publicity stunt and like everything else, the gesture was meaningless. It was not a sign of sincere intentions and it did not make a difference. Much like his entire tenure as Governor.

To date, the only significant action that New Jersey has encountered under his leadership was the abolishment of the death penalty in New Jersey and the worthiness of that achievement is quite debatable.

Other than that, he has raised taxes every chance he has gotten and he has pushed for increasing tolls on our roadways every year for decades to come. He even pushed for putting tolls on roads that don’t have any tolls.

The Hindenburg Going Down In Lakehurst, New Jersey

Truth is, Jon Corzine is like the Hindenburg. He floats around like a big deal but instead of getting us from point A to point B, he explodes and unleashes a load of rubble allover the place. There is not a single problem that he has solved or improvement that he has created. All he has done is enter into shady deals, hire inept cabinet officials, tinker with budgets and raise taxes.

New Jersey really does need a change.

We need a leader who can take control of circumstances, not be controlled by circumstances. We need someone who can clean up the mess, not make a mess.

It is time for Republicans in New Jersey to get their act together.  The Republican Minority Leaders in the Senate and Assembly have better get on message.  They need to create and present their own budget, drop everything else and from High Point to Cape May, make that budget known.  They need to point to the empty list of  achievements that the Governor has accomplished and point out what the Democrat majorities in the legislature blocked.  Beyond pointing out what they did wrong and the right things that they didn’t do, Republicans need to make it clear what they would do and present New Jersey with their roadmap.

After that, we have to get rid of Corzine.

Ridding ourselves of him wont eliminate all of New Jersey’s problems but it will at least help prevent us from getting into more trouble.

And Be Sure To Also Sign The Petition To

REPEAL THE CONGRESSIONAL PAY HIKE

Sign the Online Petition – To Repeal The Automatic Pay Raise That Congress Is Receiving Congress

Pass The Link On To Family, Friends and Co-workers

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

The rest of the world cannot understand how after bitter election campaigns…

…….American politicians can return to reality. For instance, Sarah Palin has invited to her great state of Alaska the men who defeated her, Barack Obama and Joe Biden.

She has provided a moose hunting trip for their enjoyment and has hired two other prominent men to assist them. Dick Cheney will instruct them in safe gun handling, and Ted Kennedy will drive them back to their cabins in the evening.

What a gal! That Sarah is such a sport and thinks of everything!

Submitted by Bill, Ardmore, Pa.