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Saturday, October 17, 2009
Corzine still the best choice to lead New Jersey
New Jersey Gov. Jon Corzine chats with Xavier Diaz, 9, at H.B. Wilson Elementary School in Camden last week. (Sharon Gekoski-Kimmel / Staff Photographer)

As Gov. Corzine nears the end of four tumultuous years in office, polls suggest a majority of New Jersey’s electorate will vote against him on Nov. 3. Such dissatisfaction can’t be dismissed lightly.

But the opposition is split between Republican Christopher J. Christie and independent Chris Daggett, and neither has made a convincing case that he would do a better job in Trenton.
 
As important, despite Corzine’s flaws, the Democrat’s record shows a capacity to go against the state’s traditional politics and improve its government. Given that record and the weak alternatives, The Inquirer endorses JON CORZINE.
 
Christie entered the race on the heels of seven years of successful corruption-busting as the state’s U.S. attorney. But over the better part of a year of campaigning, he gave the public astonishingly few reasons to vote for him, and not just against Corzine. By dodging fundamental policy questions, he asked to be exempted from the basic rules of seeking public office.
 
Much of Christie’s emphasis, which has become sharper in recent weeks, is correct. The state needs to do more to improve its cities and their schools, as well as to end state control of Camden. Trenton must be tougher on public-employee unions, and easier on taxpayers. Ethics laws must be strengthened.
 
But Christie still relies too heavily on Corzine’s unpopularity while spouting vague promises to cut taxes and spending. And the more Christie is forced to give specific answers to fiscal questions, the more he sounds like Corzine.
 
That may be part of why Daggett has made such a strong showing. His detailed plan to reduce property taxes — with numbers and everything — filled the vacuum created by Christie’s platitudes.
 
Daggett would expand the sales tax to more services and goods and use the revenue to reduce property and corporate taxes. Given New Jersey’s outlying position on the national property-tax map, his idea is much closer to what’s needed on the issue than the failed rebate program his opponents have embraced.
 
Beyond that, though, Daggett’s platform is sketchy. He relies heavily on his status as an independent who can “bring people together” — which sounds good, but could mean almost anything.
 
So how did “Not Corzine” come to be such a vast constituency? The former Goldman Sachs chief’s unusual background might have suggested he would bring real and needed upheaval to Trenton, but the past four years have not seen that. For a man who rose to the top of Wall Street from humble beginnings on an Illinois farm, Corzine has sometimes seemed timid about shaking up the statehouse. He has also been hindered by a recalcitrant Legislature, a once-in-a-generation economic crisis, and even a car wreck that nearly killed him.
 
As such, his administration’s victories have been qualified, its progress halting. On finances, the governor took a principled stand for funding pension obligations, only to have to retreat from it amid the downturn. He budgeted cautiously, but then made exceptions under political and economic pressure. He put forward but abandoned a controversial proposal to retire state debt. He won important concessions from state-employee unions, but often seemed too cozy with labor.
 
Corzine has taken some of the sternest steps in memory to push school and municipal consolidation, while capping property levies. But he has managed only to significantly slow the growth of property taxes, not reduce them.
 
The governor has also pushed for the nation’s strongest campaign-finance laws. But he has been stymied by an unrepentant Legislature and tarnished by his own generous underwriting of party bosses.
 
Some of Corzine’s imperfect victories are nevertheless remarkable for a New Jersey governor — and hard to imagine under the state’s usual government by insiders.
 
The dual-officeholding ban he championed, for instance, is often criticized for excepting current offenders, but it will put an end to a backward practice that was thoroughly entrenched. The governor hasn’t fully realized his school funding formula, but it replaces an unsustainable system of heavily subsidizing a few poor school districts — and undoes bad policies long protected by his fellow liberals.
 
These are the sort of once unlikely changes that New Jerseyans hoped for in electing Corzine four years ago. They should serve as his model in a second term, if he’s fortunate enough to get that chance.
Posted by Inquirer Editorial Board @ 5:00 AM  Permalink |
About The Inquirer Editorial Board
Harold Jackson, a winner of the 1991 Pulitzer Prize for Editorial Writing, grew up in Birmingham, Ala., during the civil rights movement. He graduated from Baker University in Baldwin, Kan., in 1975, with a degree in journalism/political science. He has also worked at the Birmingham Post-Herald, United Press International, the Birmingham News, and the Baltimore Sun. He was at The Inquirer in the mid-1980s, returned in 1999, and became editorial page editor in 2007.

Paul Davies is the deputy editor of the Editorial Page. His newspaper career has spanned more than 20 years and includes stints at The Wall Street Journal and the Philadelphia Daily News. He graduated from the University of Delaware and received a masters in journalism from Columbia University, where he was also a Knight-Bagehot Fellow. He was born in Philadelphia and still lives in the city.

Tony Auth began drawing while bedridden for a year and a half at the age of five. He graduated from UCLA in 1965 and worked for six years as a medical illustrator while doing three cartoons a week for various college newspapers. Tony has been happily ensconced as The Inquirer’s editorial cartoonist since 1971. He won a Pulitzer Prize in 1976, and has won numerous other awards, including five Overseas Press Club Awards, the Sigma Delta Chi award for distinguished service in Journalism, and the Herblock and Thomas Nast Prizes. Tony is married to Eliza Drake Auth, a painter of realistic landscapes and portraits.

Trudy Rubin is the foreign affairs columnist for The Philadelphia Inquirer, and a member of The Inquirer’s editorial board. Her column appears twice weekly in The Inquirer and runs regularly in many other newspapers around the United States. She is the author of Willful Blindness: The Bush Administration and Iraq.

Kevin Ferris is an assistant editor on the Editorial Board who oversees the Sunday Currents section and writes a weekly column on a wide range of issues. In his 15 years on the board, he’s handled letters to the editor and the Community Voices pages and has been Commentary Page editor. He started with The Inquirer in 1986, and his assignments have ranged from the copy and news desks to the Chester County bureau and the national/foreign desk.

As an editorial writer for The Inquirer for the past two decades, Russell Cooke has written on a wide range of topics covering government, legal, civic and social issues. Before joining the Editorial Board, he was a reporter in the Inquirer’s City Hall bureau.

Editorial writer Dave Boyer joined The Inquirer in 2002. He writes about politics, government, the economy, sports and many other subjects, but draws the line at writing about "Jon & Kate Plus Eight." He has won journalism awards and insists bribery was not involved. A native of Allentown, Boyer graduated from Penn State. He and his wife reside in Center City, where they enjoy strolling and paying the wage tax.

Melanie Burney joined the editorial board in January 2008 after covering education at the Inquirer for eight years. She previously worked at the Associated Press in Philadelphia and southern New Jersey. She is a graduate of Glassboro State College, now Rowan University, and a member of the National Association of Black Journalists.

Josh Gohlke has been The Inquirer’s op-ed editor since last year, editing the daily commentary page and writing occasional editorials. He came to the Inquirer after eight years at The Record of Bergen County, N.J., first as a reporter covering local and state politics and government and ultimately as the deputy editorial page editor. He also worked as a reporter for several smaller papers in New Jersey and California. Josh was born and raised in Los Angeles and graduated from Stanford University. He lives in Philadelphia.

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