Reaping What Their Parents' Sow

by: huntsu

Sun Mar 23, 2008 at 09:34:04 PM EDT

Now we see a new problem for Tom Kean Jr. when it comes to his father: Dad's negatives attach to the son, as well.

Yet with state debt at an all-time high and public pension and health care expenses rising, the political leadership agrees the time has finally arrived to take the car into the garage to do something about the spending, even if some are unhappy about it.

"There's a great deal more (cutting of) waste and structural reform that need to be implemented if we're going to get to the goal of making the state more affordable," state Senate Republican Minority Leader Thomas H. Kean Jr., of Union County, said. "We have to look at everything."

Yet when Kean's father, Thomas H. Kean Sr., was governor in the 1980s, state spending doubled during his eight years in office.

Oooooh, it was your own family's fault?  Daaaaaaammmmmmnnnnnn.

The truth is that Kean Sr. not only drastically jacked spending but also handed his successor, Jim Florio, a massive deficit that Florio closed with increased taxes.

Yes, that's right.  Kean Sr.'s spending caused Florio's tax increase.

It's an old Republican trick since the Reagan days.  They get in power and spend like drunken sailors, then give up power to the Democrats and scream to the rafters about taxes increasing to pay for their own excesses.  

They get to give the public all the goodies of increased spending, then blast the Democrats who are forced to pay for it.

And that's just what Junior's doing today.  Corzine inherited a mess that was in no small way created by 16 years of Kean Sr. and Whitman spending, debt and government growth.  Kean Jr. and Kate Whitman are now blasting Corzine and making fixing it harder.

Because, you see, it's more important to get back in power so they can spend again than to actually fix the situation and help New Jerseysans.