Opinion

Besides giving a shout out to Wally Edge at Wednesday's New Jersey Legislative Correspondents Association Dinner ("As Wally always says, 'Hold Me Accountable.'" ... and you know we will.) Gov. Jon Corzine had some kind words for the state's political reporters and poked ... >

Sen. Robert Menendez and Rep. Albio Sires will again endorse Frank Lautenberg for the Democratic U.S. Senate nomination at an announcement at the Liberty House in Jersey City at 4PM tomorrow.  Parking will be validated, according to the Lautenberg campaign, which also noted that the ... >

Michael Lapolla will leave his post as Executive Director of the New Jersey Turnpike Authority at the end of June to take a private sector position.  The former Union County Freeholder and County Manager has been at his state post for six years. 

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Everything that I admire and fear about the Democratic Party was on display this week. The compassion for creating affordable housing and the insensitivity to economic growth were both reflected in the new COAH rules.

New Jersey needs affordable housing. Young workers and people on modest ... >

The rules that govern the Democratic Party's Presidential Delegate selection process are the result of thirty years of conflict. National conventions have been divided and reform commissions have fought into many long nights. There's really only one major reform in recent decades that ... >

Some New Jersey Democrats are facing the February 5th Presidential Primary with consternation. With three credible and capable candidates it appears to be a difficult choice. It’s actually quite simple.

America >

McCain announce his intention to appoint real judges, and both teh Times and the Journal muff the story. >

Discussing the vacuity of Barack Obama’s rhetoric, I find myself taken to task for ignoring the substance allegedly underlying it. Far from it. My initial post merely pointed out that Obama’s speeches convey essentially none of that substance. But don’t take my word for it; Hillary Clinton, ... >

OK, so political rhetoric often lacks a certain intellectual pizzazz. Politicians – properly – speak to the electorate, and not to the faculty at Harvard. And what campaign wants for a fluffy, harmless sound-bite theme: "Morning in America"? Nothing wrong with that, either.

But what ... >

Let’s get this straight. Does U.S. Attorney Chris Christie think he only has a role to play when there’s a violation of US federal criminal law?

Apparently that’s what we’re supposed to believe based on the hot-off-the-press statement ... >

Did you hear about the latest PSE&G rate increase approved by the BPU on Monday?  Probably not.  That's because only the Ledger reported the story, inside its business section. 

Here's the topline: >

Apparently size matters where the Governor’s concerned. He’s proposed reducing aid to local towns less than 10,000 residents and slashing it completely for communities smaller than 5,000.

As reported in the Philadelphia Inquirer this week: ”The governor ... >

FOR 190 YEARS, New Jersey had no income tax and no sales tax. As recently as 1966, it had only the third-highest property taxes in the nation.

Through home rule, local governments delivered efficient and inexpensive services. New Jersey's small towns powered the state to become an economic ... >

Trenton’s legislating machine is running in over-drive. The radicals who are running the engine of big government have opened the throttle of central planning and are bent on ramming through their agenda, regardless of disturbing economic indicators, skyrocketing taxes and the evacuation of job ... >

It is clear that the big-government radicals running Trenton today will stop at nothing to advance their vision of an even bigger nanny state no matter what or who is destroyed on the way to achieving the “Common Good.” So much so that they will pass drastically flawed and dangerous bills ... >

The budget proposed by Gov. Jon Corzine has produced myriad negative reactions, featuring various interests seeking to limit the impact of the cuts he has identified. Lost in the minutia of how much money will be saved by eliminating various executive departments and agencies, or how small towns ... >

In preparing for a presentation I gave at the New Jersey Political Science Association meeting last week, I spent some time reviewing the exit poll data compiled by the New York Times. In assessing whether or not moving the New Jersey presidential primary from June to February was worth the ... >

In an op-ed piece I wrote for the Bergen Record on Sunday, January 13, 2008, I observed that Governor Corzine's financial restructuring plan was taking a page out of the state's history.  From 1830 until the 1860s, the state relied on a deal it struck with the Camden & Amboy rail ... >

NATIONAL CARTOON: Bush sacrificed golf for the troops >

Click more to view the Monty Python video clip this cartoon is based on. >

And don't forget to vote in this week's Cartoon Caption Contest. Voting ends this Friday at noon. >

With her victory by ten points in Pennsylvania, Hillary Clinton has re emerged as a very viable candidate for the Democratic nomination.  It is obvious that the party is severely split and that both she and Obama are like two punch drunk boxers slugging it out without a knock out coming.  They ... >

In their collective wisdom, the American Founding Fathers in the Constitutional Convention of 1787 wrote into our primary document that there would be no religious test for public office.  Later, in the Bill of Rights, they banned any interference between church and state.  They had learned the ... >

In the chaos of Iraq, there are some interesting lessons we might extract from our occupation of post world war II Germany.  The historian David Stafford has carefully shown where the similarities and differences between these cases.  With the collapse of the Wehrmacht in Germany, the Allies ... >

A hugely misguided attempt to eliminate the Department of Agriculture is the spark which has lit an angry fire which took over West State street recently as an unlikely combination of farmers with goats, pigs, tractors, ... >

Accepting the Oscar for his leading role in the budget adaptation of "There Will Be Blood" is Governor Jon Corzine. This was a budget speech that reached out and stabbed nearly every constituency and hacked at countless services that the public holds dear. As intended, the ... >

Seventeen-year-old Dave Landstrom lives in Flemington, the county seat of one of New Jersey's most Republican leaning counties. He was a 10-year-old when George W. Bush was elected President, and he turns 18 this October 26th, making him eligible to vote on Election Day in November. >