That’s Five For You and Ninety-Five For Me

According to an analysis by the Star-Ledger, 95 percent of the $350 to $500 million in last minute pork barrel spending in this year’s state budget went to legislative districts controlled by Democrats, with Newark, Jersey City and Camden the biggest winners. The Democrats contend this is a political tradition in New Jersey and that the Republicans did it too when they controlled the legislature.

Just 11 years ago, the Republican majority in Trenton approved a revised budget that included $20 million in add-ons, prompting one Democratic lawmaker to dub it "Jurassic Pork II."

As we all remember, Democrats shutdown state government while they argued over which taxes to raise, by how much and who would benefit from the additional tax revenue. We now know between 30 to 40 percent of the sales tax increase was spent on local pet projects. But here comes Governor Jon Corzine with his solution to the spending problem:

Corzine said he could favor a system where "maybe the majority party gets 60 or 70 percent and the minority gets 30 percent or something".

That sounds fair doesn’t it? With the tax eaters getting about 88 percent of the entire state budget, taxpayers can look forward to the day when they get that “30 per percent or something”.

Don’t hold your breath. Lawmakers in Trenton are hard at work figuring which taxes to raise and by how much to bring you property tax relief. Four legislative committees have been formed to solve the “property tax crisis” with four Democrats and two Republicans on each committee. Given the Democrats' concept of “fair”, New Jersey taxpayers ain’t seen nothing yet.