Jersey Boys

New Jersey Senator Bob Menendez is facing corruption charges that he accepted gifts from a political benefactor in exchange for favors. Corruption is something of a New Jersey tradition, of course, right up there with the Jersey Shore Food Truck Festival and Atlantic City mobsters. But, frankly, the charges against Menendez are small potatoes — in the form of Boardwalk Fries — compared to what it appears Gov. Chris “Hindenburg” Christie is trying to pull.

Here’s the background. For over a decade, New Jersey had been embroiled in a battle with Exxon Mobil over the contamination and loss of use of more than 1,500 acres of public land in the northern part of the state. The company was found liable several years ago, but the amount of damages and cleanup costs it owed had not yet been determined.

Expert witnesses for the state ballparked the total figure at $8.9 billion, and a judge was expected to rule on the final number soon. But then, this month, the state’s lawyers swooped in and decided to settle for a mere $225 million, not including undisclosed cleanup costs.

You will never guess why the state’s lawyers did such a thing. Oh, wait, you did guess.

Most of the coverage of the peculiarly low settlement has emphasized Exxon Mobil’s generous donations to the Republican Governors Association. The company gave hundreds of thousands of dollars last year, while Christie was its chair and the case was in trial; suspicions about a tacit tit-for-tat don’t seem unwarranted.

But there’s more!

Christie’s crowning achievement as governor of the Garden State has supposedly been balancing the budget without raising taxes. He’s even managed to reduce corporate taxes by hundreds of millions of dollars annually. But he’s primarily accomplished these goals through accounting tricks, raiding rainy-day funds and other shortsighted gimmicks. He has, in other words, sold off the state’s future to preserve the fiction of his fiscal responsibility.

These environmental settlements are no exception.

Historically, under state law, money received from environmental settlements has to be used on environmental efforts. But last year the Christie administration snuck some language into the state budget that effectively overrode this. For this fiscal year — and potentially this fiscal year only — the first $50 million of any environmental settlement will go toward environmental programs; anything above that can be diverted to plug holes in the state’s general fund.

You really have to read Brian Murphy’s bit at Talking Points Memo to take in the breadth of the whole thing and get just a glimpse of the many layers of kickbacks and quid pro quo going on here, and not limited to Christie himself. And it’s probably not even limited to Republicans. You’ll remember how the state Democratic party effectively stood aside and let Christie take the 2014 election without a fight. Now those same Dems in the state legislature are making much noise about investigations, but I question whether they mean it.

See also Charles Pierce.

5 thoughts on “Jersey Boys

  1. “He has, in other words, sold off the state’s future to preserve the fiction of his fiscal responsibility.”

    Typical of Republicans – and sadly, oh too many Democrats.

    They borrow from Peter, only to have someone else later have to borrow from Paul, too!

    Like Gov. Wanker in WI, Gov. Chris “Krispy Kreme von Zeppelin” Christie, has been a disaster for his state!

    And, as usual, like with Nixon, Reagan, Bush’s I & II, some poor Democrat will have to pick-up the pieces.

    And then, when that Democrat doesn’t pick-up the pieces fast or cheaply enough, the feckin’ eedjits in the electorate will put in another repulsive and corrupt GOP stooge in that office!
    Oy!

  2. So Christie is likely to disappear off the national radar pretty soon, if he hasn’t already, is he toast within his own Joisey? I mean, the good people of the Garden State, their traditions notwithstanding, certainly have a limit to how much corruption they can take.

  3. “Christie’s approval rating hit a new low last week, Politico says. He’s down to 35 percent of register voters.” We can only speculate how Christie would poll in Alabama….

    Having disposed of His Girthiness, the Menendez thing seems small potatoes, indeed. Taking private money for favors? Isn’t that what politicians *do*? I guess Democrats have to be “saints”; Republicans just have to be a hairs-breathe shy of Satan.

    • //Taking private money for favors? Isn’t that what politicians *do*?// LOL. Yeah, I’m having a hard time working up much outrage.

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