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Is Governor Christie becoming the king of pork spending?

23 May

The Delaware Joint Toll Bridge Commission (DRJTBC) is the western version of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.  It wants to build a toll bridge costing a third of billion dollars between New Jersey and Delaware to replace a perfectly safe four lane bridge currently serving residents of the area.

At the Star-Ledger Paul Mulshine has written several columns about the absurdity of his project, and most recently Senator Mike Doherty held a news conference highlighting the opposition of this project for economic and environmental reasons.

Although Governor Christie has not stated publicly he supports a third of a billion dollars increase in the state’s debt to fund an unnecessary construction project, he clearly would lose any credibility as a fiscal conservative if he were to push hard for this boondoggle.

Moreover, if Governor Christie supports this project he would in effect reveal his embrace of Keynesian economics, namely that more government spending is necessary to boost the state’s economy.  This is one of the most widespread economic fallacies of all time.  For Governor Christie to sound like Paul Krugman when it comes to government spending shows how far the Keynesian economic virus has infected even so-called fiscal conservatives.

 
 
  1. thebullhorn

    June 17, 2012 at 7:15 am

    Of course the bridge to almost nowhere is a government boondoggle (but I repeat myself). But I truly doubt that Christie is a Keynesian ideologue like Krugman. Rather, I suspect he’s just a politician doing what pols noramlly do . . . . pandering got the booboise.

    I’d be willing to bet dollars to doughnuts that The Guv has never read anything written by Keynes or his many deluded disciples. More likely that he’s just finished watching Chris Matthews or Rachael Maddow.