WEEKLY COLUMN:
JDM vs the WORLD

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FINE PRINT

There’s a certain kind of stubborn pride that comes from living in Jersey. Situated betwixt the Big Apple and the City of Brotherly Love, one might conclude this attitude’s a lot like middle-child syndrome—and it sure doesn’t help that Jersey’s so frequently used as a punchline. But those of us who live here have made peace with our reputation. We find most Jersey jokes to be uninformed and remarkably unfunny, and we’ll gladly ride your tail doing 95 in the cars and trucks lane on the Turnpike to prove it. Go ahead. Ask us. We’ll show you.

But if there’s ever been a time when the rest of the country should be laughing at old NJ, that time is now.

Last Monday, amidst allegations of corruption and plummeting poll results, Jersey’s reigning and defending congressman, Senator Robert Torricelli, dropped out of the race for reelection. This happened just a scant 36 days before his inevitable trouncing at the hands of Republican challenger Douglas Forrester, who will now face former three-term senator Frank Lautenberg.

So, what’s the problem? The problem is that state law says a candidate cannot be replaced on the ballot less than 51 days before the election, and, as explained in most second-grade math classes, 36 is less than 51.

Leave it to the Democrats to see the law—not to mention basic math and the English language—as a problem.

As is often the case, the Democrats’ contention is ripe with utter disregard for the difference between right and wrong. They say that the aforementioned law is ambiguous, somehow, and they claim that disallowing Lautenberg’s eleventh-hour candidacy contrasts the spirit of our political system—“denying,” in the words of Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, “the people of New Jersey a choice.”

And sadly, both the New Jersey and United States Supreme Courts agree.

But let’s you and I discuss the facts, all right? Because the fact is, those who’ve moved to replace Torricelli on the ballot are election-fixing charlatans.

Now, the first thing you need to know about this debacle is that Torricelli is literally a crook. No less than a whopping seven people pled guilty to making illegal contributions to Torricelli’s victorious 1996 campaign. Just in case our liberal school system has brainwashed you with the Democratic Party’s unique brand of fuzzy math, let me quickly explain the concept of seven to you: (1) One; (2) Two; (3) Three; (4) Four; (5) Five; (6) Six; and (7) Seven.

Not too complicated, right? No need to hold your hand all the way up to 51, right?

Anyway, one of the men who pled guilty was David Chang, a North Jersey businessman who’s said to have showered Torricelli with all sorts of outlandish luxuries in exchange for the senator’s assistance in collecting some $85 million dollars from the North Korean government. According to a report printed in the Philadelphia Inquirer just a day before the scandal-plagued senator’s early exit from the election, Chang viewed Torricelli as merely an “investment”—an investment for which he’s now serving an 18-month prison sentence.

Now, there’s an expression that says it takes two to tango, and it’s that very logic which precludes Torricelli’s guilt—some sort of transaction must’ve taken place to the court’s satisfaction, otherwise Mr. Chang would be waking up in his own bed tomorrow. And even though the Democratic Party knew this long before the 51-day deadline for making ballot changes, they chose to run Torricelli nonetheless.

Wonder why? Well, the answer is arrogance, plain and simple. The Democratic Party hasn’t lost a senatorial election in New Jersey since the 1970s, after all. And apparently, they thought so highly [sic] of the state’s left-leaning constituency that they figured voters would opt against the Republican regardless of the Democrat’s thorough lack of character.

Fortunately, New Jersey watched this fiasco unfold with a shrewd eye, and suddenly the once-invincible Torricelli found himself down by 13 points in the polls to a challenger whose name remains largely unknown.

So, the Democrats decided if they can’t beat Doug Forrester, they’ll cheat him instead. That’s why they yanked Torricelli from the campaign trail.

It’s a move that some have likened to changing the rules in the bottom of the ninth inning in the seventh game of the World Series, but I’d take it one step further. I’d say this is more like leaving your seat for the seventh inning stretch at a midsummer Subway Series game and returning to find that the Mets have been replaced by the Police Athletic League’s 12-year-old softball champions. Sure, the little ladies might stand a better chance against the Yankees than the Mets would, but that doesn’t mean they belong there.

So, obviously, the Democrats—like the Mets of yesteryear—will go to amazing lengths to win.

Say what you will about politicians on both sides being dirty, filthy people—sweeping though your statement may be, by and large, you wouldn’t be wrong. But here we have a political party that’s apparently playing an altogether different game, and, I might add, a game with no bounds. Anytime real power hangs in the balance, as it does with November’s Senate elections, the Democrats are willing to do whatever it takes to make things go their way—up to and including breaking the law.

Just look at what they did to achieve their current Senate majority, for example.

Mere months after the elections of 2000, control of both Congressional houses fell into Republican hands by—gasp—the will of the American people. So, what did the Democrats do? They wined and dined a liberal Republican by the name of Jim Jeffords, who abandoned ship shortly thereafter. Having declared himself an Independent, Jeffords tossed control to the Democrats by a 50-49 margin—all it took was one backroom deal.

What Jeffords did was not illegal—based on the details that surfaced, anyhow—but it sure as Hell should be. We’re talking about the ultimate in broken campaign promises, and in the infancy of a six-year term. Jeffords may well have chosen the GOP for the same reasons New York City’s Mayor Michael Bloomberg did (i.e., convenience), but if the people reelected a Republican senator, don’t they deserve what they asked for?

In getting back to the elections of 2000, we find the most devastating for-instance of Democratic deception yet. For it was in the year 2000 when Vice President Al Gore turned in a losing effort against the son of a former president, that being George W. Bush, and it was in the year 2000 when Mr. Gore took his narrow defeat all the way to the Supreme Court—which thankfully proceeded to lay the smack down. And although Bush’s superlative leadership in the War on Terror has washed down the bitter taste for most, there are those in this country who still believe the Supreme Court quote/unquote decided the election.

In truth, the Supreme Court didn’t decide a thing. They simply saw that Team Gore was poised to protest anything that didn’t go their way. So, can you really blame the Supremes? I mean, if it wasn’t for them, the old man might still be demanding recounts today. After all, there must be some Intergalactic Court of Appeals, or better yet, a Heavenly High Court, to whom he could’ve taken his hanging chads.

As it were, the snobbery of that year’s presidential election was unprecedented. The Bush camp was quickly vilified by Gore and his supporters, and yet it was Gore, not Bush, who tried to steal the election. When a man demands recounts, but wants those recounts restricted to the counties supposed to be his strongholds, he’s trying to steal the election. And when a man cries foul about disenfranchisement, but yet wants to discard military votes because they comprise a faction he knows he can’t win, he’s trying to steal the election.

And besides, Bush was in control of the vote when the stalemate entailed, so semantically speaking, isn’t possession nine tenths of the law?

But I digress.

The point is, the Torricelli/Lautenberg switcheroo is nothing more than a stolen election redux. It represents more of the same win-at-any-cost philosophy on behalf of the Democratic Party. Like Jersey’s own Sopranos, the Democrats are an outfit made functional by organized crime. Because that’s what this mess is, really. It’s a carefully constructed crime.

Quips about his career aside, Torricelli’s not dead. There are no time-draining familial issues to which he must tend. Both such circumstances would make for an acceptable withdrawal, but neither is in play. Torricelli dropped out of the race on account of partisan politics, and he said so himself. Take a gander at the text of his speech last Monday, and you’ll find he said:

“Some of you believe that partisan politics has no dignity and is of no particular value. I’ve been a partisan all my life. I believe in the Democratic Party...Control of the Democratic majority in the United States Senate is now at issue, and I am a part of that issue. It will not only be decided in New Jersey, but it most certainly will in part be decided in New Jersey...But I will not be responsible for the loss of the Democratic majority in the United States Senate. I will not allow it to happen.”

The gist of the above-quoted text is fairly straightforward. Torricelli dropped out of the race because his party knew full well he couldn’t win. He said so himself. It’s right there. To his credit, it’s the one truth he told.

And it’s all fine and good that he wanted to drop out. I can’t say I blame him. Except for one thing: He missed the deadline. That’s it. That’s the state law, and it mandates—or mandated, once upon a simpler time—that a candidate can be replaced up until 51 days before the election. Not 51 days give or take a few. Not on a whim. Just 51 days. The Democrats could’ve told Torricelli to take a hike earlier this year. They didn’t. They blew it. That’s the entire situation in a nonpartisan nutshell.

The fact is, this election is not several weeks away, but rather it’s already underway—after all, 1,700 absentee ballots had been mailed by the time that rat Torricelli weaseled his way out of the thick. So, to call a do-over at this late juncture is to undermine both the political process as well as the rule of law in their combined entirety.

More and more, inexplicable incidents such as these are forcing me to reevaluate my respect for the men and women chosen to uphold the institutions upon which this country was founded. Nothing’s sacred now. Not even the Constitution. And laws? What laws? We have no laws. Just loosely enforced suggestions. I mean, why should you and I file our taxes by April 15th—or even by the extended deadlines—in order to pay the salaries of government officials like those who showed no respect for this election’s deadline? Honestly, let me know if you’ve got an answer, because I’m having a hard time finding one on my own.

You know, atrocious as Torricelli’s crimes may have been, in a weird way, they’re secondary. No doubt, most elected officials accept illegal handouts. That goes for Democrats like Torricelli, Republicans like Forrester, Independents like Jeffords, and so on. That doesn’t make it right, but it’s a fact we’ve long since accepted. So, to that end, the Torch is merely the cretin that got caught. What’s much more appalling, really, is the fact that the Democrats nominated a lawbreaking thug for office, and then went on to break yet another law in removing him from the ballot. Worse yet, the law they broke was written to prevent just this sort of debauchery.

Registered Democrats in every state from Jersey to al-Qalifornia should be ashamed by this outright sham. So, too, should Mr. Lautenberg. His reputation is sullied by this deception; a vote for him is a vote for illegitimate government, impressive credentials be damned.

What saddens me the most is that recent polls indicate Lautenberg is already leading Forrester amongst potential voters. That Jersey Democrats may well reward this trickery almost prompts me to pull a page from the Alec Baldwin handbook, but a promise to move I will not make. Even if the people in my home state are that incredibly blind, I’m far too lazy to leave.

And so, speaking of leaving, I’ll leave you with this parting thought: Prior to introducing Frank Lautenberg as the new Democratic candidate, Governor Jim McGreevey called Bob Torricelli’s decision to exit “courageous.” You got that? Courageous. It’s a choice of words which only serves to underscore how insidious this group can be.

Just a little more than a year ago, we saw true courage, and it wore a fireman’s badge.

If men like Mr. Torricelli can also pass for courageous, in Jersey or elsewhere, you’ve got to wonder if there’s hope left for mankind.

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