Chris Christie Defeats Jon Corzine in NJ Race for Governor

In a momentous win for the Republican party, Chris Christie defeated Jon Corzine to become the first Republican Governor of New Jersey in 12 years. Despite Obama's trips to NJ to stump for Corzine and Obama's recent phone campaign for Corzine, Corzine still lost the election. NJ residents apparently were not swayed by phone calls of a recording of Barack Obama telling them to vote for Corzine. I don't know about you but I don't remember any president running a phone campaign for another politician. Nevertheless, according to Politickernj.com "six out of ten New Jersey voters said that President Barack Obama was not a factor in their vote for governor, according to exit polls" That doesn't say much for Obama.

Despite the fact that NJ voters are mostly democrats, the republican candidate, Chris Christie won the governorship. Many NJ residents resent Corzine raising property taxes and his plan to raise them again. New Jersey has the highest property taxes in the nation and the vote for Christie shows how fed up we are with property taxes in New Jersey. When I owned a home I paid a fortune in property taxes that eventually was not tenable. We can only hope that Cristie will keep his promise not to raise property taxes and to possibly lower them.

The race was close and had been very intense until the very last moment. According to NJ.com (Star Ledger) Jon Corzine spent 23.6 million on his campaign as opposed to Chris Christie's 8.8 million. The difference in expenditure was huge and it's remarkable that Christie was able to put up such a good fight against Corzine's massive wealth. The fact that Corzine lost indicates that voters cannot be swayed by the tactics of the very rich, they are very concerned with the issues at hand and will not fall for a glossy, showy campaign.

Hope For Change

Chris Christie's acceptance speech was full of hope and a determination to "fix the state" (see nj.com) He also made mention of the nasty tactics that were used to attack him and his family. He said that this election shows that a negative campaign is not successful and should be stopped in future campaigns (see nj.com). I hope his words will be heeded and there will no more viscous campaigns in my state. I think Christie is a finer man than Corzine since his campaign did not resort to attacking Corzine to the extent that Corzine attacked him. While it may take awhile for NJ to feel as optimistic as Christie is, the vote shows that we are willing to give him a chance.

Sources:

http://www.politickernj.com
http://www.1010wins.com/pages/5281251.php