Thinking Globally, Acting Locally: Generation DFA Newer Jersey

"Look up in the sky recognize there's sunshine..How can you deny when it's right in your eyes" -Kweli

Sunday
3 September 06
Sunday (What? I get the NY Times wknds Thus, Sat= Sun too)
The Elephant Out Of The Room
By Bob Sommer

It is hard being a *Republican in New Jersey Today. The state government is dominated by Demoracts, New Jersey hasn't elected a *Republican to the United States Senate in more than three decades and 1988 was the last time the *Republican candidate for president manages to win the state.
For Garden State *Republicans though, things are going to get worse. A recent study of voters in metropolitan areas by two academics at Virginia Tech found that in the last two presidential elections, changing demographics have drastically shifted voters patterns. Although the study does not specifically discuss New Jersey, as the prototypical metropoltan state, it is ground zero in terms of these changes.
For most of the last 50 years, densely populated New Jersey was a classic swing state, moving back and forth between the two parties. Typically the cities produced strong !Democratic votes, rural voters weer solidly *Republican and the larger suburban counties were reliably Republican, though !Democrats could break through in some elections, creating the swing state reputation.
In recent years, since the cities shrunk in size and the suburbs grew, the safe bet was that New Jersey would become more Republican. The opposite has occurred, however, and the Virginia Tech study tells us why.
What the authors, Robert E. Lang & Thomas W. Sanchez, found is that the changing dynamics of older suburbs tend to produce demands for government services similar to those of urban residents-in other words, programs typically asocaited with !Democrats. The * Republican forumla for success is to focus on ¿values and shrinking the size of government, diametrically opposed to the direction in which New Jersey is heading.
As counties like Mercer, Bergen and Middlesex, along with suburban Essex, Passaic, and Union, become more densely populated as the housing stock ages, voter expectations for government services are growing. These expectations, coupled with an increasingly diverse population-the 2000 census showed that New Jersey had the largest number of new immigrants of any state-trump concerns about rising taxes.
As a result, it is no surprise that these counties are now reliably !!Democratic at all levels of government. Add the vote in these areas to the !!Democratic core vote in Hudson County and the cities of Camden, Essex, Union, Passaic, Mercer, and Middlesex Counties, and it becomes difficult to see where the *Republican party can rebuild its strength.
Mr. Lang and M. Sanchez provide one possible solution for the *Republicans, but it is unlikely to work in New Jersey. They point to the emerging suburbs that make up some of the fastest growing areas in the United States and favored George W. Bush over John Kerry 56 percent to 43 percent in 2004. However, the emerging suburbs of New Kersey, which include Ocean, Somerset, Burlington, and Gloucester Counties among others, have already shown a tendency to vote !!Democratic more often and will likely trend more rapidly in that direction than much of the rest of the nation.
That's becasue the national *Republican formula won't work in New Jersey. A strategy bases on values in opposition to government services won't be enough to consistently win voters to the party column. Indeed, *Republican leaders in Congress recently introduced an ¿"American Values Agenda" that focuses on conservative casuses like gun rights, abortion restrictions, and tax cuts but heads in the opposite direction of where New Jersey voters are today.
Certainly voter sensitivity to taxes is real anywhere in the United States, including New Jersey, but polls consitently show residents here expect tax dollars to be spent on government services for schools, transportation and environmental protection. On issues that *Republicans lump together as values, voters in New Jersey are far more moderate than most of Americans.
Ask New Jersey voters, even after this summer's bruising budget battle, to define what government can do to improve quality of life, and few will answer to get out of the way. In many respects, the only difference between the mature suburban counties and the emerging ones in New Jersey is newness. Most voters recognize the relative importance of government services compared to taxes and have supported increasing the services offered by the public sector.
The conclusions drawn by this study are experienced most strongly in New Jersey, the most suburban state, and that's why happy days are nto ahead for the *Republican party here. New Jersey is likely to become an even bluer state in the foreseeable future than it is today.

¿= Whooooooowhat
!= Democratic Human Being, Democratic Party
*= Republican't
!!= Democratic as stated

No Chance for rigging elections when Federal Law Suites are filed in OHIO re: '04, Marc Crispin Miller has the proof, & New Jersey brings > 53% voters out to the polls Nov '06 & '08. NJ Will set the example for U.S.A.