MORE RR (RIGHTWING REPUBLICAN) HYPOCRISY

I was reading an article in the Arts section of the NY Times recently about a new movie starring Paul Giamatti with a story set in a Jersey high school wrestling scene. The article mentioned in passing that the movie wasn't shot in the actual Jersey town the filmmaker grew up in but on Long Island instead because of "tax incentives."

As I've written here before, for some reason the Republican governor of my state, NJ, eliminated the tax breaks that were in place when he was elected for movie and TV productions shooting in Jersey, so they've all moved to New York, where the previous and present Democratic governors had and have tax incentives for production companies to work there.

That's why "Law & Order SVU" which had been shooting the show in Jersey left the state, and others too, and ones that had been thinking about coming here don't anymore. What's with that? These productions employ plenty of local workers as well as contribute greatly to the local economies with everything from catering to rentals of all kinds etc.

It's like Christie turning down that tunnel that was going to relieve train traffic between New York and New Jersey after work had already begun and hundreds of millions had already been spent on it and even though most of the cost was being covered by the federal government and other resources.  If the governor was really into saving the state money and balancing the budget you'd think he'd want TV and movie productions bringing money into the state and a tunnel that would make commuting to the city more efficient and less polluting and less costly than the highway building and widening projects he plans on doing that won't employ anywhere near as many workers as the tunnel would and will increase pollution and not benefit anyone much except oil corporations.

Obviously what Christie and his fellow recently elected Republican governors are about is not saving money for states and their taxpayers, but saving and making more money for their corporate masters and those whose wealth is dependent on corporate welfare.

Christie has given $637 million in tax cuts to the wealthiest in Jersey since his election while cutting all kinds of stuff that benefits the rest of us in the state. Same old RR tricks, give more to the rich and then make the rest of us pay for it.

Here's John Stewart's most recent take on this subject (I couldn't isolate the bit, so the link takes you to the whole show—it's the first segment but the best part comes over seven minutes in, if you can stick with it, it's worth it).