PACKET EDITORIAL, Oct. 29
By: Packet Editorial
In what is shaping up as perhaps the most vacuous statewide campaign in recent memory, the two major-party candidates seeking to represent New Jersey in the U.S. Senate Democrat Frank Lautenberg and Republican Douglas Forrester have offered precious little reason for voters to elect either of them.
Since disgraced Sen. Robert Torricelli dropped out of the race earlier this month, depriving Mr. Forrester of his chief campaign issue the honesty and integrity of his opponent this race has been long on rhetoric and short on substance. Here, in a nutshell, is what the candidates have been telling us:
Mr. Forrester says he should be elected because Mr. Lautenberg (who is merely a cog in the "Torricelli-Lautenberg Machine") shouldn’t be on the ballot at all. What’s more, he refuses to debate. He voted against the Gulf War resolution when he was in the Senate more than a decade ago. He opposes the death penalty, even for terrorists. And he did a lousy job during his 18 years in Washington in bringing federal dollars back to New Jersey.
Mr. Lautenberg says he should be elected because Mr. Forrester has reactionary views on issues like abortion and gun control. Proof of this comes in the form of weekly musings Mr. Forrester offered more than a decade ago in a column in a now-defunct West Windsor newspaper. What’s more, Mr. Forrester raised taxes and sewer rates when he was mayor of West Windsor (more than two decades ago). He refuses to release his complete income tax returns. And he made oodles of money running a business BeneCard Services Inc. that profits from peddling prescription-drug benefit programs to employers.
Never mind that Mr. Lautenberg made oodles of money running a business ADP that profits from peddling payroll services to employers. Or that Mr. Forrester served as mayor of West Windsor under a township committee form of government, in which the mayor holds no greater power than any other committee member. Or, for that matter, that Mr. Lautenberg won re-election handily even after voting against the Gulf War resolution and opposing the death penalty for terrorists. Or that New Jersey, regardless of who represents the state in Washington, will always contribute more to the federal treasury than it receives in return because our taxpayers have among the highest per-capita incomes in the country while our state is home to only a handful of modest military installations.
The candidates may be going out of their way to avoid what this election is really all about, but the voters should not. It is about which candidate can be counted on to represent New Jersey’s best interests, and the views and values of the state’s citizens, in the U.S. Senate. We have concluded, albeit reluctantly, that that candidate is Mr. Lautenberg not because of anything in particular we know he will do in Washington, but because of all the things we are confident he won’t do.
We know he won’t support tax policies that favor the rich, or environmental policies that turn back the clock on clean-air and clean-water standards, or energy policies that promote gluttony, or social-service policies that are over-reliant on the generosity of the private sector, or transportation policies that shortchange rail and bus commuters. We know he won’t support a foreign policy that sees the world divided simplistically into camps of good and evil, or judicial appointments calculated to carry out the agenda of a small but vocal extremist flank of the Republican Party. And we know he won’t vote for Trent Lott for majority leader.
Mr. Forrester does not strike us as a right-wing ideologue. But he has offered no indication in this campaign that he is prepared to deviate substantially from the policies favored by the Bush administration, or from the marching orders delivered by Republican congressional leaders, if elected to the Senate. That places Mr. Forrester well outside the mainstream of New Jersey electorate, who, in our judgment, will be far more comfortable, as long as President Bush is in office, with the checks and balances provided by Frank Lautenberg and a Democratic majority in the Senate.