So 2008 has finally arrived — and with it all the new and exciting challenges every new year brings, along with a fair amount of unfinished business the old year has left behind.
As one of those years that happens to be divisible by four, 2008 promises to be unusually eventful in the political arena — with the very first of these events coming right up: the Iowa caucuses. By the time the first week of the new year is over, the battle for the White House will be joined in earnest, with discernible winners and losers having emerged from their initial engagement with a real, live electorate.
This may or may not reshape the strategies the candidates employ as they face off in New Hampshire next week and Michigan the week after — which, in turn, will likely have a direct impact on what the battleground looks like when they roll into New Jersey (and 21 other states) in early February. Chances are good that by the time they’re gone, we’ll know who both the Republicans and the Democrats are going to nominate for president — and we’ll have a full nine months of nonstop campaigning, rather than the customary three or four, to look forward to.
It’s altogether fitting that the same years in which large numbers of Americans run for president, athletes from around the world gather for the Olympic Games. Both sets of participants require stamina, perseverance, concentration and elaborate networks of support just to join the contest, much less win it. Watching from the comfort of our living rooms, whether the contestants are suffocating under the hot lights (and hot air) of another raucous presidential debate or the veil of pollution hanging over every outdoor venue within 100 miles of Beijing, we will marvel at how they perform so magnificently under such intense pressure.
Only later will we learn how many of the candidates rehearsed every gesture, every smile, every nuance of every word spoken with pollsters, acting coaches and focus groups. And how many of the athletes overcame the elements, and their opponents, with the assistance of substances not altogether in keeping with the Olympic spirit.
In Trenton, 2008 will usher in a new Legislature to deal with an old problem: a state budget that defies balancing. Gov. Jon Corzine will unveil his long-awaited and much-delayed asset-monetization plan, now reframed as a restructuring of the state’s finances. Whatever it’s called — and whatever it calls for in the way of fiscal reform (or, for those less inclined to be charitable toward the governor, monetary slight-of-hand) — it will be controversial, the debate it inspires will be loud and the repercussions, both political and economic, will be felt all across New Jersey.
Here in the central part of the state, 2008 is likely to be a year of reappraisal. For some towns, that will literally mean a complete reassessment of property values — a process that is widely misunderstood and almost universally distrusted, although it has a way of producing as many winners as losers when the property-tax bills are recalculated. For other towns, this will be a year to take a long, hard look at what they really can afford and what they can’t — and whether it makes sense to team up with a school district or another municipality to provide services more efficiently.
For still others, it will be a year of making tough decisions — finding the will, and the money, to breathe life into their downtown business districts, fix potholes, revitalize troubled neighborhoods, extend sewer lines, redevelop abandoned or underutilized properties, provide affordable housing, preserve open space, allow senior citizens to age in place, offer more recreational opportunities and otherwise improve the quality of life for residents.
So welcome to 2008. From every angle, it looks like it’s going to be one of those years, as Walter Cronkite used to say, that alter and illuminate our time. And you’ll be there.
