Gov.-elect Chris Christie and his team got their first hands-on look at New Jersey’s already bleak state finances today and he says it’s even worse than he realized.
"We did not get any pleasant news this morning from the Treasurer’s Office, not that I expected to, but more unpleasant, perhaps, than we had hoped," Christie said.
Robert Grady, one of the men on the special transition panel, said the looming structural budget deficit that was routinely talked about during the campaign will likely be worse than the $8 billion estimate put forward by nonpartisan legislative analysts over the summer.
Corzine frequently downplayed the $8 billion estimate during the campaign.
Fast-forward to January 2010:
Just 48 hours into his new role, Gov. Chris Christie said New Jersey faces a $1.3 billion shortfall in the current budget and blamed former Gov. Jon Corzine for setting him up to fail by hiding the depth of the problems.
"He was trying to make it as hard as he possibly could," Christie said. "Avoidance of the facts and avoidance of the truth was a staple of the Corzine administration."
Christie also found fault with Corzine’s last-minute appointments of several allies to state boards that in some cases will allow them to maintain and boost their public pensions....
Which makes Corzine's current predicament quite predictable:
First we learned that under Corzine’s directorship, MF Global was going bankrupt because it purchased Europe’s risky debt. Then several companies each expressed interest in buying parts of MF Global–only to find that the books were worse than they looked, and that no part of the company was salvageable. But yesterday’s news was far worse. It turns out that $700 million of MF Global investors’ money is missing, and the firm is being investigated to find out if Corzine skimmed investors’ own money to cover his bets.
Corzine still thought he was in the public sector, and assumed a government bailout for Europe. When none appeared forthcoming, he assumed he could just take other people's money to cover his policy failures, like he did in New Jersey.
Private sector doesn't work like that, however. And one would not be surprised if - despite his political connections, and likely because of the political environment his allies created - Crooked Jon finds himself in front of a hanging judge in the not-so-distant future.
A heartbeat away from the Treasury Secretary position. Anyone ask Barack Obama for a comment on his cabinet heir apparent, and his #1 Wall Street bundler?
No comments:
Post a Comment