When you look at your kid and say "hon, we really don't have the money for a new Xbox this month" it's responsible parenting and economic husbanding. But when a state says no to a piece of desperately needed infrastructure 20 years in the planning, because it may well go over budget and costs "too much" it adds up to bad math, short-sighted economics and is a perfect example of how so-called "toughness" and the "willingness to make hard choices" in the real world manifests itself as just bad leadership.
Gov. Christie put the kibosh on a much needed, long planned addition to the tunnels under the Hudson River that connect NYC to the mainland and carry literally millions of passengers each year on NJ Transit and Amtrak. Now a GAO Report shows that it wasn't just bad leadership, it was dishonest to boot.
Not that anybody who has followed Christie is surprised. He may be best known for his prickly bullying demeanor and contempt for answering questions from those below him (constituents), but his dishonesty and double dealing are an underappreciated side of the Governor's craptastic style.
"This was the most important transportation project of our time," he said. "ARC was critical to the future of New Jersey's economy and it took years to plan, but Gov. Christie wiped it out with a campaign of public deception."
So two 100 year old train tracks between NYC and NJ (and literally the rest of the country) already at capacity, are going to be it for the foreseeable future, unless what? NJ wins the MegaMillions Jackpot? Someone needs to remind people in government that governing means making the government work for the governed. Christie is just typical of his entire party that used to be a party of real conservative managers, bean counters, who often, legitimately, stood up and said "whoa let's look at this first and really think about this." And often when the facts were in and they saw that the proposal on the table was a good investment, they got on board with the progressives.
Christie and his modern conservative ilk just want to balance budgets because that's what they think is responsible, like in a family balancing their checkbook. They don't understand (or don't want to understand) that government is not like individuals, there are long term responsibilities to generations unborn. But the most important reason that the checkbook analogy is an example of classic bogus rhetorical nincompoopery is that government finances are more flexible, they can borrow at no interest, issue bonds, etc. Investments must be made, sometimes no matter the cost upfront because they will pay off down the line and for a long time to come.
What if they hadn't built those tunnels 100 years ago? Clearly some other infrastructure would have been built at some point at far higher cost because they were necessary. It was a failure of NYC, NJ and the Port Authority not to have added more tunnels 50 years ago! Robert Moses hated tunnels, loved bridges ("because you can see it everyday") and he ran the city until 1964. To delay another decade is beyond foolish.
The Feds need to step in and make sure this goes forward, and if it embarrasses Christie to do so then there's short term gain in it as well as the long term gain to infrastructure.