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www.RepudiateNJ.com

With your help, we?can?change the conversation on NJ Gas Tax Hike.?? Most people know how bad it is.??? Most people know that we don’t just pay gas tax at the pump.?? Everything we buy, make, or build pays gas tax because everything gets to us by car or truck.

But too many people still?think?we need?more gas tax money to fix our roads.?? They think gas tax hike will keep property taxes down.?? Or that a higher gas tax means lower sales tax or estate tax.

If you?read our emails, website, Facebook Page and www.repudiateNJ.com, you know the truth.??? You know the real problem is the $16 billion debt that was borrowed by an un-elected authority in violation of State Constitution.? You know that the simple solution is to refuse to pay that?debt, and to instead use all of the $1.5 billion we collect each year in tolls and taxes to fix our roads and bridges.

Help us force NJ’s leading opinion makers to?talk about the that truth.?? Help us force them to talk about the real problem-and the real solution.

Please call your local Talk Radio Program.??? Please write a short 150 to 175 letter to the editor of any newspaper in New Jersey.? ?Please limit your call and letter to just one or two of these talking points.

Please get the email addresses and phone numbers from your own local radio station and newspaper.?? Then please send them to us at info@libertyandprosperity.org so we can share them on our website.

WE ALSO POSTED SOME?EMAIL ADDRESSES AND PHONE NUMBERS IN THE ?ENGAGE? SECTION OF OUR www.libertyandprosperity.org WEB SITE.

ALSO– Please?”share” Facebook ?images and posts??on NJ gas tax with one of our talking points.

If you think of other talking points, problems with these talking points, or other ways to deliver our message, please contact us at? info@libertyandprosperity.org or (609) 927-7333.

?1. ?The $1.5 billion of Gas Taxes and Tolls we already pay each year is more than enough to build and fix everything we need.give us best roads and bridges in country.?

2. ? NJ roads are crumbling because:

A. ? NJ spends 4 to 8 times more mile of road than any other state.? Examples:

(1) ? $600 million for 2.6 mile bridge between Ocean City and Somers Point cost three times more than Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel in Virginia.

(2) ? ?More than one million dollars to install one new traffic light.

(3) ?Replacing one small washed out bridge over a small creek without taking years and spending millions of dollars.?? (Mays Landing/Somers Point Road, Zion Road in Northfield, etc.)

B. ??NJ spent billions on projects that had nothing to do with roads and bridges.?? Examples:

(1) ?$1.1 billion useless train between Camden and Trenton–most expensive railroad project in country.?? Locals call it ?The Crack Track?.

(2)$20 million Taj Majal Ocean City Visitor Center built artificial mountain, needing artificial ?wetlands? creation to replace small shack by side of road.

(3) ?Brick sidewalks in Toms River

(4) ? Multimillion dollar Atlantic City Visitor Center at foot of Expressway with no public toilets.

3. ? Why does everything cost more in NJ??? ?How many things are wrong with this picture??

A. ?Endless regulations, permits, and approvals that drive up costs, and cause endless delays.??? They do nothing to protect public or environment.?? Projects get built anyway, but politically connected lawyers, planners, and environmental ?experts? get rich.

B. ?Union work rules drive up costs and cause delays forcing workers in one union to stop work, and sit around, while workers in a different union do a small job.

C. ?Politicians use gimmicks to hire politically connected contractors, and then reward them with big profits in ?change orders?.

D. ?Complicated ?set-asides? for minority, women, veteran, etc. companies that phony companies set up by the same political corporations.

4. ? ? When government borrows money instead of raising taxes, voters don?t care about? waste or corruption.?

A. ?Nearly 200 years ago, Founding Fathers Thomas Jefferson and John Adams–once bitter enemies–agreed that ?perpetual debt? caused corruption, waste, fraud, and high taxes.

B. ? Out-of-control state government debt cause America?s first economic collapse, a 7 year Depression that began with ?Panic of 1837?.

C. ?Because people in NJ understood connection between state government debt and corruption, NJ Constitution since 1844 said State can?t borrow money unless voters approve ballot question.

?5. ?For 120 years, NJ never borrowed?money without voter approval.??? State government was debt free.? We had had no state income tax, no state income tax, and economy boomed.??? Starting in 1960?s all that changed.

A. ?Greedy politicians and clever lawyers set up Port Authority, NJ Transportation Authority, and dozens of other ?authorities?.

B. ?These authorities were allowed to borrow money without voter approval, because State had no legal obligation to pay their debts.

C. ?All bonds issued by these authorities and all disclosure statements clearly warn investors of the risk.??? However, certain Wall Street banks committed fraud by not giving these warnings to their customers.

D. ?Since 1960?s Republicans and Democrats used tax money to bail out these authorities and pay their debts anyway.?? They said it was the ?moral? thing to do.

E. ? ?Since 1960?s, ?NJ government depended on money borrowed without voter approval.?? Since then, we have had endless pay-to-play corruption, and endless tax hikes.??? First 3% sales tax of 1963 is now 7%.?? First 2% income tax is now 6.65%.???? Every year we have tax hikes, but they are never enough.

6. ?Billion dollar gas tax hike will be used to let Transportation Trust Fund Authority borrow another $20 billion on top of the $16 billion it already owes.???? If we don?t stop them, they will again hock all that gas tax hike money for the next 20 years and spend everything they borrowed in five years.?? Then we will have another ?crisis?.? Until we repudiate (refuse to pay) unconstitutional debt, this will never end.

?7. ?There is no legal obligation to bail out bankrupt ?NJ Transportation Trust Fund Authority?.??? Voters never approved the debt as required by NJ Constitution.

?8. ??There is nothing ?responsible? about bailing out NJ Transportation Trust Fund Authority and letting it borrow another $15 billion on top of the $16 billion it only owes.

?9. ? ?A ?bailout? of Transportation Trust Fund Authority without fixing the problems mean facing bankruptcy with $30 billion debt five years from now.

?10. ?Yes, people will get hurt if NJ Transportation Trust Fund Authority defaults on its $16 billion debt.? But even more people will get hurt by a billion dollar a year tax hike–and borrowing $20 billion more, and a default on $36 billion debt five years from now!

Respectfully submitted (in a hurry on a busy weekend),
Seth Grossman, Executive Director
(609) 927-7333
info@libertyandprosperity.org