RUSH: Did I predict this or did I predict this? From the Associated Press — a very disappointed Associated Press: ‘A member of New York Gov. David Paterson’s administration said the governor is putting together a plan that would lay off thousands of government workers the beginning of next year to help balance the state budget. The administration official confirmed a report Tuesday in the New York Times’ — do you know the New York Times has lost 74% of its stock price, stock value, in the last ten years? Hear, hear to Little Pinch! Seventy-four percent of the stock value lost in the last ten years. Anyway, the ‘administration official confirmed a report Tuesday in the New York Times that Paterson will direct state agencies to begin picking positions that could be eliminated starting Jan. 1. That date marks the expiration of the no-layoffs pledge Paterson gave public employee unions last year in exchange for an agreement to reduce pension costs.’
Told you! New York’s just the first. The stimulus money has run out. Nobody else has any money. Everybody’s broke. You can’t raise taxes too much in New York or you totally shut down the city. What is it, 75,000 people in New York City basically pay the freight for the people who don’t work in New York City? They can’t afford to lose any of them by raising their taxes. Something like $70 billion worth of wealth has moved out of New Jersey, which Governor Christie is trying to reverse and do something about. Frankly not enough attention (we’re doing it here) is being paid to what Chris Christie is doing ’cause Christie, the governor of New Jersey, is the antidote to everything being done in Washington and many of the states, and the guy is courageous. The guy has got guts. He is fearless. He doesn’t care what’s said about him, he doesn’t care what’s written about him, and he doesn’t care what’s threatened against him. He knows he was elected to do a job, and he is in the process of doing it. He is the microcosm of exactly what needs to happen in many other states and, of course, in our nation’s capital.