Christie is a Bush-Rove Republican. He opposes gay marriage, would vote to outlaw abortion, would weaken gun laws and is a tool of insurance companies.

Corzine is obviously not perfect but he supports the agenda of the progessive Democratic majority in this state. Christie is an arrogant Bushite who would repeat the Whitman policies which have led to the State's financial mess.

Not everyone who is voting for Daggett would otherwise vote for Christie. I know the media has been making a big deal about Daggett siphoning votes away from Christie, but I wouldn't vote for Christie if I don't vote for Daggett and neither would a bunch of other disaffected democrats voting for Daggett I know.

I'm no Republican, but I hate the Democrap clowns who run this state and this city.

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aufmSRtDn0gg

Goldman Sachs Still Paid for Swaps on Redeemed Bonds (Update2)

By Dunstan McNichol

Oct. 23 (Bloomberg) -- New Jersey taxpayers are sending almost $1 million a month to a partnership run by Goldman Sachs Group Inc. for protection against rising interest costs on bonds that the state redeemed more than a year ago.

The most-densely populated U.S. state is making the payments under an agreement made during the administration of former Governor James E. McGreevey in 2003, when New Jersey’s Transportation Trust Fund Authority sold $345 million in auction-rate bonds whose yields fluctuated with short-term interest costs. The agency finances road and rail projects.

“This vividly shows the risk of entering into interest- rate swap agreements,” said Christopher Taylor, former executive director of the Municipal Securities Rulemaking Board in Alexandria, Virginia. “The world’s got to see what stupidity even the sophisticated investors like the transportation fund can get into.”

While New Jersey replaced the debt with fixed-rate securities in 2008 after the $330 billion auction-rate bond market froze, the swap -- in which two parties typically exchange fixed payments for ones based on floating interest rates -- isn’t scheduled to expire until 2019.

The state paid $940,000 under the agreement last month and a total of $11.4 million since the auction-rate bonds were redeemed. The expenditures come as the fund reaches its borrowing limit and Governor Jon Corzine, Goldman’s former chairman who was a U.S. senator when the contract was signed, seeks $400 million in budget reductions as tax receipts fall.

Bond’s Life

“The state has made it clear that true interest costs are measured over the life of bonds,” the New Jersey Treasurer’s office said in an e-mailed statement from spokesman Tom Vincz. “As this swap is applied as it was intended to be applied, with TTFA variable-rate bonds, true interests costs are projected to be below the average true interest costs for TTFA bonds,” the statement said, referring to the Transportation Trust Fund Authority by its acronym.

“Unfortunately, Bloomberg misleadingly measured these costs over a brief window in time, which captured only the influences of the worst credit conditions in U.S. history.”

Harvard Swaps

Municipalities and universities across the U.S. have paid hundreds of millions to terminate swaps on variable-rate debt after interest costs, instead of climbing, fell to record lows in the worst credit crisis since the Great Depression. Harvard University last week disclosed it had given $497.6 million to investment banks to exit such agreements following similar terminations by New York’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority and the Oakland, California-based Bay Area Toll Authority.

In New Jersey, the 3.6 percent fixed rate the trust fund is paying on the swap has pushed the cost to taxpayers of the original $345 million borrowing to 7.8 percent, the most the authority has paid since it was formed in 1985, according to records posted on its Web site.

John McCormac, the Mayor of Woodbridge, N.J., state treasurer at the time of the 2003 deal, declined to discuss the issue in a telephone conversation today.

“I have no recollection of anything,” he said. “Ask the treasurer.”

Corzine spokesman Robert Corrales referred an inquiry today to the treasurer’s office for comment, and Goldman Sachs spokesman Michael DuVally referred to an earlier statement in which the bank said it is working with the state.

Inheriting Swaps

“This administration inherited a large swap portfolio and has worked over the last several years to terminate, reverse and prudently manage the derivatives to the benefit of the taxpayer,” the treasurer’s statement said. “This administration has initiated only two new swaps, which have been used to reverse pre-existing swaps and protect taxpayers from potential financial risks.”

Payments on the swaps without underlying variable-rate bonds are draining money from a dwindling account that may not be able to support new projects because the $895 million in annual gasoline taxes and toll revenue dedicated to the transportation trust fund will be needed to pay debt service on $10.3 billion in debt. To help prop up spending, officials have suggested raising New Jersey’s 14.5 cents-a-gallon gasoline levy, the fourth- lowest among U.S. states, according to research by the Tax Foundation, a Washington, D.C.-based research organization.

Pulaski Skyway

New Jersey’s contract with Goldman Sachs Mitsui Marine Derivative Products L.P., a partnership of the bank and Japan’s Mitsui Sumitomo Insurance Group Holdings Inc., allows the state to terminate the deal without penalty after 2011. Canceling before then would require a payment estimated at $37.6 million on Sept. 30, according to state records.

The state’s payments on the swap in the past year have exceeded the $10 million budgeted to maintain the 76-year-old Pulaski Skyway, the 3-mile (4.8 kilometers) elevated road from Newark to Jersey City.

“I’m sure there’s an explanation,” Corzine, 62, said during a brief interview as he left a contractors’ convention in New Brunswick, New Jersey, on Oct. 14. “They don’t just send money out.”

“We believe treasury should continue to aggressively manage the termination, conversion and management of swaps that this administration inherited, while dealing with the realities of the most difficult credit conditions in history,” Corzine’s spokesman Steve Sigmund said in an e-mail.

Cost Reduction

“Through careful planning and prudent decision-making, we continue to seek out and find ways to reduce or minimize public finance costs supported by the budget and New Jersey taxpayers,” the treasury statement said.

Corzine, a Democrat, is the only U.S. governor seeking re- election this year and tied in this month’s Quinnipiac poll with Republican Christopher Christie, 47, a former federal prosecutor. Each had about 40 percent, with a 2.8 percentage- point margin of error.

New Jersey couldn’t reach acceptable terms when it tried to issue variable-rate bonds last year to replace the failed auction-rate securities hedged by the Goldman swap, the Office of Public Finance said in a three-page response to questions about the transaction. It is unfair to judge the ultimate performance of the 16-year agreement until it concludes in 2019, the agency said in the statement.

“Cherry-picking one date in time for a net payment or net receipt of swap payment does not accurately or objectively reflect the true economics of the contract,” the office said in the e-mailed statement.

Making Adjustment

Goldman Sachs is working with officials to make adjustments in light of “changes in market conditions that have made the transaction less attractive,” spokesman Michael DuVally said in an e-mail. “The economics and risks involved in this transaction were fully understood when the authority decided to enter into this swap six years ago.”

Acacia Financial Group Inc., the Marlton, N.J.-based adviser on the fixed-rate bonds that replaced the auction securities, referred questions to the Office of Public Finance.

“Decisions were made to proceed with the swap,” Vivian Altman, the trust fund’s adviser on the original debt issue in 2003, said in a phone interview.

“I can’t speak to what discussions they had internally,” she said. “I would have no way of knowing. I just have no idea of what information they had been provided.”

New Jersey, which Moody’s Investors Service called “one of the largest users of swaps in the municipal market,” has 28 such contracts outstanding on $4.4 billion worth of debt, according to a monthly valuation report.

Trust Fund Agreement

The trust fund agreement was made three years before Corzine became governor. Auction-rate obligations involved in the transaction were supposed to allow borrowers to realize short-term interest rates on long-term debt by offering the bonds for periodic resale. The market froze after banks that historically volunteered to buy unwanted securities stopped doing so during the global credit crisis.

Kevin Willens, a managing director of Goldman and currently a director of the MSRB, which sets standards for banks and securities firms in the $2.8 trillion municipal market, presented the swaps proposal on the bank’s behalf, authority minutes show.

Charts “described the success rates of swaps,” according to the minutes. Willens was not an MSRB director at the time.

$9.9 Million

New Jersey saved $9.9 million from 2003 to 2008 by issuing the auction-rate bonds instead of fixed-cost debt, the Office of Public Finance said in a report last year.

The trust fund paid $4.5 million in penalty interest payments when the auction-rate market collapsed and some borrowers’ costs soared. After it failed to put together a sale of a different type of variable-rate bonds, New Jersey then issued 11-year, fixed-rate notes yielding 4.18 percent in August 2008, according to the Office of Public Finance.

Refinancing the bonds cost $2.1 million, reducing the authority’s savings on the transaction to $3.3 million, state records show.

Since then, the fund has paid almost four times that amount on a contract that hedges nothing.

For New Jersey, the swap became “a tool for no purpose,” former regulator Taylor said.

To contact the reporter on this story: Dunstan McNichol in Trenton at dmcnichol@bloomberg.net.
Last Updated: October 23, 2009 16:22 EDT

The irony for the state is that most people do not want Corzine to win. Most Jersey folks are sick of the debt, and highest taxes in the country, but he still might win. For simplicity Corzine 38% Democrat.
Republicans..Daggett 25% and Christie 37%.

Please vote Christie and leave Daggett for next term.

Don't let Corzine steal this, he will raise taxes again.

All of you know I voted against Obama, calling him misleading/inexperienced...and from what I read here/now, many folks regret voting for him...don't make the same mistake.

"by SamS on 2009/10/18 17:28:57

The Republican, Christopher Christie . . . his talk is far too vague, and . . . there are concerns about whether he appointed politically connected friends to lucrative positions."


----------------

And I have concerns that Corzine was able to muscle the mayors of Secaucus and Hoboken to resign yet has done nothing to get the corrupt politicians of Jersey City to resign.

You've got to be joking! Anyone who pulls the lever for Corzine is, in effect, pulling the lever for Healy and friends.

The Republican, Christopher Christie . . . his talk is far too vague, and . . . there are concerns about whether he appointed politically connected friends to lucrative positions.

A vote for Daggett, equals a vote for Corzine.
Unfortunately this is really a 2 horse race...
Corzine endorsing fraud and increasing taxes once again. Christie lowering taxes and putting white collar criminals in jail.

dont spend your vote in vain.

Independent Chris Daggett

in a nutshell

pro-choice
pro Gay Marriage
pro Charter Schools
endorsed by The Sierra Club
will make the tough choices New Jersey needs.

Funny that New Yorkers (NY Times writers) wants us to have a governer that only raises taxes. If Jersey has taxes of 80%, then NY and NYC will seem like a tax haven, and their condo prices can stop depreciating. I lobby for them to take re-patriate Corzine. What bullshit logic is that Corzine has experience and Christie does not? Did he have experience in running a State prior to becoming a Govenor?! Time for Christie to give this job a try...

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/18/opi ... 0of%20New%20Jersey&st=cse


Published: October 17, 2009
Like almost every other state in the union, New Jersey is in bad shape. Revenues are down. Unemployment is up. A state deficit is looming. Taxes are high, and more borrowing is taboo. Unfortunately for Gov. Jon Corzine, it is also election time. Mr. Corzine, a Democrat, has struggled through his first term, partly because of a legislature that will not make the tough decisions. He still has lessons to learn about communication and leadership, but he is a better choice for New Jersey voters than either of his challengers. He has earned another four years to deal with the state’s budget problems and culture of corruption.

Despite his support from President Obama, Governor Corzine faces two formidable opponents who have made the most of his stormy first term. The Republican, Christopher Christie, a former United States attorney, has made headway by talking about slashing taxes and state programs. But his talk is far too vague, and he has no record to back it up. Further, there are concerns about whether he appointed politically connected friends to lucrative positions. There were also reports that his office targeted Democrats, including Senator Robert Menendez, close to election time.

An engaging independent candidate, Christopher Daggett, has also done well, even though New Jersey’s infamous political bosses have made sure that only the most intrepid voters will find him on the ballot. Mr. Daggett’s contribution to this campaign has been his thought-provoking ideas about cutting property taxes and shifting some of the tax burden to high-end services like architect’s or lawyer’s fees or fancy haircut parlors.

It is far easier to come up with campaign themes than slog through the real-world quagmire of New Jersey politics, as Mr. Corzine has done. He inherited corruption that is legendary and a budget that his predecessors, Democratic and Republican, had milked nearly dry. Governor Corzine took some difficult steps, like his smart but unpopular plan to increase highway tolls. He shut down the state government when lawmakers refused to back his extra-lean budget. He has managed to increase the contributions to the underfunded pension plan. And he has begun the hard task of reforming state government by limiting some perks for state workers.

Mr. Corzine is hardly the perfect politician. Most New Jersey voters find him astonishingly inarticulate, and his credentials as a former co-chairman of Goldman Sachs do not seem as impressive as they did before the financial meltdown in 2008. He has poured lots of his personal wealth into this race, far too much of it for biting — and sometimes juvenile — attacks on Mr. Christie. In his second term, we would like to see him back away from the state’s unions.

A New York Times poll completed last week captured the way New Jersey voters have been grumbling about all their choices for governor. But Jon Corzine, who is slightly ahead among likely voters, is a decent man with a laudable set of goals for his state. We endorse him for re-election in New Jersey on Nov. 3.

these are your choices. seriously.

Lt Governor candidates debate the negative campaigning Is Chris Christie fat

Yes, he is saying that the state should have jurisdiction over the fed. But I liked the way you wrote it so that it sounds like he is anti-environment.

Christie says, on camera, that he will actively work against the Obama Administration's EPA.

YouTube

I know independent Chris Daggett is endorsed by The Sierra Club.

If so, tell me what issue is most important to you.

Do their (Corzine, Christie or Daggett's) stances on the environment matter to you?

What do you think the most pressing environmental issues are in Jersey City and what would you like to see the governor do about them?

What do you think of Corzine's environmental record so far?