Reader urges vote for Independent candidate for governor

The political system in NJ is broken and need a major overhaul. The sad truth is that today, our two political parties are one in the same. They have different names and different buzzwords to energize their different members, but once in office they operate very much the same way. The Democrats, at least until recently, spend and tax and the Republicans spend and borrow. Different approaches, but the same result. Our political system has evolved into one where our parties replace one politician with another and nothing ever changes. Call them plug-in politicians. Over and over we plug in a new politician from the same party and we get the exact same results. There are so many “safe seats” at all levels of government that our elected representatives have lost the courage or better yet lost the need to make dramatic changes. They simply pony up a small tax increase at the municipal level, borrow more money at the county level and add another small tax at the state level. Salaries, expenses and the like are not going down, so unless we change the way we run our government you can pencil in a tax increase at one level or another for the foreseeable future. Recently, I have been hearing people say that a vote for Chris Daggett will be a vote for Corzine or Christie, depending on who is doing the speaking. Nothing could be further from the truth. The most recent poll gives Daggett 17 percent of the vote and he can win with as little as 34 percent of the vote. Why are people running to him? Because he has a plan that will change the way NJ raises its money. It is not a perfect plan, but at least it is something different than the same old story, the same old problems and the same old tax increases. So send a message to our political parties that the same old thing is no longer acceptable. Vote Independent on Nov. 3. Bob Maikis Wantage Editor’s note: The writer is an Independent candidate for a seat on Wantage Township’s council.