Politicians Are Smarter Than You

Just ask them, ask a politician what's good for you and they'll pulling you aside, talk to you in that fatherly tone and explain that if you disagree, you must not have all the facts, are misinformed or--in quiet moments with other politicians--you are just plain stupid.

Take John Corzine for example; in New Jersey, we had a question on the ballot concerning approval of $450-million in loans for stem cell research. Check out what the response was when it was shot down:

New Jersey taxpayers have spoken, and they're clearly not happy.

There was little disagreement in the political world yesterday that voter concern over the state's finances and outrage over ever-rising taxes drove Tuesday's defeat of $450 million in bonds to fund stem-cell research and another measure to earmark more sales-tax revenue for property-tax reform.

"Voters have given us clear instructions," Gov. Corzine said yesterday. "They told us to resolve our alarming and pressing financial problems."

The measures' defeat represented the first time a statewide ballot question has been voted down in 17 years.

Liberals and the Inquirer (but I'm redundant) are perplexed that the citizens in the state would turn down funding for stem cells. You can hear them thinking: "this is a Democratic state, stem cells are a Democrat issue, voters turned it down and we had Michael J. Fox campaigning for us, they must be upset about the tax situation...or they're just imbeciles"

It will never occur to them that perhaps the voters find the entire stem cell thing distasteful. Granted, this was funding for all stem cell research, yet harvesting cells from embryos is not a road people are comfortable taking and rejected the Trenton's plans to subsidize it.

Whatever the issue is--from alcohol licenses to gay marriage--if voters reject a ballot question favored by Democrats, there always has to be another motive other than the fact that they disagreed with Democrats.