Tax Policy Expert Bruce Springsteen Criticizes Gov. Christie

The Los Angeles Times reports that Bruce Springsteen has written a letter to his local New Jersey newspaper criticizing the policies of his state's budget cutting Governor.

In a letter to his hometown newspaper, legendary rocker and Garden State icon Bruce Springsteen laments its recent report about how the state was slashing programs that help its poorest citizens while sparing more affluent residents from the budget axe.

"The article is one of the few that highlights the contradictions between a policy of large tax cuts, on the one hand, and cuts in services to those in the most dire conditions, on the other," Springsteen writes to the editors of the Asbury Park Press.

That's very righteous of rocker Springsteen, but meanwhile, back in February of this year, Fox News reported that Springsteen (also his former drummer Max Weinberg and Jon Bon Jovi) have taken advantage of New Jersey's tax laws to significantly cut their taxes on country properties by producing a minimum threshold of $500 a year's worth of farm products.

Fox stated, both in a video report and an article, that Springsteen's "Cadillac Ranch." According to Fox reporter Barbara Nevins Taylor:

Springsteen pays more than $138,000 a year in taxes on his three-acre Colts Neck home, but just $4,639 on the adjoining 200 acres, which is organically farmed and has horses, according to the report.

Just $4, 639 in taxes on 200 acres? Looks like Bruce's image as a working class hero is "Going Down," to quote from one of his famous song titles. Springsteen's accusation has been unable to "throw that speedball" by Fox News and probably Governor Christie like Bruce's buddy could in his "Glory Days."

Hey, Bruce, did you ever think that if these faux farmers in New Jersey had paid their fair share of taxes, the working guys and gals of Newark and Hoboken who made up the difference in the state budget would have had enough spare money to buy the Fords made in that Metuchen plant you sing about in "Glory Days" -- and it might have stayed open?

Liberals often twist Jesus's famous words around and cast the first stone to claim that they are without sin. But for Bruce Springsteen, this does not look like "A Brilliant Disguise."

Springsteen puts a horse on a plane to fly it all over the world so his daughter can compete in equestrian events - and then lectures the rest of America about excessive energy use. Bruce - you know what, Shut The Stuff Up! His most hypocritical action is getting agricultural exemptions on his Colts Neck estate so that he doesn’t have to pay property taxes on that 100 plus acre horse spa. He is not shy about using those ancient tax loopholes for pseudo farming. Which is his tacit agreement that the state property taxes in NJ are far too high - and they are!

Hey Bruce - do you know why the property taxes that you hypocritically avoid in NJ are so high?

He probably doesn’t understand the infamous Abbott Decision, in which the NJ Supreme Court have taken by judicial fiat, property tax monies from all the school districts in NJ to send it to 33 poor inner city districts with abysmal academic records (Newark, Camden, etc.). They claimed property tax funded education discriminated against poor areas and they, in their infinite liberal wisdom were about to make it fair. After 30 years, $40 billion spent and the effect of doubling property taxes for every family without a commensurate benefit, not a single grade in these inner cities improved. (But it was a boon to the teachers’ union.) This all came from liberal democrat social engineering which is one of the most dangerous and destructive forces in human history. As Springsteen avoids his fair share of property tax, he is thereby avoiding his responsibility that his sanctified liberal forebears put in place for the poor. Even though the program is useless, like most socially engineered programs to improve the lot of the poor, Springsteen should own it and pay his taxes before he criticizes Christie for cutting other such programs. So Bruce can stop being a hypocrite and pay his damn property taxes.

The pose of many rock stars is that they are one with the working, blue-collar stiffs and the “poor and oppressed.” Springsteen has created and maintained that facade since he started making records. Whether it squares with reality, i.e. a multi-million dollar rock star like Springsteen, is another matter. I guess Bruce singing about the glories of Ayn Rand and rugged individualism just wouldn’t sell as many cds. Hey Bruce, how about doing a song about Joe McCarthy rooting out the Reds during the fifties? The Kids In The Hall did a skit one time about right wing folksingers, and one song was called “Root’em Out Joe.”

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