New Jersey Voters Deserve More Than Leonard Lance

This week progressive Democrat Ed Potosnak was one of 230 congressional incumbents and challengers to sign onto a pledge to protect Social Security. Senator Frank Lautenberg signed as did Congressmen Rush Holt, Albio Sires, Donald Payne, Steven Rothman, and Frank Palone. And so did challngers Gary Stein and Ed Potosnak. As kentucky Senate candidate put it earlier today, "Republicans and Wall Street bankers are gearing up to try and privatize Social Security after the election, so I led the Progressive Change Campaign Committee and hundreds of candidates around the country in announcing yesterday that we've pledged not to tolerate any cuts." Needless to say, Leonard Lance, the Wall Street shill Ed is running against, would never sign this kind of a pledge. In fact, his fealty is to GOP House John Boehner who has already said that the age at which American workers collect Social Security needs to rise and that benefits need to be curtailed.

The difference between Ed and Leonard Lance is very clear. Lance represents Big Business, Wall Street and the special interests that fund the GOP. Ed represents ordinary working families, small businesspeople and a better American future. Blue America endorsed Ed and earlier today we asked him if he'd be willing to do a guest post tonight that would help voters understand how he would be a different representative if he is elected on November 2.

59 Seconds

-by Ed Potosnak
 
Let’s face it… the number one issue facing our country right now is jobs. As Democrats, we know that we can multitask and focus our attention on more than one important issue at a time. We need to get people back to work. Every member of Congress on both sides of the aisle should be fighting to put American workers back in good jobs and keep them there. Yet, my opponent, Congressman Leonard Lance, spoke about jobs for merely 59 seconds in the past two years on the House floor.  Out of the 56 million seconds since he was sworn in, he found just 59 to talk jobs. Disgraceful, out of touch, and with the help of my band of dedicated volunteers and the voters… out of office on November 2.
 
As we all know, Members of Congress can make daily speeches on the House floor about nearly any topic they choose… and the topics they choose to speak about generally show us where there priorities lie. Congressman Lance spent more time on the House floor talking about dogs than talking about jobs. I love dogs, but they don’t generally put food on the table for struggling families. Neither does rewarding companies for shipping American jobs overseas… but that didn’t stop Congressman Lance from voting to do just that. Neither does voting to allow China to continue to manipulate its currency… but yeah, Congressman Lance voted for that as well. Congressman Lance has made politics his career, and now in Congress he makes it clear that the only jobs they are concerned about are their own. Sure, he’ll protect the profits on Wall Street, but that is about GOP job preservation: otherwise, how can they expect corporations to fill their campaign coffers?
 
I’m not running for Congress to get a job, I’m running to get a job done for American families.  Here’s my plan to get Americans back to work and get America’s edge back:

·                  Improve access to small business loans. 


The owner of a Hungarian restaurant (one of few in central New Jersey) down the street from my office in Woodbridge owns his million dollar building outright. He has a business plan to expand his restaurant to additional locations and help put people back to work, but the bank won’t grant him a mortgage. We need to make sure that entrepreneurs with solid business plans can still live the American dream and create jobs.

·                  Accelerated Tax Relief for Capital Equipment and Improvements.

For many small businesses the slow economy is making a capital improvement (like an upgrade on computer systems or a new oven at a restaurant) impractical in this economy because the tax deduction is applied over decades. We can put more people back to work building and installing such equipment if the deduction is applied immediately as an incentive for businesses to make more improvements in the near term.

·                  Promote Research and Development. 

The 7th district is the Medicine Chest to the World because we have so many pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies here. We need to make the research and development tax credit permanent so that these companies have the resources they need to provide treatments and cures for disease.

·        End Tax Breaks for Companies that Ship Jobs Overseas. 

We should not be rewarding companies that move American jobs off our shores. Period.

·                  Reward Companies for Creating and Keeping Jobs Here. 

Companies that create jobs in the United States should have an incentive to keep those jobs here. I support tax credits for companies that create new jobs here in the U.S. Every percentage point by which we reduce unemployment, $200 billion is reduced from our deficit.
 
It took me twenty minutes to write this blog. So, just in one evening after a busy campaign day, I spent twenty times more talking about jobs than my opponent did in two years on the floor of the House. We know that Republicans like Congressman Lance are influenced by special interest money, private dinners with lobbyists, and all the perks that go along with being a member of the Grand Ole Party… but 59 seconds on jobs in two years is not how we get our edge back.