New Jersey state Senate president Steve Sweeney’s fight is a microcosm of the national Democratic debate over taxation. Steve Sweeney is an intimidating force. Physically, sure — his suspender straps strain over the frame of the ironworker who played offensive tackle as a teenager when he could bench-press 450 pounds and “looked like a refrigerator,” as he puts it. But that’s lazy evidence of power. His true strength comes from his steely grip on New Jersey politics. The Democrat will likely become the longest-serving Senate president in state history in February, with more than a decade in office. This is a brash talker, who once called Chris Christie a “bastard” and a “rotten prick” — to the press, no less. Actually, it was a “fucking bastard” and a “fucking rotten prick,” Sweeney informs me, but the Newark Star-Ledger columnist censored him for print. “I wouldn’t take one word back. I was so mad,” he says. In his view, New Jersey’s then-governor, a Republican, decreased funding for children with disabilities to punish the Senate for writing its own budget that year. It was particularly offensive to Sweeney, who, despite talking like a mob boss with frequent curses and overtures on loyalty, gets soft when talking about his daughter with Down syndrome. “The government has a role, and it’s taking care of the vulnerable. And when the government doesn’t do that, that’s when I get really pissed off.” | 
