Letter To the Editor:
Recently, I stood at a Wawa in Mays Landing talking to folks about the pain we’re all feeling at the pump. One of them looked over at the gas price sign and just shook his head.
“How did we get here?” he said.
This isn’t a talking point. It’s what people are living at the gas pump and the grocery store. Everything costs more, and it’s getting worse. People feel it.
And more and more people are asking a question that Washington doesn’t seem eager to answer:
What does the war with Iran have to do with us?
The reality is these rising prices are tied directly to a conflict that is escalating without a clear explanation of what success looks like or how long it will last.
A huge share of the world’s oil flows through the Strait of Hormuz. When tensions spike in that region, markets react quickly. Oil prices rise. And families here in South Jersey feel it right away. You see it on the sign outside the gas station before you hear about it on the news. Since the war started, gas is up 30 cents per week.
I started my career on the Iran policy team at the State Department. I’ve been in the rooms where national security decisions get made. Iran is a serious threat – sophisticated military, dangerous proxies, the world’s top state sponsor of terrorism. I don’t take any of that lightly.
But recognizing a threat is not the same thing as having a plan. We are spending billions, increasing risk and raising costs here at home without a clearly defined goal.
Iran is not a small country that can be quickly reshaped from the outside. It is a nation of more than 90 million people, with an entrenched regime built to endure pressure. Any conflict involving Iran is likely to be prolonged and unpredictable, with consequences that extend far beyond the region.
Those consequences are not theoretical. They are already hitting kitchen tables across South Jersey.
They show up in longer pauses at the gas pump, where filling up a truck for work now costs far more than it did just weeks ago. They show up in higher delivery costs that get passed on at the grocery store. They show up in rising diesel and fertilizer costs that hit our farmers first and ripple through every part of South Jersey’s economy.
Here in South Jersey, where many people commute long distances, where small businesses operate on tight margins, and where working families are already stretched thin, these increases hit harder.
We’re being asked to accept higher costs and bigger risks without anyone explaining why. When Washington makes bad bets, South Jersey families pay the price. If we’re going to spend hundreds of billions and put American lives on the line, and we’ve already lost over a dozen service members, then somebody better have a plan. And somebody better be willing to say what it is.
What is the goal? What is the timeline? What does success look like?
People in this district aren’t isolationists. They get that America has a role in the world. But they expect discipline, transparency and someone being honest about what it’s going to cost.
They expect their government to take their realities seriously.
We can be strong abroad without making life harder at home. Right now, we’re not doing that. If Washington can’t explain this war, they shouldn’t expect South Jersey families to keep paying for it.
Bayly Winder
Mays Landing
Editor’s note: The writer is a Democratic candidate for the 2nd Congressional District seat in the House of representatives.
