The Wrightwing

Jared Kushner, a 25 year old law student, somehow has the financial means to purchase controlling interest in one of the most influential, if moribund, newspapers in the nation.

Jared Kushner, the 25-year-old son of a wealthy New Jersey developer who was sentenced to prison last year, has bought The New York Observer, paying what one person familiar with details of the sale said was nearly $10 million for a majority stake in the weekly newspaper.

In a private, back room deal at that. How much you want to bet he is acting as a beard for his father, a notorious, if reclusive, power player in NJ politics?

The families habit of making huge donations, even before they are old enough to vote, has gotten them into hot water and even in jail.

So now they own a paper. Oh joy.

/SARCASM I guess we will finally see what a REAL liberal voice sounds like now. After all, who can trust those radical representatives of the Republican Right, The New York Times, the New York Daily News, The New York Post, or The Bergen Record, The Atlantic City Press and The Newark Star Ledger in NJ. Fronts for Pat Robertson and Dick Chaney, all of them. All of them I tells ya! /end-SARCASM

Just like a liberal to throw away money for ‘the cause’ in an attempt to buy influence through a centralized, controlled source. Maybe it will turn into another Air-America. I can only hope they bankrupt themselves before they succeed. Not likely though, when they have control of our wealth through the government they own.

I am now sitting on my back deck. (And yes, yes I DO have a big deck).

I am working on a forum to add to this site, laptop in lap, where it rarely is, a jug of iced lemonade next to me, as well as an evening mug of Darjeeling tea, and I am thinking of opening a bottle of Ommegang Three Philosophers, a quadruple bock.

It is 79 degrees, low humidity, the slightest of breezes wafting by now and then, and I am in the shade of the trees that surround me. No one is running power tools; traffic is so light on I-287, about a mile away, that I can barely hear a quiet hum from it. The birds are active and vocal; my tenants scurry by every now and then and stop to stare at me. (Chipmunks are cute, but not very talkative). There is a pair of woodpeckers nesting nearby and often one scrambles around a tree close enough that I can watch it hunt for grubs by slamming it head against the bark. Something I find strangely entertaining.

A young deer, still in fawn spots, just crashed down the hill through the trees and stopped in horror at the sight of a human staring back at it. I shooed it back to mom. Someone just learned to look before they leap, literally.

The birds are chattering away so nicely I have not bothered to crank up some tunes, as I often do when working on the PC. (Current fave: Rob Costlow). The accompanying chirps, twitters and flutters, along with the occasional thwock-thwock-thwock from the woodpeckers are enough.

You know, sometimes New Jersey is not so bad, if you can forget the politics.

Crap. I shouldn’t have said that.

The saddest thing about this, is that I am not surprised. Traveling legally, obeying the law, under protection of Federal law, is apparently illegal in New Jersey.
What’s your point? You’se gotta problem wit’ dat?

When Gregg Revell packed his bags for a trip to Pennsylvania last April, he had no idea how far he’d be traveling.
Before the week was out, the 57-year-old suburban real estate agent and grandfather would be arrested, thrown into one of the country’s most notorious jails, strip searched and inoculated against his will. The soft-spoken Utah native would be on his way to becoming a poster child for the National Rifle Association in a $3 million lawsuit.
During a nearly five-day stay in a Newark, N.J., jail, he would meet a terrifying side of America that most Utahns see only on television and briefly would become a jailhouse mentor to drug dealers and violent criminals.

All because New Jersey has a pathological, hysterical, fear of freedom.

I gotta get out of this state.

ASSemblyman Peter J. Biondi, Repugnantican from the Somerset/Morris area of New Jersey, has introduced a bill to forbid anonymous posting on public Internet forums, and to require identification of those that do post.

2. The operator of any interactive computer service or an Internet service provider shall establish, maintain and enforce a policy to require any information content provider who posts written messages on a public forum website either to be identified by a legal name and address, or to register a legal name and address with the operator of the interactive computer service or the Internet service provider through which the information content provider gains access to the interactive computer service or Internet, as appropriate.

It is clear from this that Biondi is ignorant of current technology that does not involve paper, boots and brown shirts, and that he is ignorant of the needs of free speech in a free society, and is irrelevant to modern society after about, oh, say 1970. Your papers please!

This man is a laughingstock to anyone capable of programming their own VCR, which is all the more sad, considering that VCRs are nearing obsolescence.

Just as Democrats make themselves irrelevant by continuing to call for bankrupt ideological laws on gun control, socialized medicine, and the drug war, so Republicans throw away any credibility they have by promoting clueless ignorance such as this, along with anti-evolution, anti-gay laws. There are many other things these two old parties do to drive away good people of reason, but those are enough to list here.

If this should pass and be signed into law by our fuhrer governor Corzine, NJ would become the butt-pit of free speech, in complete accord with the goals of the federal authoritarian McCain-Feingold act.

Whether or not this passes, I hereby declare this website private. Membership is open only to members species whose genetic code is within 99.01% of the genome of Homo Sapiens. While I realize this is an extremely exclusionary requirement, excluding over 99% of the life-forms on the planet, I believe that this will make for a much more manageable site for the primary readers.

I will also consider auxiliary memberships for non-human sentients that are capable of making a cogent request for membership, in English, via the on-line registration process. I expect such requests to be very few, but none the less, welcome.

via drudge

In the name of “safety”, we now need to be registered and scanned to access our own children.

When a parent arrives to pick up their child at one of three grade schools in the Freehold Borough School District, they’ll need to look into a camera that will take a digital image of their iris. That photo will establish positive identification to gain entrance into the school.

Funding for the project, more than $369,000, was made possibly by a school safety grant through the National Institute of Justice, a research branch of the U.S.

So rather than allow parents and teachers the ability to defend their children with lethal force, we should instead be registered like domestic dogs or endangered species?

While I am not sure he intended it as such, remember the words of Roger Waters:

…did they get you to trade
your heroes for ghosts?
hot ashes for trees?
hot air for a cool breeze?
cold comfort for change?
and did you exchange
a walk on part in the war
for a lead role in a cage?

Yup. We have traded strong, defensive parents, neighbors and communities, for the cold, mechanized false comfort of locked doors, barred windows, machines and bureaucrats wielding regulations.

We have traded the small everyday risks of freedom, for the cowardly comfort of a cage, dependent on the good will of those that control the feed trays, water jars and doors. Woe to him who sings the wrong tune or squawks too loudly.

And now we are training our children to accept this without a question or a whimper.

Lots of Jersey-ana there, the perfect excuse to wait and see if this first snow of the season melts by itself!

Entering New Jersey here.

These stories say so much more than the authors write into them.

The anti-capitalist freegans — the name combines “free” and “vegan” — are so appalled by the waste of the consumer society that they try to live on the leftovers, scavenging for food in supermarket dustbins.

“It’s fun. It’s a thrill. It’s more fun and more satisfying than just going to the store and saying, ‘I wanted some bread and I got it’. It’s the surprise — and the prize,” said Janet Kalish, a New York high school teacher who describes herself as “60 per cent freegan”.

and

Dinner shared by a group of friends at a well-appointed Greenwich Village apartment featured eggplant Parmesan with a salad of mixed greens and avocado dressing. The guests already had snacked on hors d’oeuvres of smoked mozzarella and crackers.

Not bad considering the diners find their food by digging through garbage. They call themselves “freegans,” a play on the words “vegan”_ vegetarians who avoid all animal products, including dairy _ and “free.” In an ideological rejection of consumer waste, they only eat food that’s been discarded.

Freegans. They hate capitalism, but exist by scavenging off its remains.

They claim the capitalist system is so inefficient that they can do this, yet they ignore the begged question of why the system is so efficient that it can grow, harvest, transport, package and prepare so much food, so cheaply, that it is more efficient to toss out perfectly good leftovers than it is to retain them? (Ignoring, for the moment, undoubted government regulation that likely prevent donation to food banks in some cases).

Greenwich Village, not a cheap place for rent. School teachers, university professors, fortune 500 list executives. Rich dilettantes that have found another way to think themselves superior and allow themselves to wallow in self righteousness, while also shoving aside those that could really use that food.

But then, what else do you expect from a bunch of narcissistic leftists?

Maybe these folks should be volunteering for organizations that help direct this food to those that truly need it?

Oh, I forget. Silly me. That would mean associating with companies like Pepsi and the evil Wal-mart. So I guess that is out. People should be able to retain their nobility as they starve, donchaknow. And those who REALY CARE would know that DIGNITY is just as important a FOOD. Besides, they wouldn’t be able to APPRECIATE the cleverness of how we find so many gourmet foodstuffs! It’s a message after all, that must be sent.

And who knew Hackensack was so hip?

You would think that when designing road improvements, the needs of all the users would be taken into to account. Not so:

HUNTER’S GREEN - As designers draft plans for a $172-million expansion of Bruce B. Downs Boulevard, there is one clear winner: the passenger car.

The losers? Bicycles and mass transit. By extension, some say, the environment and public health are losing out as well.

When New Tampa’s main drag jumps from four lanes to eight in a job that begins in 2007, there will be, at most, a 3-foot-wide shoulder for those who dare to cycle.

The design also calls for only 20 feet of transit space, confining high-speed bus or rail to a one-way service that would render it virtually useless.

I have been a bicyclist for decades, until the past few years. Traffic in north Jersey has gotten too unsafe, among many reasons. I have been hit three times by cars operated by clueless drivers. I now rarely ride. I also taught driving for a few years, so I am an observer of traffic and driving behavior more attuned to what is gong on than most people.

Roads are paid for largely out of general funds. Gas taxes do not pay for all of the maintenance, nor are those taxes set aside for the purpose, they all go into the general fund so politicians can do as they please with them. Remember that the next time a bridge collapses.

Bicyclists and other non-motor vehicles that need to use the road are treated as second-class citizens at best. Where paths are set aside, bikes are lumped together with pedestrians, dog walkers, and kids doing circles on trikes. That is a dangerous mix when you consider that even an out of shape, slow bike rider can get up over 10 miles an hour on flat ground, and coast up over 40 mph on a downhill. If you consider that bike and rider together can weigh over 200 pounds, hitting someone that suddenly steps across a cyclists path as they approach from behind, or a dog that stretches a leash across the path, can be disastrous for those involved. Do the math.

So the safest place in general for non-motor vehicles is a path or lane to themselves, though how to fund separate paths is a question, and finding the room also a problem.

Adding a lane to existing roads when they are maintained is the best option, but this is often ignored by designers, even when state statute requires it, as it does in NJ. ( state server seems sluggish on Sunday, so I will link when the state server union permits) UPDATE: I can not find the statute or regulation that requires consideration of non-motor vehicles when doing roadwork, so I may be mis-remembering something, or it has been removed. Perhaps someone with better knowledge of how to search they labyrinthine collection of state statutes, laws and regulations can find it. I can link to statutes that concern bicycles: Here .

So when designing new roads, or improving old ones, designers should take into consideration all road users, as well as what the road is intended for. It would make little or no sense to add a special lane to a limited access highway like the NJ Turnpike or the Garden State Parkway, that are designed specifically for high-speed, long distance travel, or interstates, that are designed for military use as well. But to do so on general access roads, like most county and local roads, that are used for lower speed traffic and local travel, does make sense.

In Florida, above, they ignore this need. Government is supposed to be for all the citizens, not just the largest portion.

Why they set aside space for mass transit, when most of that can use the same lanes as regular traffic, yet cheat other users, I do not know. Maybe the set aside is for rail, but that has been proved to be very inefficient for transporting people in most cases. Politics keeps rail alive more than anything else. So this space could easily be used for non-motor vehicle users of the roads. But I guess the mass transit lobby is more powerful than the League of American Bicyclists. (I always preferred the original name, League of American Wheelmen, I hated that change).

Here in NJ, along with better road conditions, road user education is needed. I see many cyclists acting in ways that endanger themselves and others, like riding against traffic, ignoring traffic signals, etc, as well as pissing-off motor vehicle users. But I see even more dangerous activity on the part of motor vehicle users. I have lost count of how many times a car has pulled up on my left side and then turned right, cutting me off in a very dangerous manner. One even hooked me and dragged me into a brick wall.
Oncoming cars that turn left, again cutting me off. One of them hit me almost head on, tossing me over the hood of another car that was waiting on the side road. How many times have I heard drivers claim they never see us, or think they have more rights than cyclist, moped-ers(?), runners, etc. They handle machines more deadly in everyday use than any firearm, yet they know nothing of either the laws or common courtesy.

OK, the election is over and, as expected, the people lost. One of the two multi-millionaire oligarchs won. The state is now safe for the wealthy elite that owns runs it.

Corzine has set his one of his first priorities vary high: Property Tax Reform. (eek).

There was an aborted attempt at a State Constitutional Amendment a while back to do something about the property tax.

The obvious first step, reducing spending, will not happen in this state. When politicians in this state hear the idea of spending reductions, it causes an allergic reaction akin to displaying a crucifix to a vampire.

Local school boards, who are the cause of about three quarters of the average property tax bill, have no reason to reduce spending, since they can just claim everything is for the children, and people shut up and get in line. The idea that much of that spending is really for the benefit of the teachers union is studiously ignored.

So if we face reality, we are going to have a property tax in this state for a very long time.

I have seen different proposals to reform it, other than eliminate it and increase other taxes. But they all seem to ignore the basic flaw in the property tax system we have here in NJ. We base our property taxes on the estimated value of the property. This requires an assessment be done periodically, to adjust the assessed value that the taxes are calculated on. This assessment is very subjective, which is unavoidable as the system stands. Some objective criteria can be included, by using sales of similar sized properties and building in the nearby neighborhood. But it is essentially subjective, since not all properties are identical. It can also lead to mischief and unfairness, if not in actuality, then in appearance.

An assessor also needs access to the inside of any buildings. Since most of these are homes, this leads to an intrusive inspection that many object to. I know I object to it. If you object strongly enough, as I did during the recent re-assessment, you can deny inside inspection, but then you are assessed at the highest possible value. In effect, you are punished for disliking having an agent of the state snooping around your home.

So as it stands now, the property tax is assessed on a subjective value, judged by humans who can make mistakes, using subjective criteria that can be misjudged, that needs an intrusive inspection of the inside of peoples homes.

None of the reform proposals, other than eliminating it, address these fundamental problems.

Some, such as a head count of children for the school portion, are equally intrusive, and raise other questions. Though as a single guy with no kids, it would lower my taxes.

Eliminating them for the elderly raises issues of fairness. Do we eliminate them for the Forbes family when they grow old? IF not, how do we judge when? Do we then also eliminate them for low income folks? Those on welfare of unemployment? The possibilities for mischief are endless. Even our past governor, Whitman, paid lower property taxes due to much of her property near Oldwick being claimed as a ‘farm’. Though little or nothing was produced on it.

No system will be perfect, as Whitman’s example above shows. But at least we could base whatever system is chosen, upon OBJECTIVE criteria. The only criteria I know of that can be considered objective are lot size and building size, along with a mostly objective criteria of use. Mostly objective, since spurious claims of use can be made, as in Whitman’s case.

If we base part of the tax on square footage of the lot, and part of the tax on square footage of the building, we could eliminate both the subjective reassessments, and the intrusive inspections.

We can make different rates based on use, and still vary the rates between agricultural, business and residential uses. After all, a 10 acre corn field uses fewer services than a 10 acre office campus. Homes use different services than factories. There are various differences that can be considered. This still leaves room for mischief, but since we already have different rates for different uses, this would remain unchanged.

Since wealthy folks tend to have bigger houses and use more services, they would automatically pay more taxes.

It is also harder to play with measurements than it is to play with subjective value assessments.

I will use my own town as an example, a town of 8.6 acres with a town budget of $13,500,000 . This does not include the school budget obviously.

If you simply divide this up by the square foot, it works out to $602.68 per quarter acre lot or a bit under $0.06 per square foot. Yup, 6 cents a square foot, rounded up.

But this would be somewhat unfair, since someone on a quarter acre lot with a 1400 square foot ranch would pay the same as someone with a quarter acre lot and a 3500 square foot home. So some sort of balance would be needed.

Some town services relate more to house size than lot size, some more to lot size. So allocate the appropriate services in the budget to either building size or lot size, and tax accordingly.

For the sake of argument, assume it is a 50/50 split. It would actually be different, but just as a way of illustration.
So the tax on the lot would be $301.34, and the tax on the houses would be about $86.09 for the 1400 sq. ft. house and 215.24 for the 3500 sq. ft. house.

Something similar could be done with school taxes, perhaps basing them on the size of the house more than the lot, since larger houses imply, to me anyway, larger families, more kids, more use of school resources.

This is just the rough idea, the details are debatable.

But the main idea is to make the tax as objective as possible, with as little room for cheating and mischief as possible, and end both the subjective, unfair, and intrusive nature of the tax as it exists now.

I have a large update to my post on the NJ Governors race below. Pawlowski for Governor

I had a brief conversation today while visiting my second home, Barnes & Noble. I went over to the magazine racks to see if there were any interesting gun mags and found a couple of guys talking about the merits of the various guns they like to carry. One guy was from Florida and the other seemed to be some sort of agency guy. Which agency I never asked, so he may not be at all. He also said he was a firearms instructor.

I did a buttinsky and mentioned I liked the SIG P239 for carry, since it was a single stack and more concealable. This raised some discussion about the concealability of some double stacks, and then on to carry permits.

Apparently, this instructor/agency type guy seemed to think the following about NJ:

A Federal law allows former police officers to carry concealed all over the nation, including the Union of Soviet Socialist Counties of New Jersey.

A firearms purchaser permit is required to posses a gun.

That hollow-point bullets are illegal, a misdemeanor offense, if you are caught with them in a gun out in public.

Now my understanding is the following:
NJ does not recognize a right to carry for ANYONE without a permit to carry or a badge. The badge needs to be held by an active duty official allowed to carry firearms in the course of duty, such as police, FBI, MP’s, etc.

Permits to carry, as we all know, are reserved for the politically influential, with almost no exceptions.

The firearms purchase permit is just that, a permit to purchase. If you move into the state with guns you already own, there is no requirement to register or get the purchase permit. You only need the purchase permit if you want to purchase guns while a resident of NJ.

Hollow-points are sold by every gun counter I know of, they are perfectly legal to posses and use.

So my question is: Which of the above are correct or wrong?

I have stayed silent on the Guber race here in the U.S.S.C.N.J. until now. But Election Day is immanent, like a plague of locusts on the horizon. The ads of the candidates assaulting our senses with the buzzing of radio ads, the scratching of sound bites, the faint, gooey, nasty, popping sound when a slime bomb is stepped on, and a flurry of lawn signs landing to consume the landscape.

We all know Sussex will fall for the latest ‘virginal’ Cadillac Conservative offered up for sacrifice to the Jersey Devil by the Reptilocrats, and Hudson, with the help of that core constituency, Cadaver-Americans, will fall for the latest Limousine Liberal that has bribed his way through the hives of the Dumbocans. That the rest of the state will basically be a contest to see who can steal the most.

May the better thief win.

I will vote for Jeff Pawlowski for Governor this election. No surprise for those that know me.

I can not face wasting a vote for one of the two old parties, thereby giving them the impression I care for either of them, or that I am stupid enough to believe them.

I can not vote for one out of fear the other will win: They are equally despicable, equally cynical in their lies, equally corrupt.
They are just the left and right shoes of the same old Boot On Your Neck Party.

I will do as I have always done, and vote for the candidate that most closely represents my views. That is the ONLY way to send any sort of message to those that have co-opted the state government for their own ends, that we are dissatisfied. That there are grumblings amongst the Plebes that may upset their perfumed, pillowed bottoms from their gold plated corporate seats.

The more voters realize that the two old parties represent the parties, not the voters, the better.
To the two old parties, the voters are only a means to an end, to be placated only enough to get them to vote, and then to be left for dead, to fend for themselves, until the next election.
Better they should stop voting all together, rather than vote for one of THEM. Which is happening, curiously enough.

There are other candidates as well, including the Green Party and independent Hector Castillo.

I urge every one to look at all the candidates and vote for the one that actually represents what you WANT, not what you FEAR.
Only when we all start to do that, when we all send those messages, will things change.

2005-10-28 update: I received the sample ballot and candidates statements yesterday. Here is what I see in these statements, in the order the candidates appear:

Forrester, Republican, Cadillac Conservative;

• “Cut property taxes by 30%”. Whoopee, heard this before. Like this makes a difference when local school taxes make up 75% of your property taxes, which the state has no control over.
• “Take back NJ from the politicians”. Like you, Forrester?
• “I moved here 30 years ago as a poor black working class child”. Channeling Steve Martin?
• “I am not a politician”. Yeah, and just because you take money for sex, you are not a prostitute.
• “We will cut spending”. Don’t make me laugh. Heard it before. Didn’t believe it then, or now.
• “We will fight corruption”. You mean, like that dude in the movie ‘Fight Club’? Cool, can’t wait to see you pummel indict yourself.
• “End pay-to-play”. Uh-huh. no one in history has ever done this, you think you can? Please….Tell me another story Stimpy!
• “blah, blah, end corruption, blah, blah, ethics reform, blah, blah, end scandals, blather, blather….” Snore….

Corzine, Democrat, Limousine Liberal;

• “A long time ago, in an election far, far, away, I promised”. Dude, mixing Lincoln with George Lucas is not very original
• “I will bring my Washington principles to Trenton”. Isn’t that like binging mud to a pig sty?
• “You deserve straight talk and honest numbers”. Yes, we do, but yours ain’t them.
• “We will cut spending”. Don’t make me laugh. Heard it before. Didn’t believe it then, or now.
• “End pay-to-play”. Is this a meme, or a mass delusion?
• “I invoke the holy name of Edison”. Gee, if the schools you Democrats ran actually worked, people might understand this…
• “Guns!” Boo!, Scary! booga-booga-booga!
• “blah, blah, Homeland Security, blah, blah, health care, blah, blah, American Dream, blather, blather….” Snore…

Laricy, Socialist Workers ( no comment needed, he barks for himself );

• “I am a Socialist that believes in the political religion that slaughtered over 100 million people in the 20th century”
• “I want to talk about national and international issues, not measly little state issues”
• “Long live the Revolution!, Viva Cuba, Viva Fidel!”
• “If you want more of that, vote for me!”

Theike, Green, (A Kinder, Gentler Socialist Tyranny);

• “I will belabor the obvious problems of taxes, corruption, schools, pollution and sprawl and the corrupting power of money”. But what are your answers
• “End property taxes and SOAK THE RICH”. Oh, that’s your answer. If money is so corrupting, why do you want so much of it?
• “End local control of schools and institute a huge, centralized, education bureaucracy”. Ah, yes. Of course. If it worked in the USSR, the PRC and Cuba, it should work here. Less choice, fewer options and less freedom are always better. To you guys, anyway
• “End pay-to-play”. Here’s that meme/delusion again.
• “Public Campaign Financing”. So we should force everyone to support candidates they disagree with, or even abhor? I certainly do not want the tax man forcing me to support Nazi’s and Socialists like Lariscy, Latigona, Corzine, Forrester,…or YOU.
• “Replace nuclear power plants with renewable energy, alternative fuel vehicles and mass transit”. You mean shut down the cleanest source of electricity and replace it with expensive, inefficient and unreliable wind power that kills migrating birds, hydro power that destroys rivers and migratory fish, Ethanol/Methanol that takes more energy to produce than is provides, Hydrogen that is unproven as yet, expensive over-hypes hybrid vehicles, and inefficient, inconvenient and expensive mass transit?
• “Ban Eminent Domain for private development”. How about banning it for POLITICAL development, such as what you propose?
• “blah, blah, Social Justice, blah, blah, Grassroots, blah, blah, Peace, blather, blather….” Snore…

Pawlowski, Libertarian, (my choice, these guys actually mean what they say );

• “I am a lifelong NJ resident, family man, Eagle Scout, church going member of local clubs and active in volunteer organizations with experience an a local elected office holder”. OK, now that we have the preliminaries over, can we get on with it? (Eagle Scout?…)
• “Strong but limited government”. I am with you bro!
• “Lower taxes and less spending” Brilliant, actually combining those two ideas! Sounds better than “tax and spend” or “borrow and spend”.
• “Support the Second Amendment, right to carry and the Castle Doctrine”. Go Baby!, Go Baby! In NJ politics, this is nothing short of Medal of Honor level courage. Too bad the gun rights groups in this state are sheep, corralled by the running dogs of gun control in the Republican Party

.

• “Property Rights, against both Eminent Domain and uncompensated regulatory takings”. YES!, I don’t want my house turned into a townhouse development by the mayors brother-in-law OR used to protect the endangered Bandersnatch, Fruminous or otherwise.
• “Government has no business dictating morality”.

Yes, stay out of our bedrooms!

• “Stop persecuting sick people for their choice of medication.”

YES! Leave that choice to patient and doctor; medical marijuana, pain medication, whatever.

• “No Victim, No Crime”.

Let’s concentrate on the real criminals: Thieves, rapists, murderers, terrorists.

Latigona RN, One New Jersey ( I think I know what that RN stands for, and it is NOT Registered Nurse. It’s either Right-wing Nazi or Raging Numskull );

• “One People, One State ONE NEW JERSEY”. “Eine Volk, Eine Riech, Eine Fuehrer!” - Adolf Hitler

Castillo, Education Not Corruption, ( I like this guy, basically a decent guy with decent ideas, but no infrastructure behind him. A bit of a one-trick pony though);

• I am a successful physician, business man, teacher and I am a minority to boot.

Preliminaries done?

• My immigrant, minority parents gave me a duty to repay America for the opportunities we received.

Your welcome. Now are the preliminaries done?

• Break the democratic and republican monopoly

I am with you here.

• Both parties have increased taxes, debt, spending and corruption

Stating the obvious here…

• School Choice, tax credits for tuition at EITHER public or private schools.

YES! I have advocated this for decades. But I would not limit it to parents, but extend it to anyone that pays for a child’s tuition, relatives, neighbors, businesses.

• Two-term limits on all elected offices.

I am with you here.

• Uniform state aid to each student, which would lower property taxes.

Not sure how that would work. Sounds more like moving the taxes around.

• State Constitutional Amendment to limit state and local spending to the rate of inflation and population growth.

Sounds good, but I would need details.

Bell, Independent, ( sounds like an old guy, with a lot of chops, but fed up and pissed off. Not that there’s anything wrong with that );

• Long, long, LONG resume.

Great, what are your ideas?

• Successfully dismissed and removed a Chief of Police, C.O.P. Secretary, two building inspectors, a municipal judge, a court clerk, two zoning officers and others for dereliction of duty.

Heck, I’d vote for him just for that! Getting RID of government officials? OORAH!

• Opposes sale of state toll roads.

Nope, I support that, if it is done fairly and without corruption. (HAH, hah, I’m so funny…)

• “blah, blah, Cut budget, blah, blah, cut state workforce, blah, blah, repeal agencies, blather, blather….” Snore…

Rozzo, Socialist Party USA, (another self barking economic and historical idiot);

• Emulate Spain, Portugal, New Zealand, Brazil and Venezuela.

Like those are all paradises. High crime, high taxes, low freedom in all but N.Z., and N.Z. Is going down fast.

• We stand on our history and accomplishments.

Which is precisely why your party was rejected over 50 years ago, after the citizenry figured out what you monsters actually stand for.

Forchion, Legalize Marijuana, ( I am all for this, but this guy is a bit off the wall. Just a wee bit );

• Admits won’t win.

OK, so not so stoned.

• Wants us to give the finger to the demo-publicans.

I do that every day.

• Claims religious persecution for being a pot smoking rastafarian.

It’s as sensible as any other religion I’ve heard of.

• Wants to end the 35 billion dollar war on drugs, AKA war on US.

All for ending it, but saner people are for this as well.

• Claims rastas persecuted like quakers in England, falun gong in China or christians in Saudi Arabia

No argument here, though a bit overstated.

• Claims he was denied the right to change his name to an Internet address.

There are saner ways to oppose the War on Drugs.

”I was trying to kick her away,” he said. ”She was more agile than I was.”

Cole said he struggled to catch his breath as the animal thrashed about, biting him. For the next half-hour, Cole lay there, until his son, police officers, and firefighters arrived.

Eight rabid coyotes since 1992 in Massachusetts.

This happened in an area bounded by 4 interstate highways, that lies between Worcester and Boston, not in the more rural western part of the state.

Coyotes have migrated east in the past few decades, into the mid-Atlantic, New Netherland and New England areas.
Massachusetts is farther east than New Jersey. NJ has many coyotes; I have seen a coyote at least 2 times in Bergen County, which is in the northeast corner of the state and borders on New York City. It is a very densely populated suburb.

This does not necessarily mean that NJ coyotes are rabid, but it is a valid concern.

As crowded as NJ is, there is a huge percentage of the state locked up in parks and forests, all of them refuge for coyotes, (and bears).

So if you live in an area near one of these parks, which includes every county, except MAYBE Hudson County, be careful. Coyotes are known to prey on pets, small animals and children. In some areas it may be a good idea to keep a loaded shotgun available, though in NJ the government would prefer you to marinate yourself in coyote lure rather than defend yourself, so be prepared for prosecution should you ever need to actually do so. To paraphrase: Better to be judged by 12 than have your kid be a snack for one coyote.

The local skool bord had a referendum on the ballot this past Tuesday to issue a huge $33,000,000 bond. This was pared down to the bone from $37,000,000. Big whoop.

It was defeated by more than 2 to 1.

Yay.

Skool tax in NJ is the biggest part of your property tax, accounting for 70-80% of it. And it is the one that most people do nothing about, since the elections are done on a day different from the November date most think of, so they miss it. Bords uv ejumacashun usually are filled without opposition, sometimes seats go begging, and yet they are among the most powerful taxing authorities in the state.

I have always wondered why so many pay little attention to it.

GeekWithA.45 writes about his loss of compassion for us citizens subjects victims of the Union of Soviet Socialist Counties of New Jersey, (USSCNJ).

He writes, about the oppressive gun laws in the USSCNJ: “For starters, few of them ever knew it any other way, or had any other positive experience to compare it to. If you want a gun, you need a license. Of course you’ll be fingerprinted, and that’s that. Isn’t it like that everywhere? And of course, all guns are registered. Having an unregistered gun is like being a criminal.”

He is so right. When I got out of the Army, (A long tail of a short and miserable experience in itself), one of the few good things I took with me was a changed attitude towards firearms. Understand, I was raised in a household ruled over by a christian scientist male genetic contributory unit, (MGCU), and an Episcopalian mother. Can you get more liberal and authoritarian than that? Yes, but not by much.

So even though I had discovered the Libertarian philosophy in my teens, through such books as ‘Of Rock and Snow’, ‘Atlas Shrugged’, the stories of Heinlein, well before ‘Free to Choose’ and ‘Restoring the American Dream’, which appeared a few years later, I was still instilled with a distrust of weapons. Any weapons: knives, bats, but guns in particular.

I went into the Army with a car festooned with early Handgun Control Inc stickers, the little square ones with a semi-auto inside of an international ‘no’ symbol, the circle with slash.

I came out with the understanding that firearms are a tool, with no inherent nature of good or evil. They were just a thing, nothing more.

After I got home, I soon purchased my first gun. A Ruger MKII .22 with a bull barrel for target shooting. The MGCU turned alternate shades of red, white, and green, but dared not argue because I was big enough by then that his usual method of ‘physical discussion’ was no longer wise for him to attempt. I soon also bough a Ruger M77 .308 with a varmint barrel, again for target shooting.

During that entire process, I meekly allowed myself to be fingerprinted, inspected, approved, stamped, signed and permitted. All under the scrutiny of the town C.O.P., who was the father of a High School classmate who knew me fairly well. But he signed the permit anyway.

During the next few years, I did some target shooting off and on at the closest outdoor range that went more than 50 yards, which was about 45 minutes away in Sussex County. I even used the .308 in self defense once, at a store I was working at, but did not need to fire a shot. All this time, I just accepted the oppressive regime in the state. But I started to learn more, about our history, the Constitution, the reasons for the Amendments, about Liberty as a political concept and reality, not just as a buzz word in Social Studies class. Note: not CIVICS class, Social Studies.

Now, that all occurred around 3 decades ago. I have lived in the USSCNJ for most of my life, and like that old, old, hoary old saying, like a frog in water that is slowly boiled, I have accepted it. I am used to it.

When I went out to Nevada to take the Practical Rifle course at Front Sight, I almost made a lot of the folks there laugh with my questions. You could tell they were used to it though. ‘Can I travel with my guns in the car?’, ‘Where do I have to keep them?’, ‘Loaded or unloaded’, etc., etc.. They were good natured about it, though you could see, in their eyes and hear in their voices, both subtle laughter, and pity at the same time.

I must have seemed like a newly freed victim of the USSR when first confronted with a supermarket produce section. Unbelieving that such a thing could be possible, when all previous experience had been rationing, food lines and shortages. So even though I had conceptually understood the difference between having rational gun laws and having oppressive gun laws, being a parochial homebody I had never EXPERIENCED it.

A frog in heating water. Picture a Warner Bros. cartoon where the character turns in a ‘Sucker’.

So Geek is correct that we accept it because it is all we have ever known. We are also overshadowed by Philadelphia and NYC. Essentially ALL of our news and mass media come from NYC, a smaller amount from Philly, the rest from government broadcasting. The major papers, the Star Ledger, the Atlantic City Press and the Bergen Record are all owned and/or operated by political insiders that profit from the political status quo. Other than stories about the occasional egregious corruption scandal, they cover little, unless it outrages Liberal sensibilities. (Side note: the Record was owned, and still managed by, a family by the name of Borg. I am not kidding. I was raised reading a paper issued by the BORG!)

Last I saw, USSCNJ has the lowest rate of firearm ownership in the US. I wish I could find the source of that, I will add it in here later if I can find it. So again, Geek is right, though I think his use of 15% is too high. I think it is far lower than that. Not so low as to be in single digits, but close. That means gun owners are indeed a small, if not powerless minority in the state.

It is not hopeless though, look at what other small political minorities have accomplished. But to get anywhere, you need to get others outside your minority to either join up, or support you. Gay rights is an example, with a representation in the population estimated to be between 3% to no more than a high of 10%. Now agree or disagree with them, you have to admit that the Gay rights movement has been very effective, and it is easier to convince someone to try a gun than it is to ’switch side’, as it were.

But it is a long haul, and USSCNJ is arguably the single worst, most difficult state to turn around, but it could be done. And it is not likely to be done by the current bunch of gun rights activists here in USSCNJ. As Geek pointed out, they were responsible for the ‘root law’ from which all gun law in USSCNJ has spread, like poison ivy through a garden. They are also mostly reactionary, far right extremists. I gave up going to the range in Sussex County die to the attitudes of the folks working there as range officers. You will not attract new converts to your cause when so many of your representatives act like totalitarian storm troopers right out of the most fevered wet dreams of leftist propaganda. We do not need to convert them politically, economically or socially. Just convert them on RKBA. That is enough.

But it won’t be me.

I am planning on leaving USSCNJ. I have little family left, I am single and have no kids. I do have a house I will need to sell as a ‘fixer upper’, but that should go fast in this market, even if my property taxes just went up $200,…A MONTH.

I am not sure how long it will take, there are still some family ties that will soon end, (my grandmother is 100, so realistically she will pass in the near future). I will still support RKBA in USSCNJ, go to rallies if any occur that I hear about, keep my NJLP membership up, all that. But my heart is no longer in it. It is easier to escape than to fight. Perhaps if there is ever a national ruling on the Second Amendment, that will spur change faster, but short of that, it will be a long, hard, slog that I am no longer willing to attempt. One that will fail unless more rational and reasonable people take over the fight. The ones running it now lost if back in 1966, hell, they gave it away.

I am not sure where, maybe Pennsylvania, maybe New Hampshire. Vermont is nice, if a little socialist, but the market for IT jobs is almost non-existent. I am an easterner, so it will probably not be anywhere out west, too dry, too much bad weather, and on the other coast, politics and taxes at least as bad as the USSCNJ.

I am open to suggestions.

This is an outrage. Jersey City is thinking of using Eminent Domain to take a well run tavern in good condition, and give it to a PRIVATE CATHOLIC SCHOOL for use as an athletic field.

Thank you Supreme Court. You stupid morons. You suborned lackeys of political masters. You socialist sock puppets.

School’s need outweighs bar’s operation: planner

The Bill of Rights is dead. We may as well admit it now. We should have admitted it decades ago.

The First Amendment now means preachers on the govt payroll, in the military, in legislatures. It means government funds for so called Faith Based charities that use our taxes to proselytize their religion to captives in disparate need. It means Abrahamic religions have special rights, others need not apply. Religious groups exempt from taxes, provided they stay out of politics unless they want to. Robertson, Falwell, Cardinals and Bishops, Moral Majority, Promise Keepers, or the despicable Westboro Baptist Church . Peaceable assembly means being corralled into barbed wire covered compounds miles from the target of your protest. Provided you have a permit, unless you are a friendly ‘protest’ of course.

The Second Amendment now means bans of vast categories of gun types, prior restraint on purchase through background checks and permits, carry permits and storage laws that render guns that are possessed all but useless. What about self defense? The right every animal on this planet has to defend itself and its offspring? Oh, that’s right, 911 will take care of THAT! What about the right to resist tyranny? Oh, registration will take care of that. No need to resist tyranny, after we make you safe by confiscating all those nicely registered guns. It worked in England, Australia and Washington D.C., didn’t it?

The Fourth Amendment now means that you can be searched without warrant or cause if you want to travel by any common carrier, like airlines or trains. Your home can be entered and searched without warrant if the police CLAIM they THINK you just MIGHT, MAY BE, POSSIBLY, engaged in commerce in illegal recreational or pharmaceutical drugs. Your property can be confiscated if you are even suspected of crime, including any cash on your person or in your bank account, the car you are driving or the home you live in, and you have sue and prove in court you are innocent to get it back. Your property is considered guilty until proven innocent. After all, only people have rights, not property, you see?

The Fifth Amendment now means that you can be charged with dozens, if not hundreds of crimes for a single act, and placed on trial for each, separately, and harassed by court proceedings to the day you die. You can be held in prison, in secret, incommunicado, with no right to trial, if a single person in authority claims you are an ‘enemy combatant’, with no recourse to review. Your property can be confiscated by any government agency , provided they pay you what THEY say it is worth, and they can GIVE it to whatever private person or corporation they think is more worthy. Or gave the biggest political contribution. Or is the mayors brother-in-law. Or is more politically connected. Or just more ‘acceptable’.

The Sixth Amendment now means that you can be tried in any court of the land, regardless of where the alleged offense occurred. A speedy trial means YEARS of procedure, sometimes concluding after you have lost your youth, your health, your family, or even after you’ve died.

The Eighth Amendment now means that you can be fined more than you are worth for crimes of bad behavior, where no one is harmed. You can be placed in prison for LIFE for possession of small amounts of a leafy herb, just because you have no information to ’share’ with the cops.

The Ninth Amendment has been torn from history, since those in authority conveniently lack enough imagination to think of any other rights not mentioned in the first eight Amendments. How about the RIGHT TO BE LEFT ALONE IN PEACE?!

The Tenth Amendment means that anything the feds want to do, they can, if any state does not do it already. And if any state does not do it to the satisfaction of the feds, the feds will take it over. What is it about ‘not delegated’, ‘prohibited’ and ‘reserved’ that is so hard to understand? Nothing, it is just inconvenient to political grandstanding and power-mongering.

The body of the Constitution?

The Commerce clause now means anything you do in your own state that is also done in another state, is fair game for the feds to regulate. Even growing your own food is now under federal jurisdiction, because you might grow a tomato that a farmer in another state could have sold to you instead.

The Declaration of War clause now means: Let the president do whatever he wants, Congress doesn’t want the responsibility any more.

How many other clauses are gone?

How about Article Five? The AMENDMENT CLAUSE. Just about every act of the feds has been unconstitutional since Roosevelt the Second ruled, not to mention the reigns of Truman the False, Ike the Disappointing, Kennedy the Overrated, Johnson the Second, Richard the Tricky, Gerry the Clumsy, Jimmy the Useless, Ronnie the Hair-do, Bush the Sneaky, Billy-Jeff the Sleazy and now Bush the Shrubberyer.

Whether or not any of those acts are a good or bad idea is beside the point, they were not permissible under the Constitution. Social Security, FDA, EPA, ATFE, FBI, CIA, SEC, FCC, keep going, there are innumerable examples. Now some may be good things, even necessary things, BUT THEY ARE ILLEGAL under the Constitution. If they truly are good things, an amendment should be easy to accomplish. We should amend it, not bend it. Or tear it up.

The question is: What to do about it?

The answer, sadly, is: Likely, nothing. People are too comfortable to care. After all, there are mortgage payments to make, credit card bills to manage, not to mention our careers. Freedom and Liberty? Too much trouble, not worth the effort.

Besides, the Feds will do it for us, right?

For the second time in state history, non-oligarchic candidates force thier way into the gubanatorial debates. I was proud to play a small part the first time that happened, back when Murray Sabrin made it in as a Libertarian.

Now, Libertarian Jeffrey Pawlowski has done it again, along with an independent candidate, Dr. Hector Castillio.

Great news!

OK, Bears have overpopulated much of the state, and are threatening pets and small children. Time to deal with it.

“A strong turnout by New Jersey sportsmen at an upcoming public hearing is critical to the future of the state’s 2005 bear hunt. The head of the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection (DEP), who holds the hunt in his hands, must hear from hunt supporters.”

Bear hunt

What’s the big deal? You got a problem with Cadaver-Americans exercising their right to vote?
Stay active in politics, die in NJ
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