Governor Murphy caught in an act of cultural appropriation?

The Left calls it “cultural appropriation”. It’s what they complain about when a member of the so-called “dominant” culture appropriates elements of another culture – especially a disadvantaged “minority” culture. Well, Phil Murphy is certainly a mega-wealthy one-percenter, so having a can of PBR would probably count as cultural appropriation. But in this case, he dressed up…

This photograph was posted by the Governor’s own communications guy, a “proud alum” (as he puts it) of Hillary Clinton, Bill DeBlasio, and Barack Obama. So he should know all about the rights and wrongs of political correctness. Or is it only incorrect when someone you don’t like does it? Of course, that could be anyone from Bernie Sanders and Tulsi Gabbard to Mitch McConnell and Donald Trump.

Was this a case of cultural appropriation or just an attempt at pandering? Will the Governor wear a kilt on St. Andrew's Day? A sombrero on Cinco de Mayo? Will he do a dance too… maybe end up on a remake of Coldplay’s Dancing Politicians (Violet Hill)?

Governor Murphy is always up to something. One day he is issuing directives on providing Sanctuary and millions in aid to illegals – while slashing education funding to the children of taxpayers. The next he is instructing local law enforcement on how to incarcerate the sexes together – can’t wait for the lawsuits that will result from this brainstorm. But somehow he can’t seem to address the highest property taxes in America, or the worst foreclosure rate in America, or the lousiest business climate in America.

Phil Murphy runs away from the big stuff. He likes to meddle in the lives of “lesser beings” (average folks like us) and he like photo ops. And he likes to feel morally superior to everyone else (we suppose it goes along with being economically superior). What you see here is what you are going to get. This is what he is good at.

Some NJ Democrats want to make speaking bad about Islam a crime.

And not just any old crime, but a crime that is punishable outside the normal justice system. A crime that is not subject to the rule of law – punished without due process – based on no more than an accusation. A crime where merely an accusation by a “believer” or an activist who claims to represent a “believer” is enough to make someone lose their job, their career, their ability to live free.

They tried to do it to liberal comedian Bill Maher. A lifelong Democrat, Maher donated $1 million to Barack Obama’s re-election… but it didn’t protect him from the far-Left when he criticized Islam. They wanted his job, his career, his life…

Entire county party organizations are being taken over by a far-Left group called Action Together New Jersey. In Sussex County, for instance, their members have thoroughly infiltrated the local Democrat committees and pushed the moderates out. On the group’s website, they identify members of Action Together New Jersey who have taken over and occupied leadership positions in the Democrat Party.

These include Katie Rotondi, the new Chairwoman of the Sussex County Democrat Committee. Also listed as members on the group’s website are Democrat State Committee members Michele Van Allen and Ben Silva, Stanhope Councilman Anthony Riccardi, Sparta Board of Education member Kate Matteson, as well as a number of Democrat County Committee members.

Also listed on the website are Action Together New Jersey members who failed as candidates for elected office. These include Jennifer Hamilton, who ran against State Senator Steve Oroho in 2017; former legislative candidate Gina Trish, who now holds an appointment from Governor Murphy’s administration; and several former candidates for town council or school board.

No less than eight Democrats who are running for the New Jersey Legislature this year have been clearly identified as members of the far-Left Action Together New Jersey on the group’s website. They are Stacey Gunderman, Lisa Mandelblatt, Deana Lykins, Lisa Bhimani, Darcy Draeger, Christine Clark, Laura Fortgang, and Steven Farkas.

On February 10, 2018, Action Together New Jersey accepted an award from Linda Sarsour. Accepting the award was Action Together New Jersey’s Executive Director, Uyen “Winn” Khuong; Action Together New Jersey’s Sussex County Co-Chair, Johannah Hinksmon; and Action Together New Jersey’s Director of Operations, Kim Baron.

Linda Sarsour is the controversial Democrat activist who has praised the notoriously anti-Semitic Louis Farrakhan, cop-killer Joanne Chesimard, and the anti-Semitic BDS movement. In 2017, Sarsour famously called for “Jihad” against the elected government of the United States of America…

The award was in recognition of voter registration drives and other political campaigning done by Action Together New Jersey in coordination with a group called CAIR, the Council on American-Islamic Relations. Presenting the award was CAIR National Chairwoman, Roula Allouch, and CAIR-NJ Founder, Ahmed Al Shehab.

Due to its apparent ties to the Muslim Brotherhood, one of America’s most important Islamic allies – the United Arab Emirates – has designated CAIR a terrorist organization.

Action Together New Jersey is in the forefront of the drive to push the Democrat Party in New Jersey to the far-Left. They have joined CAIR in opposing the bi-partisan efforts of New Jersey Congressman Josh Gottheimer (D-5) to push back on members of the so-called “Jihad Squad” (far-Left Democrats Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Ilhan Omar, and Rashida Tlaib) in their attempt to promote the anti-Semitic BDS movement.

Action Together New Jersey has endorsed the economically ruinous Green New Deal of Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

The far-Left is on the march, taking over the Democrat Party, pushing out common sense and fiscal responsibility. The Action Together New Jersey crew are not traditional liberal Democrats. In fact, they explicitly reject liberal thought in favor of authoritarian conformism, the end of Free Speech, and making the American Bill of Rights subservient to their mob rule. Action Together New Jersey represents the most radical far-Left elements of the Democrat Party.

Malinowski’s dilemma: One school shooter a Democrat. The other is Transgendered.

The couple involved in the Colorado school shooting are a modern Bonnie & Clyde… well, sort of.

It is reported that “she” is Maya Elizabeth McKinney – except that her public defender said on Wednesday that his client uses male pronouns and goes by the name Alec.

And our modern day “Clyde” is a fellow (still, as of this printing) reportedly called Devon Erickson, described as an “actor and musician.”  According to published reports, Mr. Erickson “shared two posts about politics – one criticizing President Donald Trump and one praising Barack Obama. Erickson is a registered Democrat.”

Ray Lesniak will be glad to know that Mr. Erickson lists paintball (along with videogames and skateboard) as an activity.  So maybe that deadly paintball assault weapon that Lesniak warned us about is germane after all.  No word yet on whether or not he used it in the school shooting.

Both suspects are “white” – so maybe Tom Malinowski will be emboldened to continue arguing that the biggest terrorists on earth are White Americans.  But somehow we don’t think these two were what he had in mind. 

This is what happens when you conflate juvenile attention seekers and the mentally deficient with genuine terrorists.  As our erstwhile “Bonnie” wrote in a social media post… “I probably sucked more today than anyone in the history of kung fu. In the history of China. In the history of sucking.”

These are not the words of a terrorist group, taking credit for an act of terror. 

Tom Malinowski should take note and remember the difference.

Democrat Malinowski ignores genocide. Blames White Americans.

The oldest magazine in the English-speaking world – The Spectator – recently reminded its readers of the 2017 study conclusively reporting that 92 percent of all terrorism murders in the United States were the work of Islamist fanatics.  92 percent. 

Of course, both here and around the world, innocent Muslims have themselves been victims of terrorism perpetrated against them by Islamist fanatics.  The most notable outrage against innocent Muslims being perpetrated at the moment is in Burma and the perpetrators are not fellow Islamists, but rather…

Congressman Tom Malinowski would have you believe that it’s “White Americans” who are oppressing the innocent Muslim population of Burma, known as the Rohingya people.  That’s what Malinowski would have you believe, but it’s a lie.   

Leftist “new” Democrats like Tom Malinowski, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, and Ilhan Abdullahi Omar say we need to “worry” about “White Americans”.  They claim that white Americans are the real terrorists.  In fact, Congressman Malinowski recently wrote an op-ed for Jeff Bezos’ newspaper, claiming that white Americans are the biggest terrorist threat. 

There’s been a genocide going on in the former Burma – now called Myanmar – since 2012, when the military started persecuting an ethnic minority called the Rohingya people, many of whom practice the Muslim faith in this majority Buddhist country.  Around the time that Tom Malinowski began his campaign for Congress – in August of 2017 – the government of Myanmar let loose its latest pogrom on the Rohingyas.  This included “atrocities” in the form of “looting and burning down Rohingya villages, mass killing of Rohingya civilians, gang rapes, and other sexual violence.”

Médecins Sans Frontières estimated in December 2017 that the violence claimed the lives of “at least 10,000 Rohingya people…  At least 392 Rohingya villages in Rakhine state were reported as burned down and destroyed…  as well as the looting of many Rohingya houses, and widespread gang rapes and other forms of sexual violence against the Rohingya Muslim women and girls.”

In September 2018, the United Nations reported that over 700,000 Rohingya people had been driven out of Rakhine state and had become refugees in neighboring Bangladesh.  Two Reuters journalists covering a massacre of innocent people at Inn Din were arrested and imprisoned by the Myanmar government.

Agencies of the United Nations and the International Criminal Court have termed these attacks as acts of “ethnic cleansing” and “genocide”.  In August 2018, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights declared that the leaders in Myanmar should face charges in the International Criminal Court for "crimes against humanity", including acts of "ethnic cleansing" and "genocide."

The leader of Myanmar, State Counselor Aung San Suu Kyi has been strongly criticized for her inaction and silence in response to the military abuses. On September 27, 2018, the Canadian Parliament voted unanimously to dispossess Myanmar leader Aung San Suu Kyi of her honorary Canadian citizenship for the atrocities against Rohingya Muslims.

Tom Malinowski personally knows State Counselor Aung San Suu Kyi and has, in the past, championed her.  Unfortunately, back when he was working for the State Department – during the administration of President Barack Obama – Malinowski had the opportunity to publicly say something about the genocide, instead, said nothing.  In 2014, the organization United to End Genocide reported: 

“The Burmese government has isolated and demonized the 1.3 million Rohingya in Burma as part of a plan to promote a singular nationalist and Buddhist identity. This was formalized in the 1982 Citizenship Act when they were declared ‘non-national’ or ‘foreign residents.’ Today, the Rohingya have become outsiders in a land they have occupied for generations. They are prohibited from marrying, having children, working, obtaining healthcare and going to school...

So who can the Rohingya rely on for protection? Instead of taking a hardline approach against Burma’s repressive government, much of the international community is fighting for the economic spoils of a resource-rich country that is now opening its economy to the world.

Eager to please the Burmese government, the international community is now honoring Burma’s request not even to mention the name Rohingya.

In August, when U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry visited Burma, he met with President Thein Sein and other leading officials, and did not use the word Rohingya. When questioned, a State Department representative said the name issue should be ‘set aside.’

Earlier this summer, Tom Malinowski, the U.S. Special Envoy for Human Rights, visited Burma and failed to say the word ‘Rohingya’. When giving a presentation on the status of the Rakhine state where the majority of the Rohingya live, he did not even acknowledge the group.”

Think about it for just a moment…

This is the same Tom Malinowski who weeps publicly because not enough taxpayer money is being spent on providing Sanctuary State services to illegal immigrants in New Jersey.  But then he does nothing – won’t even acknowledge – the plight of people who have been deemed “foreign” in their own country.

In Congress and in newspaper op-eds, Tom Malinowski has been blaming “White Americans” and labeling them the world’s worst terrorists.  But when an actual bricks and mortar government and its military commits institutional genocide and crimes against humanity… it’s crickets.  Tom Malinowski does nothing.

And remember these words from United to End Genocide… “Instead of taking a hardline approach against Burma’s repressive government, much of the international community is fighting for the economic spoils of a resource-rich country that is now opening its economy to the world.  Eager to please the Burmese government, the international community is now honoring Burma’s request not even to mention the name Rohingya.” 

So what did Tom Malinowski do in between leaving the Obama State Department and running for Congress?  Well, it was disclosed when he filed for Congress:

You guessed it.  He tried to help the “international community” cash in on those “economic spoils” of “resource-rich” Myanmar/Burma.  Tom Malinowski became part of an entity called the Inle Advisory Group.  Who are they? Well, we’ll let them tell you themselves…

Uniting Myanmar’s Heritage With its Brightest Future.

Inle Advisory Group is a boutique firm focused on development opportunities in Myanmar. As Myanmar opens up to political and economic engagement from around the globe, Inle Advisory Group will be there to provide in-depth and comprehensive advisory services for clients across industries.  

Like the iconic fishermen using his distinctive rowing style to navigate the difficult waters of Inle Lake, Inle Advisory Group will utilize our unique knowhow and capabilities to steer our clients through the many investment challenges. The strength of Inle Advisory Group is unparalleled knowledge of Myanmar. This deep expertise equips us to provide clients looking to invest in the world’s newest emerging market with a tailored package of the best possible tools and strategies for long-term growth and desired results.  

Inle Advisory Group will ensure our clients are fully informed to invest successfully in a challenging environment, promoting the “gold standard” of business practices that will benefit U.S. companies and the people of Myanmar.

Something tells us that there was an Inle-type “advisory group” back in the 1930’s promoting a “gold standard” of business practices and enabling another regime set on genocide.  Hey Congressman, is trade really the right response to genocide and crimes against humanity? What point is made by making murderers rich?

Tom Malinowski trades real action to prevent genocide for fashion statements and virtue signaling.  Now it’s time to meet some of his victims…

Tom Malinowski is a disgrace… as is everyone who votes for him.  You are all complicit. 

Tom Moran shits the bed again. NJ.com editorial goes nuts with the name-calling (again).

By Rubashov

At what point did Star-Ledger/NJ.com editor Tom Moran go from a somewhat reasonable – albeit excruciatingly liberal – man of journalism, to New Jersey’s own Julius Streicher, throwing invective and hate at anyone who doesn’t see the world through the increasingly dark and confused lens he does.  Like Streicher, who edited a newspaper called “The Attacker,” Moran discards journalism and adopts a political role as the state’s leading propagandist for what has come to be known as “The Resistance.”

Of course, what he is “resisting” is the outcome (under long established rules) of a national election in the world’s foremost democracy.  Moran and his movement are not only threats to the political and economic stability of United States, but of the World.  It takes humility to live in a democracy, to preserve a Republic.  But Moran and his movement place their will above all else – and if their will should triumph, all future elections would be fought after the fact, regardless of outcome, endlessly, the way they are fighting this one.

To Moran and his movement, we are in year three of the 2016 presidential election.  This election will not be over until they get their way.  Only then will they permit us to move on to the next election. 

But who is this movement?  They are the permanent Establishment Party of government.  That’s what they would be called if they were honest about it.  In Mexico, where honesty rates higher than in Washington, DC, the longtime ruling political party calls itself the Partido Revolucionario Institucional – the Institutional Revolutionary Party.  They held power for 71 uninterrupted years – until the corruption and economic decline got so bad that voters, in their pain, sought other answers (both good and bad).  Donald Trump, Bernie Sanders, like Ralph Nader and Ron Paul before them, are symptoms of a corrupt institutional party producing more pain than benefits. 

Tom Moran is a chief propagandist for global corporatists, like those who publish his newspaper, and for all those who are made comfortable and secure by government and the largesse of the taxpayers.  These include the crony capitalists, pay-to-play government vendors, the Wall Street operators (like Moran’s heroes Jon Corzine and Phil Murphy), and the legions of lobbyists and senior bureaucrats who might as well be interchangeable.  It includes too, those well-off academics, like Brigid Harrison of Montclair State University.  A failed Democrat candidate, Harrison was provided a second life as an Establishment propagandist whose work has been pushed as required reading.    

The permanent Establishment Party straddles both established political parties in America – where our political choices are limited to faux chocolate and faux vanilla – and where propagandists like Tom Moran direct members of the working class to battle each other over race, ethnicity, and gender.  Using the last, they are now in the process of endlessly expanding the opportunities for internal division amongst the 99 percent. 

Candidates like Mikie Sherrill are the face of this “Resistance” to working class pain – to those same voters who bet on Barack Obama to rescue them in 2008, and who, in their pain, reached for Donald Trump in 2016.  A wealthy, expensively trained, representative of the Elite – whose career path was to “check the boxes” on the way to being given “power” as a safe pair-of-hands for those who actually wield it.

The means to Sherrill’s rise to celebrity are notorious.  Along with her Antifa-inspired thugs, she stalked and hounded the aged Congressman and Vietnam War Vet, Rodney Frelinghuysen.  They spat insults at him and lied about his record – acting as if this most bi-partisan and gentlemanly of public servants was akin to David Duke.  In this, they are not so different from Tom Moran and the NJ.com editorial board who over the weekend used words like “fraud” and “fanatical” to describe those who oppose their nurtured-by-hand celebrity, Mikie Sherrill.  If anything, they are using others as a mirror to reflect back what they see in themselves… frauds and fanatics.

Over the next two weeks and beyond – until they get their way and the result from the 2016 presidential election that they believe they are entitled to – Tom Moran and company will continue to behave the way they have been, calling names, spitting hatred, urinating down their own trousers.  They are like beings possessed, confirmed in their certainties, their righteousness and indignation.  They can not think outside of it… just ask Jonathan Salant. 

Tom Malinowski caught trying to capitalize on John McCain’s death?

Democrat candidate for Congress Tom Malinowski is using Senator John McCain’s death for political gain… so says the executive director of a major national Jewish organization. 

 Apparently Malinowski’s campaign has launched a commercial that makes use of some “kind words” that the late Senator had for Malinowski after President Barack Obama nominated him for a post at the State Department.  Along with this, the Malinowski fundraising machine has launched another appeal for more money (it seems the Washington, DC, political team responsible for the commercial want to be paid).

 Senator McCain did have some “kind words” for Tom Malinowski, but that was after Malinowski told those at the hearing that his lovely mother was present.  It is kind of hard to be tough on someone who has brought his mom… 

 Regarding the Malinowski commercial that trades on the late Senator, Matt Brooks of the RJC issued the following statement:

 “For Tom Malinowski to use Senator John McCain’s kind words in a political advertisement to imply support for Malinowski in his race against Congressman Leonard Lance is wrong, and he should immediately take the commercial down. John McCain would have voted for Leonard Lance if he lived in New Jersey’s 7th district. John McCain would have quickly pointed out that Tom Malinowski is dead wrong on Israel, taxes, and a host of other important issues. John McCain’s strong support of Israel flew in the face of Malinowski’s lobbying against supplying Israel’s military with American weapons and his support for the Iran nuclear deal. To wait until the passing of Senator McCain to release a political ad featuring his kind words, and implying support for Malinowski, a claim that McCain is no longer here to refute, is disgusting. Tom Malinowski must take this disgraceful commercial down."

 Of course, we all know that Tom Malinowski has a long record of Israel-bashing and that his campaign has allied itself with groups like the Women’s March, led by “friend of Louis Farrakhan” Linda Sarsour – who last year called for Jihad against the elected government of the United States of America.  And Tom Malinowski is a close political ally of this guy…

Calling for the end to the border wall and other fortifications that protect Israel against terrorists is like calling for a second Holocaust.  It is not enough that Cory Booker’s international allies have driven Jews out of every country they control, now he wants to tear down Israel’s protective barrier and allow them to march in to commence a pogrom of terror, torture, rape, and murder.

And to make matters worse, thanks to the Philadelphia Inquirer, now we know that Booker's fellow Democrat - Bob Menendez - is allowing his campaign to be run by a lobbyist for the foreign government of Qatar, one of the worse anti-Jewish culprits in the world and a government criticized by the United Nations and Amnesty International for its relaxed attitude towards modern slavery - human trafficking and the exploitation of children. 

 So why has Tom Malinowski used the image of a staunchly pro-Israel Senator in his campaign?  Is it because he knows that now that Senator McCain is dead and buried the Senator won’t be able to correct Malinowski’s misinterpretation of him? 

 Senator John McCain would never have time for a Louis Farrakhan or a Linda Sarsour or a Cory Booker holding a stupid anti-Israel sign like that or the antics of a Bob Menendez.  But Malinowski’s use of McCain’s death isn’t the only thing wrong with his campaign commercial.  He brags about standing up to dictators.  He sucked at standing up to dictators.  Hey Tom, occupying an office that is supposed to stand up to dictators, but sucks, isn’t the same as standing up to dictators.

 Just like Tom sucked at standing up to human traffickers.  Especially after his boss, Barack Obama, wanted to pass the union-screwing, working class eviscerating, job-killing Trans-Pacific Partnership (TTP).  Malinowski’s State Department willfully ignored the deplorable records on modern slavery of a number of nations and simply said that they were okay to compete with American working men and women.  It was shameful. 

That’s Tom Malinowski… shameless (but pretty).

Malinowski and Kim embrace the dangerous Left

There’s a group called BlueWave.  It comes out of one of the most radical places in America… Amherst, Massachusetts… a far-left academic enclave where they fly the flag of the United Nations over their town hall.  Yep, they are “citizens of the world” not the United States of America.

In New Jersey, BlueWave is organized out of Montclair in Essex County.  That’s right, Montclair – a town that gave Barack Obama 83 percent of its votes.  Where Hillary Clinton got 18,000 votes to Donald Trump’s 2,300.  Does this sound like your town?

The deal with BlueWave is that they send people from places like Montclair – into communities like yours.  They go door-to-door and raise money to bring their vision of how the world should be to you… and you better accept it!

Now BlueWave is raising money for Tom Malinowski and Andy Kim – two career bureaucrats who were so imbued with leftist “government-knows-best” ideology that rather than give the newly elected President the benefit-of-the-doubt, they quit government to join Leftist groups to undermine his administration.  Wow, refusing to accept the outcome of a democratic election, and then working to undermine the government you work for, is kind of like…

Well, tonight BlueWave is hosting an event for Malinowski and Kim – two bureaucrats whose tenure in government so screwed the American people that they reacted by electing Donald Trump.  And to place an exclamation point on just how dangerously far-Left they are, they’ve invited in Senator Elizabeth Warren… who represents Amherst, Massachusetts. 

Senator Warren is an academic and the sponsor or supporter of a number of far-Left initiatives that obviously Tom Malinowski and Andy Kim stand for as well.  These include…

1.     Warren, Malinowski, and Kim stands for the abolition of ICE;

2.     Warren, Malinowski, and Kim stands for higher taxes;

3.     Warren, Malinowski, and Kim stands for government, run single-payer healthcare;

4.     Warren, Malinowski, and Kim stands for extreme partisanship;

5.     Warren, Malinowski, and Kim stands for increased job-killing regulations;

6.     Warren, Malinowski, and Kim stands against Israel;

7.     Warren, Malinowski, and Kim stands against free trade.

Message from the Kids Rally: Tomorrow belongs to me

"We are the voices of the new generation... We want change, and those who try to stop us cannot stand in our way. We will outnumber you, we will outvote you, and we will outlive you." (High School student, March 24, 2018, Newton, NJ)

This has all happened before.  The same words were used by another generation of students who demanded security over freedom.  They ended up with neither.

What began as a modernist dream ended in retching sadness. 

"I have a message for all of those politicians... Your thoughts and prayers are not going to stop this from happening over and over again, like it has for the past 20 years." (Ibid)

Yes.  We are going to need to address our rotting culture.  A culture, by the way, that many of those young marchers have totally bought into. 

Twenty years ago... In the aftermath of the Columbine shootings, President Bill Clinton first highlighted the problem of violence in our culture and how it was being marketed for profit.  Psychologists had long noted how violent media content acts like a drug on childhood development, chemically altering a child's brain. 

It was President Clinton who pointed out that study after study, and the marketing documents of the entertainment industry itself, all pointed to the entertainment industry's premeditated marketing of violence to children and their undeveloped brains.  All the evidence was there.  Then he went further and ordered a study by the Federal Trade Commission.  The study, released on September 11, 2000, can be accessed below:

https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/press-releases/2000/09/ftc-releases-report-marketing-violent-entertainment-children

In response, the entertainment industry increased its campaign contributions by 1,000 percent and spent hundreds of millions on lobbying and soft money to convince Congress to forget every study it had ever read.  Then September 11, 2001, occurred and concerns over media violence were ignored in the run-up to war.  Some in the entertainment industry never forgot, and when another Clinton ran for President, they derailed her by supporting a first-term senator named Barack Obama. 

Does our young high school student really believe that government will be able to eliminate the illegal possession of firearms any better than it has eliminated the illegal possession of narcotics?  Is there any high school in America free from illegal drug use?

President Richard Nixon declared war on drugs in 1971.  That's before most parents of today's high schoolers were born.  Are we any closer to winning that war -- or have we started to surrender, making up reasoning for decriminalization of those things long warned against?

Gun-free school zones have been disastrous failures.  Will trying to make all of America "gun-free" fare any better?  Instead of carrying the agenda of pre-existing movements, like the anti-NRA Brady bunch, shouldn't students be separating themselves from the failed paradigms of the past?

Of course, that would take thinking in place of emotion and a "be-in" is always cooler than a think-in.  Rallies, like dance parties, stir the emotions.  And the emotions of the young have always been a target for hijacking and abuse by political authoritarians.

If you want to protect children in schools make that the priority.  In other nations, including those on the front line in the battle with terrorism, school shootings are rare.  Despite schools being a prime target for terror attacks, in Israel there have been just six attacks on schools since 1974. 

America doesn't have Hamas or the Fatah al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades or Palestinian Islamic Jihad operating on its borders -- so why does America do such a poor job protecting our schools when other nations, in active battle with terrorist groups, manage it so much better?  Is it simply the case that other nations face facts, while we prefer to bask in emotion and the idea that "it shouldn't happen here" in exceptionalist America? 

We are going to be looking very hard at this and passing along ideas for solutions.  We invite commentary and participation from all.

The One Percenter who stalks GOPer Frelinghuysen

We like Rodney Frelinghuysen because, unlike Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, he didn't try any bullshit, got drafted into the United States Army, and served in Vietnam.  That qualification alone carries him far in our book.

Last spring, a few media boys tried to create a "working class hero" out of a lawyer and bank executive named Saily Avelenda.   In covering her manufactured controversy with Congressman Frelinghuysen, the media boys consistently neglected to provide their readers with Ms. Avelenda's full title:  Senior Vice President and Assistant General Counsel of a bank.  Yes, a fully-fledged member of the one percent!  Before landing her job with Lakeland Bank, in 2010, Ms. Avelenda was general counsel for Hann Financial Service Company, and was a vice president and counsel for Hudson United Bank.

The media tried to make Ms. Avelenda into Northwest New Jersey's version of "La Pasionaria" -- just an average employee standing up to a powerful member of Congress.  In fact, Ms. Saily Avelenda is the co-founder of her own SuperPAC.  You know, S-U-P-E-R-P-A-C, those largely unregulated tools of the super rich that allow the one-percent to wield enormous power to lobby and affect policy in the least transparent way possible.

Yep, Saily Avelenda started her own Super-PAC with GOOGLE multi-millionaire Jonathan Bellack.  Bellack uses his vast wealth to shout down working class voters who can't throw the kind of money around that he can.  While most people worry about their kids' college tuition, property taxes, and staying out of foreclosure, Bellack uses his money to select those who tell everyone else how to live.

Bellack is so stinking rich that he can afford to spend $33,400 on a single dinner ticket, just to hang out with Barack Obama.  $33,400 is what the average working American pays for a new car if they can afford it.  Hey, if you had $33,400 in your bank account could you afford to spend it on ticket to a political fundraiser?  Thought as much.

Now for a word from the great George Carlin.

Carlin is right.  The education establishment sucks.  The establishment media sucks.  And GOOGLE -- the richest corporation in the world -- sucks!  GOOGLE already exercises a creepy corporate control over way too much in our daily lives, but they want more.  Not only does GOOGLE off-shore what should be American jobs to low-paid sweatshops overseas, GOOGLE off-shores its profits to avoid paying taxes to the United States of America.  GOOGLE, corporate lawyers, lobbyists, corporate executives, bankers, one percenters, owners of SUPER-PACs... This is what your Democrats have become. 

They complain about Trump when they damned well know they gave us Trump when they rigged the Democrat presidential primaries to cut off Bernie's nuts.  For once, the "obedient workers" refused to do as they were told and rebelled against allowing the corporate establishment and their media to anoint "Big Mama."

And Saily Avelenda?  Well, the one-percenter Senior Vice President and Assistant General Counsel of a bank has reshaped her media image into...

Yep... she's a "warrior princess"!  You see, this is what comes from playing video games too much and for too long.  You become detached from reality and actually believe yourself to be one of the characters in the game.

You also start to think that a good, decent fellow like Rodney Frelinghuysen is a monster because... well, that's how it is in those games.  There's the "baddies" and there's the "goodies."  Not the kind of character development you get in a novel, but who has time to read a book these days, right Saily?

Actually, the world is a bit more complex than our "warrior princess" would like us to believe.  Less black and white than she'd like us to think.  We'd like Ms. Saily Avelenda to examine with us the policy positions lobbied for by the corporations who paid her so handsomely.  We'd like her to tell us if she showed any compassion at all for those displaced, forced into foreclosure, made homeless by those policies and/or subsequent actions of the corporations she served.

In the real world -- the gray world -- maybe it is Saily who is a bit of a monster herself, and Rodney a bit of a hero? 

We'd enjoy debating Ms. Saily Avelenda or Mr. GOOGLE himself -- Jonathan Bellack -- about the need for Super-PACs in our already corrupt political environment.  We would enjoy a back-and-forth with these two walking, talking advertisements for Citizens United... and all the rest of what is wrong with our political process.

One Percenter Democrats stalk Frelinghuysen

We like Rodney Frelinghuysen because, unlike Bill Clinton and George W. Bush, he didn't try any bullshit, got drafted into the United States Army, and served in Vietnam.  That qualification alone carries him far in our book.

Recently a few slacker reporters have been testing their manhood, trying to compare their bonafides with those of Rodney Frelinghuysen.  You can smell these guys a mile off.  They smell of play.  The perfumed sweat of exertion done, not through gritty work, but the kind you get running on a trail, paddling on a lake, playing with some balls.

The person these reporters are openly promoting -- "La Pasionaria" of their shameless pantomime -- is a lawyer and bank executive named Saily Avelenda.

The sweet smelling boys covering her consistently neglect to provide their readers with Ms. Avelenda's full title:  Senior Vice President and Assistant General Counsel of a bank.  Yes, a fully-fledged member of the one percent!  Before landing her latest job with Lakeland Bank, in 2010, Ms. Avelenda was general counsel for Hann Financial Service Company, and was a vice president and counsel for Hudson United Bank.

If you read, for instance, the New Jersey Herald articles written by David Danzis, you come away with the impression that our "La Pasionaria" is just an average employee.  In fact, Ms. Saily Avelenda is the part-owner of her own Super-PAC!

We shit you not.  Saily Avelenda owns and operates her own Super-PAC with GOOGLE multi-millionaire Jonathan Bellack.  Bellack uses his vast wealth to shout down working class voters who can't throw the kind of money around that he can.  While most people worry about their kids' college tuition, property taxes, and staying out of foreclosure, Bellack uses his money to select those who tell everyone else how to live.

Bellack is so stinking rich that he can afford to spend $33,400 on a single dinner ticket, just to hang out with Barack Obama.  $33,400 is what the average working American pays for a new car if they can afford it.  Hey, can you afford it?  Thought as much.

Now for a word from the great George Carlin.

Carlin is right.  The education establishment sucks.  The establishment media sucks.  And GOOGLE -- the richest corporation in the world -- sucks!  GOOGLE already exercises a creepy corporate control over too much in our daily lives, but they want more.  Not only does GOOGLE off-shore what should be American jobs to low-paid sweatshops overseas, GOOGLE off-shores its profits to avoid paying taxes to the United States of America.  GOOGLE, corporate lawyers, lobbyists, corporate executives, bankers, one percenters, owners of SUPER-PACs... This is what your Democrats have become. 

They complain about Trump when they damned well know they gave us Trump when they cut off Bernie's nuts.  For once, the "obedient workers" refused to do as they were told and rebelled against allowing the corporate establishment and their media to anoint "Big Mama."

Ever since, "La Pasionaria" and her GOOGLE friends have been suffering from a kind of PTSD -- no, not the kind you got from Vietnam -- but a hothouse flower variety picked up by those effete types who have had their asses powdered for far too long.  Too long, but no more, for like all one percenters, the owners of this Super-PAC have a record too.

We'd like Ms. Saily Avelenda to examine with us the policy positions lobbied for by the corporations who paid her so handsomely.  We'd like her to tell us if she showed any compassion at all for those displaced, forced into foreclosure, made homeless by those policies and/or subsequent actions of the corporations she served.

We'd enjoy debating Ms. Saily Avelenda or Mr. GOOGLE himself -- Jonathan Bellack -- about the need for Super-PACs in our already corrupt political environment.  We would enjoy a back-and-forth with these two walking, talking advertisements for Citizens United... and all the rest of what is wrong with our political process.

Just a Minute: Frelinghuysen critic has a Super-PAC???

There have been three stories in the New Jersey Herald about the controversy between Bank Executive Saily Avelenda and Congressman Rodney Frelinghuysen. 

There have been a bunch of other stories from around the state.  None that we read have mentioned this:

National Journal: Hotline Latest Edition (USA)

March 9, 2017

Protests, Super PAC Suggest Frelinghuysen Could Face Serious Challenge

Author: Colin Diersing

Article Text:

Rep. Rodney Frelinghuysen (R-NJ) "has never had a hard time getting re-elected. The 22-year incumbent represents a district so safe that Michael Moore in 2000 tried to run a ficus tree against him to highlight the lack of competition. ... But Frelinghuysen's streak of effortless elections may come to an end in 2018, just as he's at the height of his power as chairman of the House Appropriations Committee."

"Anti-Trump activists have incessantly called on Frelinghuysen to hold a town hall .. He's refused. And now, NJ 11th for Change has a super PAC, founded last month by Google executive Jonathan Bellack and local bank executive Saily Avelenda. ... Donald Trump won Frelinghuysen's district last year, but barely — and by a significantly smaller margin than Mitt Romney won it in 2012." ( Politico)

Nearly all of these news stories fail to provide readers with Ms. Avelenda's full title:  Senior Vice President and Assistant General Counsel of the Bank.  Yep, she is a fully-fledged member of the one percent!  Before landing her latest job with Lakeland Bank, in 2010, Ms. Avelenda was general counsel for Hann Financial Service Company, and was a vice president and counsel for Hudson United Bank.

And far from being a simple everywoman the press makes her out to be, Ms. Saily Avelenda is wrapped up with some even bigger mega-rich political operators.  Ms. Avelenda is actually a partner in a Super-PAC with GOOGLE multi-millionaire Jonathan Bellack, a guy who drops $33,400 on a single dinner ticket to hang out with Barack Obama.  $33,400 is what the average working American pays for a new car if they can afford it -- and this fancy arsed executive drops that much on some political chicken dinner?  This is courtesy of WikiLeaks:

Jonathan Bellack is a mega-rich guy who uses his vast wealth to shout down working class voters who can't throw the kind of money around that he can.  While most people worry about their kids' college tuition, property taxes, and staying out of foreclosure, just look at the kind of money this rich liberal throws around on dirtbag politics:

Joint Fundraising Contributions

These are contributions to committees who are raising funds to be distributed to other committees. The breakdown of these contributions to their final recipients may appear below

Joint Fundraising Contributions

These are contributions to committees who are raising funds to be distributed to other committees. The breakdown of these contributions to their final recipients may appear below

Wow, that is a lot of dough!

Here are the actual filing papers for the Super-PAC controlled and operated by mega-dirt rich corporate executive Jonathan Bellack and lawyer/banker corporate executive Saily Avelenda.  Talk about poster children for our screwed-up political system!

Really?  Really???  When did Democrat activists stop being union guys and started being one percenters, corporate executives, lawyers, bankers, owners of Super-PACs, and other corporate scum?

Super-PACs and the people who own them -- people like Jonathan Bellack and Saily Avelenda -- are the problem with politics in America today.  They have destroyed representative democracy in America.  They have destroyed our Republic.  Don't believe us -- listen to this study from Princeton University:

There you have it.  The problem wonderfully explained.  The rich one percent get their way -- the lobbyists, bankers, lawyers, corporate executives, and especially the owners of Super-PACs are responsible for the shit we are in.

Phoebus votes to create Transgender Task Force

As President Ronald Reagan used to say:  "Personnel is Policy."

It didn't take long for Assemblyperson Gail Phoebus to go off the rails.  Since firing the conservatives on her staff just before Thanksgiving, her voting record clearly shows their absence. 

On Monday, Phoebus voted to establish a Transgender Equality Task Force.  The legislation, A-4567), is sponsored by liberal Democrats Valerie Huttle, Tim Eustace, and Nancy Pinkin.  Here's what it would do (taken directly from the official OLS Bill Statement):

This bill, as amended, establishes the Transgender Equality Task Force, which is charged with assessing the legal and societal barriers to equality for transgender individuals in the State, and providing recommendations to the Legislature and the Governor on how to ensure equality and improve the lives of transgender individuals, with particular attention to the following areas: healthcare, long term care, education, higher education, housing, employment, and criminal justice.

     The bill provides that the task force shall consist of 17 members as follows: a representative of the Department of Banking and Insurance whose duties or expertise includes insurance and banking services and policies as applied to transgender individuals; a representative of the Department of Human Services whose duties or expertise includes expanding access by minority populations to the department’s services or eliminating discrimination in the delivery of departmental programs, policies, or initiatives; a representative of the Department of Health whose duties or expertise includes expanding access by minority populations to clinically appropriate healthcare services or eliminating discrimination in the delivery of healthcare programs, policies, or initiatives; a representative of the Department of Education whose duties or expertise includes protecting the rights of minority students or eliminating discrimination in the delivery of educational programs, policies, or initiatives; a representative of the Office of the Secretary of Higher Education whose duties or expertise includes protecting the rights of minority students in the higher education system or eliminating discrimination in the delivery of higher educational programs, policies, or initiatives; a representative of the Division of Civil Rights in the Department of Law and Public Safety whose duties or expertise includes expanding access by lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender individuals to the department’s services or eliminating discrimination against lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender individuals in the delivery of the division’s programs, policies, or initiatives; and a representative of the Department of Children and Families whose duties or expertise includes expanding access by lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender youth to the department’s services or eliminating discrimination in the delivery of departmental programs, policies, or initiatives with regard to lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender youth; a representative of the Department of Corrections whose duties or expertise includes protecting the safety of minority populations or eliminating discrimination in the delivery of departmental programs, policies, or initiatives; a representative of the Department of Labor and Workforce Development whose duties or expertise includes expanding access by minority populations to the department’s services or eliminating discrimination in the delivery of departmental programs, policies, or initiatives; two public members to be appointed by the Speaker of the General Assembly, one of whom shall be a physician who specializes in transgender health issues, and one of whom shall be a transgender individual; two public members to be appointed by the President of the Senate, one of whom shall be aparent or guardian of a transgender individual, and one of whom shall be an attorney specializing in transgender rights; one public member to be appointed by the Governor, who shall be a representative of a social service agency that provides services and supports to transgender individuals; a representative of the American Civil Liberties Union; a representative ofGarden State Equality; and a representative of The Gender Rights Advocacy Association of New Jersey.

     The bill provides that the task force is to organize as soon as practicable following the appointment of its members, but not later than the 30th day following the appointment of its members, and that the task force is to select a chairperson from among its members.  The bill permits the task force to hold meetings at the times and places it may designate, and provides that a majority of the authorized members of the task force shall constitute a quorum. The bill also provides that the task force may conduct business without a quorum, but may only vote on a recommendation when a quorum is present. Pursuant to the bill, the task force is entitled to receive assistance and services from any State, county, or municipal department, board, commission, or agency, as it may require, and as may be available to it for its purposes, and The Division on Civil Rights in the Department of Law and Public Safety is to provide professional and clerical staff to the task force, as necessary to effectuate the purposes of the bill.   

     The bill requires that the task force prepare and submit a written report to the Governor and the Legislature, outlining its recommendations for advancing transgender equality in the State, not later than six months after its initial meeting. 

A-4567 ensures that the opinions of people with traditional or religious points of view are totally shut out -- along with the views of eminent researchers, medical professionals, scientists, psychiatrists, therapists, and experts in the field of child psychology.  This legislation is designed, in advance, to achieve an intended radical, far-left outcome. 

So get ready to pay more in health care costs after those transgender mandates are recommended and then voted into law by the Democrats who control both chambers of the Legislature.  Get ready to pay higher insurance premiums.

Here's Phoebus' vote (SOURCE:  New Jersey Legislature):

This is what happens when you get rid of conservatives who were Reagan-supporters from even before he was President and replace them with liberal lawyers who donate to Barack Obama.  What you get are votes worthy of Barack Obama.

What's up with Gail Phoebus?

We've all seen these characters before -- shoulder angels or devils, depending on your point of view.  For Assemblyperson Gail Phoebus, her shoulder conservative was Bill Winkler, and her shoulder liberal -- Dan Perez.

It was Winkler, along with Ginnie Littell, who recruited Phoebus to run for Sussex County Freeholder -- her first countywide office -- in January 2012.  They met with the future Assemblyperson at her country club/golf course and convinced her to take the plunge.  And it was Winkler who charted Phoebus' early course as a conservative "reformer" -- word for word.

Meanwhile, Dan Perez was gaining notoriety in Sussex County as the wingman of then Skylands Victory SuperPAC founder Kevin Kelly.  The two lawyers were involved in the lawsuit that broke Republican Party hegemony in Vernon Township.  And Perez was instrumental in ending the careers of a couple Republican members of the Board of Sussex County Community College.

Both Perez and Winkler are outsiders to Sussex County, although Perez has taken up residence here in recent years.  Where they differ most is in their ideological perspective:  Winkler is a conservative and a 1980 delegate for Ronald Reagan for President, while Perez is a liberal who contributed to Barack Obama.

There they sat on Phoebus' shoulders, Winkler on the right and Perez on the left, each trying to sway the ever swayable Phoebus.  One issue in particular was a point of contention:  Abortion.  When Winkler pushed Phoebus to take a tough stand on funding for Planned Parenthood, Perez called Roe v. Wade a great legal decision. 

So it was no great surprise when Phoebus ally George Graham (Sussex County's Freeholder Director) and two Phoebus committeemen from Andover Township angrily approached Winkler at a recent GOP event where he was handing out information packets on the 20/20 Vision Project  -- an ecumenical Pro-Life effort organized by the Roman Catholic archdiocese.  The goal of the 20/20 Project is to pass legislation to address the scientific fact that unborn babies are pain-sensitive at 20 weeks.  Every other country on earth recognizes this fact except North Korea, China, Vietnam, Singapore, Canada, and the Netherlands.  Senator Steve Oroho is the prime sponsor of 20/20 legislation in the State Senate.  Similar legislation has been passed in 15 states and 2017 has been designated as the year of the big push to bring our laws into line with the rest of the civilized world.

With the patronage of Phoebus and Graham, Perez has been moving up the political ladder in Sussex County.  He recently landed a plum political appointment as a Sussex County Municipal Utilities Authority (SCMUA) commissioner and he has made it known that he has his eyes set on an appointment as a Superior Court Judge. 

Of course, as a conservative, Winkler would oppose elevating such a liberal to a high court.  For that reason, Winkler had to go.  And it could also explain why Phoebus, after less than six months in office, began making moves to oust conservative incumbent State Senator Steve Oroho -- who had backed Phoebus when she ran for Freeholder and for Assembly.  Even by New Jersey standards, the short time between Phoebus' taking Oroho's support and then screwing her benefactor was remarkable.  It was real Hudson County Democrat stuff.

When Phoebus summarily fired longtime conservative staffer Lou Crescitelli as her chief of staff, the die was cast.  Crescitelli, a career civil servant and lifetime Pro-Life and Pro-Second Amendment activist, was popular across party and ideological divides for his kindness and gentlemanly behavior.  Unfortunately, he was just too conservative for the new Team Phoebus.  They only want people around them who think like them. 

Back in the Reagan Administration, they had a saying: "Personnel is policy."  What that means, of course, is that to advance a conservative agenda it is necessary to hire staff who supported conservative policies, and who work to achieve conservative objectives rather than to undermine them.  It is clear that Gail Phoebus has chosen a different course.

Spadea lands candidate against Oroho

Franklin Borough Mayor Nicholas Giordano, a Republican, recently bragged on Facebook that he had voted for both Bill Clinton and Barack Obama.  The Mayor, who is said to be seeking a political appointment at the Sussex County Municipal Utilities Authority (SCMUA) while dodging questions about a land deal that benefits his family, has been a controversial figure since replacing longtime Mayor Paul Crowley in January.

CONSTITUENT:  Don't talk conservative when you brag about voting for Bill Clinton and Barack Obama Mayor.

Franklin Mayor Nick Giordano: Yup cause I vote best candidate at the time not by party.

"He's a critter in a big hurry," said one county insider, while another dismissed Giordano as "Mayor Thuglife".

Mayor Nicholas Giordano:  Obama was the "best candidate".

Nonetheless, Giordano seems ready to heed former GOP candidate turned talk radio host Bill Spadea's call for candidates to primary the anti-debt Republicans who stood up and took on the Transportation Trust Fund debacle after 25 years of deficit spending, debt, and lies to cover up the can being kicked down the road.  He's told supporters that he's preparing to run and will launch a recall effort against Senator Steve Oroho (R-24).

The Mayor has also trashed the state League of Municipalities for taking a position opposite his on the TTF.  On Facebook, Giordano exhibits a stunning lack of knowledge on the subject of how the TTF is funded, operates, and about the Tax Restructuring legislation passed on Friday.  Just one example is that Giordano insists that the 23 cents a gallon tax is on home heating oil and is unmoved by evidence to the contrary.

Given Bill Spadea's political history, a Giordano candidacy makes sense.  Spadea's campaign manager in his last attempt at elected office (Assembly) was none other than Tea Partier Leigh Ann Bellew.  She challenged Republican Senator Joe Kyrillos in 2013 the year after she ran Spadea's effort against conservative darling Donna Simon.  Her campaign was dreadful and ended even more dreadfully.  A popular video was circulated to describe the effort, start to finish:

This is the way with so many "Tea Party" members.  Rational discussion is suspect.  It is the anger that matters (aka, "Heart and Soul").  Welcome to Spadea's toilet.

Vanity Fair: Democrats the Party of the 1 Percent

A must read for anyone interested in the shift occurring in politics today.  Just as African-American voters came to embrace the Party whose annual fundraising events were billed as Jefferson-Jackson Day Dinners, working class voters are coming to understand that they have been rejected by both parties but that they have a better chance at forcing the gates of the GOP than they do the "globalist" dominated Democrats.  So will the "party of the rich" become the party of the working class?

The story appeared yesterday (April 20, 2016) in that mainstay of the mainstream media, Vanity Fair, under the headline:  "Why Democrats Are Becoming the Party of the 1 Percent".  Below are some excerpts:

Rich Americans still have it pretty good. I don’t mean everything’s perfect: business regulations can be burdensome; Manhattan zoning can prevent the addition of a town-house floor; estate taxes kick in at over $5 million. But life is acceptable. Barack Obama has not imposed much hardship, and neither will Hillary Clinton.

And what about Donald Trump? Will rich people suffer if he is elected president? Well, yes. Yes, they will. Because we all will. But that’s a pat answer, because Trump and Trumpism are different things. Trump is an erratic candidate who brings chaos to everything. Trumpism, on the other hand, is the doctrine of a different Republican Party, one that would cater not to the donor class, but rather to the white working class. Rich people do not like that idea.

In a world of Trumpism and Clintonism, Democrats would become the party of globalist-minded elites, both economic and cultural, while Republicans would become the party of the working class. Democrats would win backing from those who support expanded trade and immigration, while Republicans would win the support of those who prefer less of both. Erstwhile neocons would go over to Democrats (as they are already promising to do), while doves and isolationists would stick with Republicans. Democrats would remain culturally liberal, while Republicans would remain culturally conservative.

The combination of super-rich Democrats and poor Democrats would exacerbate internal party tensions, but the party would probably resort to forms of appeasement that are already in use. To their rich constituents, Democrats offer more trade, more immigration, and general globalism. To their non-rich constituents, they offer the promise of social justice, which critics might call identity politics. That’s one reason why Democrats have devoted so much attention to issues such as transgender rights, sexual assault on campus, racial disparities in criminal justice, and immigration reform. The causes may be worthy—and they attract sincere advocates—but politically they’re also useful. They don’t bother rich people.

It’s a costly arrangement. The more that Democrats write off the white working class, which has been experiencing a drastic decline in living standards, the harder it is for them to call themselves a party of the little guy. The more that the rich can frame various business practices as blows to privilege or oppression—predatory lending as a way to expand minority home ownership, outsourcing as a way to uplift the world’s poor, etc.—the more they get a pass from Democrats on practices that hurt poorer Americans. Worst of all, the more that interest groups within the Democratic Party quarrel among themselves, the more they rely upon loathing of a common enemy, Republicans, in order to stay united.

Things get darker still, for, if the G.O.P. becomes ever whiter, failing to peel away working-class voters of other races, then partisan conflict could look more and more like racial conflict. That is the nightmare. Our politics are bad enough when voters are mobilized mainly by culture-war issues, such as abortion, because compromise is often impossible. But when voters are mobilized by issues of identity, something most people can’t change, then nothing works. It’s just war.

Seen in this light, Bernie Sanders suddenly looks quite different from his counterpart, and quite shrewder a politician than many give him credit for. One effect of focusing on economic conflict, as Sanders has done, is that it helps reduce other types of conflict. With his calls for breaking up Wall Street banks and helping young people with tuition, Sanders is uniting people across lines of identity by directing them to a cause that has nothing directly to do with identity. Moreover, while economics cause serious and passionate fights, compromise is possible. Maybe Bernie supporters will have to settle for less tuition help than they wanted, or Wall Street will have to give up more than it expected. But people will be left standing. With economic negotiations, adversaries can arrive at something other than total victory or annihilation.

This is a perspective worth considering -- especially in New Jersey -- where the state's number one political website, underwritten by Trump-Kushner money, appears to be wholly wedded to the cause of identity politics and absolutely hateful towards the working class.  Go figure... then again, it is the plaything of a very rich Manhattanite looking to be an ever bigger player in the Garden State.

Read the full Vanity Fair article below:

http://www.vanityfair.com/news/2016/04/why-democrats-are-becoming-the-party-of-the-1-percent

Stuart Stevens is what's wrong with politics

Stuart Stevens has grown very fat off the system.  Year after year, campaign upon campaign, he's gotten rich off the Republican Party as one of the most inside of insider political consultants to the Washington, DC party bosses.  Stuart always gets his cut of whatever is going down.

Usually everything goes his way.  Some tame, docile, member of the GOP political establishment get's nominated and Stuart makes a bundle.  The candidate loses of course -- but the grease machine of corporate cronyism, lobbyists, wads of money, and consultants like Stuart, it keeps going on and on.  Winning and losing matters less than it did because not only does Stuart have corporate clients who are fully participating members of the grease machine, but he has foreign clients too.

Stuart Stevens ran Republican Mitt Romney's lackluster campaign for President four years ago.  Romney spent a lot of money but lost to a bigger insider, President Barack Obama.  This year finds Stuart upset because he doesn't have a seat at the table and isn't getting his cut.  The candidacies of anti-establishment outsiders like Donald Trump and Ted Cruz have completely undone Stuart, who is now threatening to help the campaign of Democrat Hillary Clinton by getting Republicans to vote for a throw-away third-party candidate.

Stuart Stevens is having a hissy fit because the citizens are refusing to do as they are told.  Democracy doesn't matter to Stuart, getting paid matters, and Stuart is willing to take a dump in the picnic basket if he doesn't get his own way.  More than a few establishment Republicans are applauding Stuart, not thinking about what would happen if we all adopted this attitude. Think of all the unmitigated bear shat you serve up as candidates and think of all the times we have dutifully supported them "for the good of the party"  -- and you don't even pay us like you do Stuart.

Stuart Stevens claims that he's betraying his party because he doesn't agree with what someone like Donald Trump "stands for," that he doesn't like Trump's "tone."  It's rather amusing, coming from someone who has worked for the political operations of foreign thugs.  One such thug, the former President of Albania, actually had his "special forces" shoot protesters at a rally.

That's right, some political consulting businesses are no longer American enterprises but instead work for the interests of foreign potentates wherever there is lots of money to be made. Take Stuart Stevens' client Sali Berisha, the former President of Albania.  This guy is a real piece of work, as Wikipedia reports:

Sali Berisha was elected President on 9 April 1992... Berisha introduced Islam to the Albanian political scene, pursued re-Islamisation of the country to reverse decades of anti-religious policy under Communism. Non-Governmental Organisations from Saudi Arabia and other parts of the Muslim world were invited in to build mosques and schools and provide other aid, and introduce Wahhabi or Salafi Islam to Albania.

...The collapse of the Ponzi schemes towards the end of 1996, into which it is alleged that Albanians invested $1 billion worth of life savings from 1994, recapped the crisis. The schemes failed, one by one, from December 1996, and demonstrators took to the streets accusing the government of having stolen the money. Those demonstrations were then taken over by the opposition.

During the first ten days of March, the situation deteriorated, culminating in the desertion of large numbers of police and military, leaving their arsenals unlocked. These were promptly looted, mostly by militias and some criminal gangs, and for a time it looked like civil war would erupt between the government and rebels. Although the Prime Minister resigned immediately, Berisha refused opposition demands to step down, claiming he had to ensure continuity, and UN and European Multinational Forces were required to step in and take the situation under control. After their intervention in Albania, early elections were held in June 1997, leading to the victory of a socialist-led coalition of parties. On 24 July 1997, a month after the DP lost the 1997 elections to the left coalition, Berisha stepped down as President...

On 3 July 2005, Sali Berisha was able to lead a coalition of five right center parties into the 2005 parliamentary elections, which eventually won a majority of 74 MPs from a total of 140. He was appointed Prime Minister of Albania on 8 September 2005...

The 2009 elections were flawed and have been called as such by the socialist opposition, who have asked for a recount of the ballots. Berisha refused any recount of the votes... The political crisis between government and opposition worsened over time, with the Socialists abandoning parliamentary debates for months and staging hunger strikes to ask for internal and international support. The EU attempted a conciliation, which failed. The ongoing political crisis was one of the reasons for the EU's refusal to grant Albania official candidate status in late 2010.

On 21 January 2011, clashes broke out between police and protesters in an anti-government rally in front of the Government building in Tirana. Four people were shot dead from government special forces. The EU issued a statement to Albanian politicians, warning both sides to refrain from violence, while Berisha defined the protests and the subsequent charges by judges upon policemen as stages of an attempted coup against him - consequently using this to his advantage to further attempt to consolidate his grip on the state institutions. He accused the then President of having been part of the coup after the relations had soured between the two and he embraced his perceived victim status to install his own 'yes man' in the office.

...After his party's defeat in the 2013 parliamentary election, Berisha resigned as party leader, but he remained in parliament.

Another foreign politician who Stuart Stevens worked for is Joseph Kabila, the President of the Democratic Republic of the Congo since January 2001.  He became President after his father, the dictator Laurent Kabila, was assassinated by his bodyguards.  The Kabila family has a long association with such memorable figures as Che Guevara, who worked with the elder Kabila in a 1965 coup attempt.  As a youth leader for Patrice Lumumba, the elder Kabila was present for the orgy of rape and murder that followed.

The younger Kabila (Stuart's client) received his military training in China at the Peoples Liberation Army National Defense University, in Beijing.  He became the commander of the "infamous" army of children -- taken from their families and conscripted -- known as the kadogos.  Up to 10,000 children, some as young as seven years old, were abused in this way.     The International Criminal Court (ICC) at The Hague has condemned the use of children in combat, calling it a violation of human rights as well as a war crime.

One of Kabila's first acts as president was to round up 135 people -- including 4 children -- and try them for the assassination of his father.  Dozens were executed and others faced torture and abuse.  President Kabila stood for election in December 2011.  We'll let Wikipedia take it from here: 

After the results were announced on 9 December, there was violent unrest in Kinshasa and Mbuji-Mayi, where official tallies showed that a strong majority had voted for the opposition candidate Etienne Tshisekedi.  Official observers from the Carter Center reported that returns from almost 2,000 polling stations in areas where support for Tshisekedi was strong had been lost and not included in the official results. They described the election as lacking credibility.  On 20 December, Kabila was sworn in for a second term, promising to invest in infrastructure and public services. However, Tshisekedi maintained that the result of the election was illegitimate and said that he intended also to "swear himself in" as president.

In January 2012, Catholic Bishops in DR Congo also condemned the elections, complaining of "treachery, lies and terror", and calling on the election commission to correct "serious errors".

On 19 January 2015 protests led by students at the University of Kinshasa broke out. The protests began following the announcement of a proposed law that would allow Kabila to remain in power until a national census can be conducted (elections had been planned for 2016).  By Wednesday 21 January clashes between police and protesters had claimed at least 42 lives (although the government claimed only 15 people had been killed). 

How after working for these monsters, after pocketing their bloody money, how does Stuart Stevens call a Republican like Donald Trump a "thug"?  It's a little ridiculous, isn't it?