Joshua Sotomayor Einstein for County GOP Chair Launches Mailer to County Committee Candidates

Joshua Sotomayor Einstein

Hudson County, NJ – NJ GOP State Committeeman Joshua Sotomayor Einstein launched a mailer in the campaign to oust current Chairman, and Democrat operative, Jose Arango. The mailer, targeting GOP County Committee members and candidates comes on the heels of an open letter he previously sent to county committee members in which he laid out how grassroots GOPers and members of the committee can make the Hudson County Republican Party great again.

The mailer includes a short bio of Sotomayor Einstein highlighting his record of GOP leadership, including his tenure as a member of the NJ GOP State Committee, years of experience running GOP events, assisting Republican and Republican leaning organizations, and his public advocacy of GOP positions. The other side has a bullet point comparison between current Chair, and Democrat lackey, Arango and NJ GOP State Committeeman Sotomayor Einstein.

NJ GOP State Committeeman Joshua Sotomayor Einstein stated, “the contrast is clear, the current Hudson GOP Chairman doesn’t live in Hudson County, hasn’t built up the county GOP, doesn’t support GOP candidates, works against election integrity, has been in his position for over a decade, and works for the Democrats.” He continued, “I, on the other hand, not only live in Hudson County, but have organized the largest GOP events in over the last half decade, facilitated protests against left wing leaders such as Hillary Clinton and Bob Menendez, and I have publicly stood up for election integrity. In sum, while Arango works for the Democrats, I work to advance the GOP. It’s time for new leadership.”

A conversation with Douglas Steinhardt

by Joshua Sotomayor - Einstein

In a December 18th interview on NJ Spotlight News with Chief Political Correspondent Michael Aaron, would-be GOP Gubernatorial candidate Douglas Steinhardt, a self-professed Reagan fan violated President Ronald Reagan’s 11th Commandment that “thou shalt not speak ill of another Republican.” This was of course a desperate attempt to paint himself as the conservative candidate for the GOP Gubernatorial nomination. The interview by Aaron was a series of straight forward questions each ducked by Steinhardt, the immediate former NJ GOP State Chairman.

When asked by Aaron, “to control spending, what big ticket item would you cut if you were governor?” Steinhardt had no answer but a vague platitudinous response about “bold” programs, “cutting spending so people would keep more of their tax dollars,” and how we need to “keep jobs here.”

It is unclear what “bold” programs Steinhardt was referring to as he could not give specifics. It is painfully obvious that New Jersey needs to cut spending, let people keep more of their own money, and keep jobs in the state.

But what is inexplicable is why Steinhardt, who was theoretically leading the state GOP for 3 years and who has planned for run for governor for months if not longer, could provide no actual budget items as an example of wasteful spending he would eliminate.

Aaron politely pushed back on Steinhardt’s non-answer on cutting state spending, precipitating Steinhardt’s responds that, “I think you gotta roll up your sleeves and look under the hood so we can figure out exactly what’s going on.”

This second non-answer on what he would cut from the pork laden budget that is killing New Jersey begs the question, what was Steinhardt doing for 3 years as state chair if he cannot identify a single specific item he would eliminate from state spending?

When asked by Aaron “if you were governor would you undo New Jersey’s strict gun laws?” Steinhardt ducked the question, discussed his childhood on a farm, and stated that the real problems in New Jersey are “our states failure to enforce the gun laws that we have that keep our communities safe.”

Yet in reality, the restrictive NJ gun laws make our communities less safe by prevent more law-abiding citizens from legally owning guns while preventing zero criminals from access to firearms.

Asked about voter fraud in the 2020 election, Steinhardt hemmed and hawed, calling evidence of voter fraud mere “claims” and “claims the law allows them (witnesses to voter fraud) to assert” as well as stating that, “eventually January 20th is gonna roll around and our constitutional republic will move on.” As if this passivity to defending the vote was not enough, on the mandatory vote-by-mail elections New Jersey was recently subject to he said, “I don’t think he (Murphy) proposed a fix to that yet, we have to wait and see what comes up in 2021.”

Steinhardt repeatedly ducked questions, failed to identify a single budget item he would eliminate, offered vague empty promises rather than actual concrete solutions, responded with lethargy in defense of basic freedoms, and was passive and deferred to Democrat Governor Feckless Phil Murphy in how the next election is run instead of taking a stand for the people.

That’s Doug Steinhardt and that was in a straightforward interview less than 6 minutes long - how the heck can anyone believe he could be a good Gubernatorial candidate?

NJGOP Chairman Doug Steinhardt: 20 reasons to Vote Republican on Tuesday

Over on the New Jersey Globe website, editor David Wildstein assures us that New Jersey is still a two-party state, with the caveat that the GOP might not be one of those two parties. Wildstein’s words must be taken seriously, for whatever his faults, he has a laudable record as a campaign manager and operative. He even managed to get elected himself.

Under Governor Chris Christie, the New Jersey Republican Party functioned as a kind of cult of personality. If you were around for earlier GOP administrations, you would have recognized the difference. So far as legislative seats are concerned, this didn’t work all that well even while Christie was Governor.

Post-Christie, New Jersey Republicans have suffered from a crisis of identity. This has been exacerbated by two things. The first, of course, is Donald Trump – the face of the national Republican Party. Many New Jersey Republicans don’t know how to explain him or fit even the positive aspects of his hegemony into a local narrative. They got out of the habit of having big vision ideas or policies – so that they can’t even effectively change the subject.

This brings us to the second… the rise of South Jersey Democrats as a kind of opposition party to the Democrats of Governor Phil Murphy. As they did with the so-called “Clean Elections” gambit, they pose as “reformers” who are “pro-business” and “pro-taxpayer” – with watchwords like “efficiency”. In reality, they are an old-world political machine, fueled by crony capitalism and soft corruption (at the very least). Their model is the one-party state, with a relationship between political power and business that resembles something out of Red China… or National Socialist Germany.

But at least they have ideas and policies, many of which are attractive to business, so they occupy an alternative ground to the Murphy Democrats’ collectivist and confiscatory impulses. On social issues they are equally disreputable. Their refusal to post the Human Trafficking & Child Exploitation Prevention Act for a vote shows that they monetize anything to please a supplicant corporate interest. Just keep the money flowing… and suffer the children.

Which brings us to a post over the weekend on Matt Rooney’s Save Jersey website. In it, NJGOP Chairman Doug Steinhardt provides an outline of why voters should choose Republican candidates over Democrats this coming Tuesday.

It really is a good list, and Matt did a great service publishing it. With due acknowledgement to Matt and to Chairman Steinhardt, we are re-publishing it below:

State Republican Chairman Doug Steinhardt

#20: New Jersey Has The Worst Foreclosure Rate In The U.S.
Phil Murphy and Democrats have had full control of the state house for 2 years now. Their liberal agenda has produced the highest foreclosure rate in the country. New Jersey is too expensive, and Phil Murphy, who said “If … tax rate is your issue … we’re probably not your state,” is too aloof, for hard working families to afford their homes. This is the danger of one-party rule in Trenton.

#19: Governor Murphy Tried To Steal Money From Firefighter Burial Fund
The NJGOP is proud to fight alongside New Jersey’s first responders, especially after their Governor tried to pay for his laundry list of liberal handouts by stealing $33 million from the Firemen’s Association burial fund. And even though his screwball scheme failed, Phil Murphy’s last second retreat can’t erase his blatant disregard for the hard working men and women who risk their lives to protect our lives. New Jersey voters should be shocked and appalled, but then, hey, this is the same Governor who, last week, said, “If … tax rate is your issue … we’re probably not your state.” You shouldn’t be our Governor either, and your Party’s policies are killing our State.

#18: New Jersey Has The Lowest Mainland US GDP Growth
Governor Murphy’s job-killing regulations and ever-expanding tax burden is leaving New Jersey’s economy hobbled and lagging behind the rest of mainland America. While the US economy is booming, New Jersey is failing. Trenton needs business-minded conservatives to bring a common sense check to Governor Murphy’s unbalanced budget.

#17: Phil Murphy Blew The Amazon Bid
Just weeks after New Jersey Democrats passed Phil Murphy’s billion plus dollar tax hikes, Amazon passed on New Jersey and put its HQ2 in New York and Virginia. Governor Murphy’s liberal lunacy cost thousands of well-paying jobs and a chance to revitalize our state’s biggest city. But this is the same Governor who maintains, “If … tax rate is your issue … we’re probably not your state.”

#16: Phil Murphy’s Online Sales Tax
Phil Murphy calls New Jersey a high tax for high value state, but Democrats are squeezing out what little value is left. If it walks, talks, ships, shoots, rides, drives, eats or roots, New Jersey’s daft Democrats devise a devilish way to tax it. Under the Murphy Administration, New Jersey residents now pay an internet sales tax. But, this is the same Governor who says, “If … tax rate is your issue … we’re probably not your state.”

#15: NJ Transit Fail
If a good executive keeps the trains running on time, Phil Murphy isn’t – good. New Jersey Transit is rated among the least reliable nationally. And even though Governor Murphy has the power to change it, he can’t. That’s because he’s more interested in liberal headlines than commuter wait times. People spend more time commuting than they do with their families. The system is so bad that even Democrats are investigating Murphy’s abject failure.

#14: Hiring Corrupt Officials
We should be throwing corruption out of government, not welcoming it back in. When Governor Murphy hired into his administration a former public official convicted of taking bribes, he called it the new normal. Never! The bar should never be so low. At a time when we should be building the public’s trust in government, Phil Murphy is tearing it down.

#13: Sky Blue Soccer Scandal
Governor Murphy preaches public equality, but fails miserably to practice it privately. As the owner of a women’s soccer team, Phil Murphy oversaw a team that was so badly treated that the Star Ledger equated the player’s conditions to a sweatshop. These professional women were housed in impoverished conditions, played without simple resources, like locker-room showers, and refused payment on their medical bills. That’s not stronger and fairer, that’s weaker and poorer.

#12: Legal Aid For Illegal Immigrants
The NJGOP will not ignore Governor Murphy while he scoffs at federal immigration laws for the sake of his personal political agenda. He has funneled millions of taxpayer dollars into state sponsored legal aid for illegal immigrants while hardworking, middle-class New Jersey residents miss another opportunity for tax relief. But this is the same Governor who says, “If … tax rate is your issue … we’re probably not your state.

#11: So-Called Free College
Phil Murphy’s promise of free college tuition is the classic political bait and switch. He dangles the feels-good carrot of “free education”, then beats New Jersey’s already battered taxpayers with his tax hike stick. Two years of free tuition for a lifetime of tax increases isn’t a bargain. It’s another bad deal that New Jersey can’t afford. Then again, all this is from a Governor who said, “If tax rate is your issue … we’re probably not your State.” That’s not leadership Governor. It’s what millionaires say to the middle class.

#10: Sanctuary State
Phil Murphy can’t pay for his progressive platitudes with the health, safety and welfare of New Jersey families. The Governor and the Attorney General should encourage cooperation between law enforcement agencies at all levels. Instead, they weaponize the Attorney General’s office and are taking aim at our County Sheriffs. Millions of innocent New Jerseyans depend on law enforcement to keep them safe from predators, drug dealers and violent criminals, but Phil Murphy will ignore them for a progressive headline.

#9: Worst Employment Rate In The Region
America’s economy is booming and our neighboring states are thriving, but New Jersey lags behind. Evidence continues to mount that New Jersey is teetering on the edge of an economic meltdown, but Governor Phil Murphy is stuck in a tax and spend trance. He is oblivious to, or simply ignores, the State’s affordability crisis and the crippling effect it’s having on New Jersey families. That was on full display at Rowan College in October, when the Governor let slip, “If tax rate is your issue … we’re probably not your State.” If you want more blind, political indifference, elect more Democrats this November, but if you want honest answers to the State’s real problems, vote Republican.

#8: Largest out migration of retirees, businesses and residents
Governor Murphy’s radical, liberal policies aren’t just emptying wallets, they’re emptying nests. More jobs and people are leaving New Jersey than any other State in America. Millionaire Phil Murphy is so disconnected from New Jersey’s working and middle classes that he let slip that, “If tax rate is your issue … we’re probably not your State.” Trenton’s Democrats share Phil Murphy’s callous indifference, so if you want honest answers to the State’s real problems, elect Republicans.

#7: Highest property and income tax rates in the US
Phil Murphy inherited a state with high taxes, but he campaigned on a promise for a stronger and fairer New Jersey. In reality, his radical tax hikes and progressive platitudes make us weaker and poorer. His solution is to tell working and middle class families, who can’t afford his high tax agenda, to move. But why move when we can vote? We need leaders in Trenton who will have the courage to reduce the size of state government and create real tax relief. On November 5, vote Republican.

#6: Ride Share Tax
Ride sharing has revolutionized urban and suburban transportation. Innovative new companies like Uber and Lyft provide safe rides home, affordable transportation for people who don’t own a car, and help stop drunk driving. So, how does Governor Murphy reward successful new businesses providing valuable services? He taxes them! That’s Phil Murphy’s New Jersey. If you don’t like it or can’t afford it, he says you’re welcome to leave. Don’t like the choices? Vote Republican instead. We can do better.

#5: Second Amendment Attacks
Governor Murphy’s political obsession with appeasing the radical, anti-gun lobby can’t come at the expense, or from the pockets, of New Jersey’s law abiding citizens for simply exercising their Second Amendment right to own a firearm. In his haste to punish legal gun owners, he’s proven unwilling and unable to deal with the scourge of gun crime, opting instead to criminalize lawful gun ownership. Taxes, fees and laws must have a rational nexus to a legitimate government purpose, and not just be a back channel to pay for feel-good, liberal giveaways. No Governor is empowered to choose which constitutional rights matter and which don’t and where Phil Murphy will trample long standing rights in his quest to replace them, the NJGOP will fight alongside grassroots Republicans to defend those rights.

#4: Shore Rental Tax
This year, among Governor Phil Murphy’s multitude of new taxes, he signed a tax on Jersey Shore vacation rentals. The NJGOP called on the Governor to refund to the moms and pops who were forced to pay it, the money he was so quick to take. In response, he ignored us, and them. It seems this was just another Democrat money grab that hit hardest in communities still recovering from Superstorm Sandy.

#3: Second Most Miserable State
The most miserable state in the Union is California. Governor Murphy has said he wants New Jersey to be the California of the east. So, it’s no surprise we’re number two. Under Phil Murphy, New Jersey is the second most miserable state in America. People in New Jersey are struggling with affordability. We have the highest foreclosure rate, and one in four families goes hungry. So, when our Governor says that, “If tax rate is your issue … we’re probably not your state,” it hurts. New Jerseyans need hope for a better tomorrow, but they won’t find it in our state’s Democrat Party. This year, vote for the party that still has New Jersey pride and honest answers to our state’s real problems. Vote Republican.

#2: Corporate Business Tax
New Jersey has the worst business climate in America. We lead the nation, not just in the outmigration of residents, but in the outmigration of jobs. We’ve suffered the exodus of leading corporations, like Honeywell and Gerber, who uproot and run for low cost states like North Carolina and Virginia. We even lost the bid for Amazon’s HQ2. When Governor Murphy hikes the corporate business tax by over $1 billion it signals to business owners that they can’t count on New Jersey for stability, predictability or affordability. But then this is the Governor who said, “If tax rate is your issue … whether you’re a business or an individual … we’re probably not your state.

#1: Rain Tax
A rainy day fund used to be what responsible government collected for emergencies. Not anymore. Not in New Jersey. And not under Governor Murphy. Today, it’s just another Democratic property tax and Trenton money grab. Instead of feeding your families, Phil Murphy’s rain tax scheme drains money from your pockets and pours it into Trenton’s coffers, to feed Murphy’s liberal agenda. None of that should come as a surprise, since the Governor let slip that, “If tax rate is your issue … we’re probably not your state.”

Please visit the Save Jersey website here: https://savejersey.com/2019/11/vote-republican-new-jersey-assembly-election-results-november-5th-doug-steinhardt/

What happens after Tuesday will determine whether this is a first step on the road to an actual party platform… or if it was a one-off, albeit a very strong and persuasive one. Stay tuned…

Has the NJBIA become a voice of woke capitalism?

Remember when Republicans were the party of business and Democrats the party of the working class? While the GOP still loyally votes on behalf of the interests of business, the days of business rewarding that loyalty with its support appear to be long gone.

Today’s corporate class votes Democrat because they (1) know the Democrats will do nothing to threaten their economic position in society, and (2) they get to publicly assure themselves that they are "good people" by doing so. Yes, for them the modern Democrat Party is a religious experience – but one that doesn’t require sacrifice.

Government intrudes on business so much these days that instead of organizing resistance to those intrusions, many businesses have made politics their partner. Government is, after all, run by politicians – so corporations hire lobbyists, fund candidates, and more importantly adopt political and social policies that signal the virtues they want the world to see. And for some, it’s sort of like the pious mob boss who makes a great show of paying for the new roof on the church, so that possible critics look the other way when his real work comes to light.

Woke capitalism is crony capitalism with a social justice cover.

Here is a succinct but very much on-point explanation by Kajal Iyer, who boils down a New York Times editorial by Ross Douthat, called “The Rise of Woke Capital.”

Ms. Iyer outlines how corporations are embracing a woke identity to couch their “malpractices” and market their products. These corporations have disrupted the traditional balance between Left and Right in America, between business and labor – its yin and yang.

Woke corporations are like hip middle aged husbands who have successfully found a young mistress, content in the continued loyalty and forbearance of the dutiful wife at home. Guess which political party is “the wife at home”?

Take the New Jersey Business & Industry Association (NJBIA) and its political action committee, New Jobs PAC, which calls itself “The Voice of Business”. When the NJBIA and the Chamber of Commerce rolled out their “Plan for an Affordable New Jersey” in July, who handled the messaging?

If you answered “the Clinton grease machine” you would be correct.

Yep, MWW, the firm that is so close to Bill and Hillary they even found a job for disgraced former Congressman Anthony Weiner when he was too controversial to be hired elsewhere. The biography for the firm’s founder notes that he is “known for his political contributions and fundraising for the Democratic Party” and he’s served as a Deputy Finance Chair of the DNC.

So how pro “leave me alone and let me create jobs” kind of business is this firm and what kind of messaging are you going to get out of them? The answer can be had just by going through the media section of the NJBIA website, which offers lectures on climate change and diversity as well as a host of other left-wing incantations. The rest is a course in “politics/government is your wingman”. Do what they want, pay them what they want, support who and what they tell you to support, and they will allow you to do business.

For the non-woke businessperson who just wants to make a living and create jobs, the message is one of subservience. Pay the Danegeld or the Vikings will pillage your business.

On the other hand, if you are a big pharmaceutical firm mired in controversy over the fallout from one of your products… being uber-LGBTQ can change the focus and make you one of the “good guys”. Yep, too bad about the cancer… or the opioids.

Is this the only voice for business in New Jersey?

Is it time for Republicans to quit playing the loyal “wife at home” and ask for a divorce? Why take the blame for all that corporations do, only to watch them hire the Left to provide a Leftist message that helps Leftist politicians to run against you? Wouldn’t it just be better to leave the Democrats and their crony capitalist backers in the muck and run on a message of reform and clean government?

Does anyone really believe that the “corruption tax” (so labeled in the Soprano State) has gone away? Or would the average voter say that crony capitalism has made it stronger than ever?

Learn how a South Jersey Tea Party group took control of their local government

Stafford's "Tea Party" Took Control of Local Government Last November.  Last Week, They Ousted Establishment's Local Republican Club.  Learn How They Did It.

Stafford Township at Parkway Exit 63 has 26,000 residents.  It includes Manahawkin and Beach Haven West.  In 2010, a handful of conservatives including Mike Mazzucca, Tom Steadman, Eric Libenschek, Steve Jeffries, and Greg Myhre formed a Tea Party Group there. After being ignored and ridiculed by local and county GOP officials, they organized and worked.

They raised money, they ran for public office.  They did not run and lose as "independents".  They instead joined an existing party, and used Primary Elections to take it over.   In 2015, they lost by less than 100 votes, but they did not give up.  They stayed active for the next 3 years and ran again last June.  They formed a column on the ballot with U.S. Senate and House candidates Brian Goldberg and Seth Grossman called “Ocean County MAGA Republicans”.   They won “Column A” in the ballot position lottery.

These “MAGA Republicans” won last June.  Then they beat the Democrats (and sore loser Republicans who backed them) in November.  This week, this former “Tea Party” group was recognized by Ocean County GOP leaders as the official local Republican Club in Stafford Township.  The local Establishment Republican Club that opposed them to the bitter end was ousted.

Seth Grossman is Guest Hosting for John DeMasi tomorrow, Saturday March 16 on WPGG Radio.  DeMasi's “Talk With a Purpose” is 3 hours of live 2-Way Talk Radio from 9AM to 12 Noon.  Learn about how the Stafford Tea Party took over their local government.  WPGG Radio is heard in most of South Jersey at 1450AM and 104.1FM.  Or anywhere online at https://wpgtalkradio.com/tags/john-demasi/.

The Democrats hit 100,000 doors this weekend. You don’t do that by ignoring your activist base.

It could be all smoke and mirrors, but it certainly doesn’t sound like it.

This was reported on InsiderNJ yesterday evening:

A thousand people showed up earlier today in Summit for a campaign canvas launch at the Essex Road home of former LD21 candidate Lacey Rzeszowski (who lost by Assemblyman Jon Bramnick last year by 2,567 votes), he said.

“So many people came it shut down the block that Bob Hugin lives on and somebody called the cops,” said the Democrat. “There were so many people and they came and directed traffic to help us out.”

The event did get the attention of the GOP. A source at the earlier Somerset Republican event fumed about the incident, irritated by the inconvenience caused those close to Hugin.

It was all but a punch line here amid blue throngs.

Campaign allies knocked on almost 100,000 doors today, Malinowski said.

Was that 100,000 doors just in District 7???

If so… holy dogshit!

These Democrats are kicking our collective ass.  Hats off to them that they have successfully motivated their base and have got average people involved in the political process. 

We could do that too you know.  It’s called the telephone.  Talk to people, organize them, stop being afraid of them.  Hey, we assure you, they haven’t eaten human flesh in years!  They won’t bite! 

200 Evangelical pastors were in Trenton just days ago.  There’s a clean-living alternative to the human trafficker and sexual exploiter at the top of the Democrat’s ticket.  That is a pretty easy sell to Evangelical clergy.  They were there… the salesmen never showed up.  Not even an apprentice! 

Could 200 clergy have each come up with 5 people from their congregations that average 500 each?  We think so.  And that 1,000 would have matched their 1,000.  

Oh well… maybe we’ll learn sometime.  Maybe. 

200 pastors in Trenton yesterday: The GOP misses an opportunity.

More than two hundred circles of influence came to Trenton yesterday.  They came to the State Capitol to pray for the Garden State and for the Nation.  More than two hundred leaders who – at least once a week – stand before hundreds of like-minded people at gatherings held across the state, in small towns and big cities, to help them navigate the important decisions in their lives.  More than two hundred leaders…

But who was there to engage with them?  To provide them with ideas and to hear their concerns?

Who is ever there?  Instead, they are left in a kind of echo-chamber.  Left to figure it out on their own.  And if their own ways sound more fire and brimstone than politic – whose fault is that?  After All, they are clerical people not politicians, and if politicians won’t break bread with them, talk to them, they are left only to themselves.  They in their hundreds and their flocks in their thousands and tens of thousands. 

Hey, how is that GOP turnout coming?  Good?  Or screwed?

Will lessons never be learned?

Acres of diamonds.  Acres of diamonds.  It’s sad.

Lyon supporter claims Reagan "destroyed" the GOP

Those of a certain age (GOP primary voters?) may remember the movie "Wild in the Streets."  The soundtrack from the 1968 cult classic included "Shape of Things to Come" and other hits.

The movie covers the events leading up to and after the election of a 25-years-old Republican as President of the United States.  He embarks on a campaign of intergenerational warfare that transforms America into "the most truly hedonistic society the world has ever known."

"Wild in the Streets" came to mind after reading an opinion piece by yet another Morris County YR.  This one has turned his personal Facebook page into a homage to Freeholder Hank Lyon, a candidate for Assembly in legislative district 26. 

The title of the young man's column was:  " Why Reagan Destroyed the Republican Party."  Yep, you read that right.  We kid you not.

First of all, for anyone with sensory perception, the Republican Party is not "destroyed."  It controls the White House, the Senate, and the House of Representatives.  There are 33 Republican Governors to 16 Democrats and one Independent.  As for State Legislatures, the map below illustrates how tilted to the GOP that is:

Destroyed???  Is this strange perception due to this young man coming from a state like New Jersey?

Perhaps.  But we believe that what is at work here has more to do with age.  The young man who wrote this did not live in that time before Reagan, when the Democrat congressional softball team was called "The Permanent Majority."  After Reagan, that boast would never be heard again.

And thanks to President Ronald Reagan, that young man was born into a world in which the Soviet Union was a memory, not a menace.  That's not the case for most Republican primary voters.  For them, the Soviet Union was a very real psychological disturbance, always in the background, hovering, waiting.  The civil defense drills and the threat of nuclear war, was something to be absorbed and then compartmentalized, away from daily life but always someplace there.

The 1950's...

The 1960's...

The 1970's...

The 1980's...

Today's young Republicans never experienced any of that, because Ronald Reagan beat the Soviet Union, destroying their economy along with their ideology, and doing it so thoroughly that even "Red" China went capitalist.  Reagan's greatness is assured because he kept his most important promise -- to leave Marxism/Leninism on the "ash heap of history" -- and he did so without it costing a million American lives.

The young Hank Lyon supporter's indictment against Ronald Reagan is that the President did not sufficiently rein in spending.  Lyon's supporter appears to forget what President Reagan was spending that money on:  The largest peacetime military buildup in history, whose goal it was to overtax the Soviet economy into oblivion.  With the alternative a nuclear exchange, it was money well spent.

To write a critique of Ronald Reagan's presidency without mentioning the Cold War or the Soviet Union, is like writing about Abraham Lincoln and leaving out slavery and the Civil War.  It's a non-starter.

The Lyon supporter who so cavalierly trashed the memory of President Ronald Reagan can do so because he has never held any form of public responsibility at all.  Once he holds public office of some kind, and we sincerely hope he does, he will gain some humility.  He will learn that in a representative democracy, perfection is unachievable.  That there are always trade-offs and muddle-throughs.  The young writer will learn this from life as well.  He will learn that no marriage goes exactly as wished for, or children, or career.  He will learn that the expectation of perfection is the enemy of happiness. 

Time and that river, life, will work away his stoney sharpness and his certainties.  And he will be a better human for it.

The Hill: What conservatives got wrong in 2016

Conservative 'social issues' are winnable

— if the GOP grows a backbone

December 20, 2016

By: Frank Cannon

NB:  In the November 8, 2016, election, Republicans picked up one State Senate seat, extending their majority to 35-15, and Republicans maintained their 74-46 advantage in the State House of Representatives.

When Gov. Pat McCrory (R-N.C.) dared to sign HB2, a bill that repealed a Charlotte ordinance which would have forced private businesses and charitable religious organizations to allow grown men who “identify” as women to use the same public bathrooms and showers as girls, the left banded together with its allies in corporate America, the entertainment industry, and the mainstream media and spent the next eight months carpet bombing the state of North Carolina.

As my colleague Terry Schilling pointed out in The Federalist:

“They launched corporate boycotts. They took away the NBA All-Star game. They cancelled sold-out concerts. And then, after ensuring the economic pain would be as excruciating as possible on residents of North Carolina, Roy Cooper and the Democrats placed the blame squarely on the shoulders of McCrory.

“The left essentially staged an economic crisis in order to win an election. Nasty.”

This blitzkrieg by progressives, an obvious attempt to bully the GOP into submission on the “gender identity” issue, made McCrory’s race one of the most consequential of the 2016 cycle.

He was outspent by nearly $8 million and was up against an avalanche of opposition from progressive elites, who dominated the news media and pop culture.

And despite all of this, McCrory barely lost. Just one or two million dollars more in financial support from conservative donors likely would have put him over the top. Unfortunately, these donors largely froze. Why?

One of the big fads among conservative organizations and donors is spending millions and millions of dollars in an attempt to change institutions that are virtually unchangeable — academia, the mainstream media, pop culture, the entertainment industry — institutions over which the left has a complete stranglehold.

This is misguided, at least when it comes at the expense of engaging in critical political races.

Politics is the only part of the culture that can easily be driven by ordinary people. Everything else — academic institutions, Hollywood, the entertainment industry, even corporate America — is all controlled by the progressive elites.

We can’t decide what books are published, what TV shows are produced (and what agendas those TV shows push), what universities teach, or what corporate America sells. The idea that we are going to direct all our money attempting to change those aspects of culture, rather than the one aspect of culture where we can have a real impact and reverse cultural trends — by winning in politics — is insanity.

So why aren’t conservative organizations and donors spending more on politics? Why didn’t they protect McCrory, go on offense fighting the culture war, and save themselves tens of millions, perhaps hundreds of millions of dollars in future spending on efforts to play defense?

Conservatives don’t succeed by persuading the elites. We succeed by persuading the people.

There was no academic work in favor of Ronald Reagan’s tax cuts. It was opposed by every elite. Yet ultimately, Reagan’s tax cut model became GOP orthodoxy… because Reagan won.

Trump’s policies on trade, immigration, and even abortion were universally derided by GOP elites during the campaign. Now, he is completely transforming GOP policy and preparing to affect real change on those issues, despite being opposed by elites. Why? Because he won.

Winning elections is not only an efficient and cost-effective way of affecting cultural change, but for conservatives, it is perhaps the only way to do so successfully.

The irony of ironies is that McCrory would have almost assuredly won had conservative organizations and donors pitched in just another $1 or $2 million — relative pocket change when compared to multi-million dollar projects being funded merely to study how conservatives might use different messaging on social issues in future elections.

While those projects go on, and while Washington policy wonks wonk out, winnable political battles are being outright surrendered — such as what happened in North Carolina, where voters, by and large,  supported the actual provisions in HB2.

Now, with a political establishment that is in all likelihood unwilling to go the way of McCrory, believing that fighting on social issues is a death sentence, conservative organizations and donors are going to pour their money into legal efforts to defend against activist courts and academic efforts to write white papers no one will read.

Amazingly, despite Republicans now holding the House, the Senate, and the presidency, those of us who believe that men probably shouldn’t be showering with women are preparing for 2017 as if we were relegated to minority status!

The underlying message of not letting men shower with our daughters is a winning one, but only if it is actively promoted. That doesn’t happen unless conservative donors pony up.

Liberals and their corporate and entertainment allies spent millions of dollars driving home the shameful idea that, if North Carolina voters didn’t vote Democrat, liberal institutions would abandon the state, and people would lose jobs. Extortion was their central campaign message!

This was an easy message to counter, especially given the extreme nature of the Left’s position — that grown men have a civil right to shower with young women, and that any business or organization that dissents from this view should be removed from the public square.

But driving home a message takes money, and the money wasn’t there.

Conservative organizations and donors pinched pennies and refused to go all-in to help McCrory, and now those same donors are going to spend ten times, twenty times, maybe even a hundred times as much fighting the narrative created by the very election they abandoned — the idea that progressive gender ideology cannot be defeated or discussed in politics without it spelling sure defeat for the Republican.

Get ready, donors, to spend millions of dollars in court fighting the practical implications of “gender identity” being considered a protected class.

Get ready to spend millions more fighting the Left’s new “proven” strategy — that by colluding with corporate elites, the entertainment industry, and the mainstream media — they can get literally anything they want, and the GOP will just cave.

This could have been prevented. We could be celebrating a popular defeat of progressive gender ideology. Instead, we are up against a narrative, promoted even by the likes of establishment conservatives like Sen. Thom Tillis, that “controversial social issues” cost us big league.

What a shame. The only question now is, will conservative organizations and donors learn this lesson for the next North Carolina? Or will we continue channeling Don Quixote — tilting at windmills we can’t defeat, while refusing to fight the battles we can actually win?

Frank Cannon is the president of American Principles Project.  Follow him on Twitter @FrankCannonAPP..

Erickson: The Tea Party is Dead.

Erick Erickson is an author, former editor of Red State, a radio talk show host, and the editor of The Resurgent.

On February 19, 2009, CNBC editor Rick Santelli, stood on the floor of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange and went on a tirade against the Homeowners Affordability and Stability Plan, which bailed out individuals who had (mostly) knowingly entered terrible mortgages and could not pay them off. Santelli was so outraged he predicted a “Chicago Tea Party” would rise up.

His statement went viral within conservative media. Played over and over on talk radio and reposted on conservative websites, activists who already felt alienated by a Republican Party that had drifted toward corporatism and away from conservatism decided to mobilize. Local talk radio hosts around the country organized tea party protests on tax day. “Taxed Enough Already” signs sprouted up across conservative areas.

Those tea party groups organized and the Washington conservative apparatus stepped in to try to bring some focus, order, and assistance. Donors stepped up and helped fund other groups. Because of Citizens United, small dollar donors suddenly found themselves able to combine resources without a bunch of lawyers and compete against the big guys. Organized tea party groups sprang up, national tea party coalitions sprang up, other groups rose, and the C-Team and D-List celebrity consultants of the right decided to cash in.

Tea party activists were mad at both Republicans and Democrats. They were mad at Democrats for Obamacare and big government and keeping all their promises. They were mad at Republicans for TARP, the General Motors bail out, and breaking all their promises. Over the course of 2009, tea party activists became more and more organized and by 2010 decided to challenge long time Republicans they felt had broken promises while challenging Democrats as well in open seats.

The media portrayed them as racists. They were derisively called “tea baggers” by reporters and left-wing pundits. Republicans really did not know what to make of them. Democrats considered them a hate group. During the 2009 August recess, as Democrats sought to hide from voters, tea party activists showed up at townhall meetings and began embarrassing congressmen by proving these citizens actually knew what they were talking about. Union activists showed up to disrupt the recesses. While the media blamed tea partiers for violence, all but a handful of arrests made at the time were of union activists. Being beset by all sides fostered a lot of unity and solidarity. But then, after the 2010 election, the activists expected the GOP to actually use the power of the purse to hold the President accountable. It did not happen. In the minds of the activists, goal posts were moved by Republican leaders who’d promised action. Excuses were made. The activists got even angrier.

Tea Party activists learned, in the process, what pro-life activists had long known. Many Republicans would tell them they supported their cause, but behind the scenes would mock the tea party activists as hicks and rubes. Their checks were appreciated, but their opinions were not. Pro-life activists had long gotten used to this, but still pushed and cajoled and tried to work from within and without to incrementally advance their agenda. The anger built. Activists began to suspect Republican leaders had no willingness to act and Republican leaders concluded the activists did not understand how the system worked.

As the anger grew within the tea party activists, something vital to their cause never did — discernment. Some activists decided they could make a quick buck. Some consultants learned quickly they could profit off scamPACs and take advantage of tea party activists. The activists could never discern the good from the bad. Sometimes it was because of friendships, but not all the time. It started to become a real problem though and when some began calling out the con-artists and charlatans, they were branded as too Washington friendly. The grassroots tea party activists grew more cynical and distrustful.

The national tea party groups started fighting internally and with each other. The local groups felt like the national groups were of no help. That distrust, over the next few years, would poison the well. With a lack of trust in any group from Washington, no matter the bona fides of the organization, and with a serious lack of discernment, tea party activists finally took a go-it-alone approach in recruitment. They began finding the most socially maladjusted candidates to run for office — people who showed up at all the rallies and who, frankly, had been the volunteers most candidates left in the back of the office putting stamps on envelopes. Now, suddenly, they were the candidates because they had put in the sweat equity and were true believers. In still other cases, candidates sprang up, bought tables at tea party events, threw red meat to the crowd, and got endorsements without ever really believing what they were saying.

Considerations of electability were set aside because these were the people the local activists could trust. When national groups stepped forward, whose core competencies were fielding grassroots conservatives candidates, the tea party activists chose to ignore their advice. Consequently, multiple true-believer conservatives started entering primaries against a conservative who could win and an establishment candidate. The true-believers attacked the conservative who could win as a poseur standing between the tea party and the establishment.

The damage became immense as the Republican establishment struck back. Groups like the Senate Conservatives Fund and Club For Growth were getting blamed for awful candidates running for office who they not only did not fund, but never actually supported and actively tried to dissuade from running.

As this confluence of malevolence, incompetence, and distrust built energy, the tea party began to fracture. Many of its members decided the only way to win was to adopt the tactics of the left.

Unfortunately, they defined those tactics as behaving like thugs and jackasses. The left won, they thought, by being nasty. So they would be nasty too. The face of grassroots conservatism became a face of anger.

When conservatives stepped forward to promote the idea of the happy warrior, the angry activists accused them of surrender and compromise. Eventually, conservatives began stepping back and the angry grew more suspicious of anyone and everyone within a few degrees of Washington, D.C. All the while, the ever more corporatist Republican establishment played on and off these divisions, smearing legitimate conservative organizations as profiteers while continually breaking promises. 

When Jeb Bush entered the Presidential race, the angry and suspicious became the angry and paranoid. They rallied to Donald Trump, not so much because they agreed with him, but because they were desperate. They had become convinced there was no hope, 2016 could mean the end of America, and they must take drastic measures to turn the tide. Drastic measures meant Trump. The conservatives, like Paul, Rubio and Cruz, could not be trusted because they were of Washington. That they had opposed Washington to varying degrees made no difference. The angry and paranoid concluded they were infected by establishmentarianism.

This all finally came to a head on Tuesday night. The angry and paranoid put forward Kelli Ward in Arizona, who believed in chem trails, and Carlos Beruff in Florida. Both reflected the bleak black hearts of the remains of a movement no longer driven by shared believe in limited government and instead driven by crazy town. Both were defeated and deservedly so. A tea party movement that stopped listening to sound advice and turned inward and tribal needed to lose.

After Trump’s loss in November, the angry-paranoid remnant of the tea party movement will not go away. It will still fester and troll. But those who developed the discernment to realize our ways are not the left’s ways and we do not have to proceed as they proceed will be the ones to help pick up the pieces. The others will, for the most part, be ignored.

The tea party began through common cause and it died because too many of its members failed at discernment and, as a result, were betrayed from within and from without only then to grow too angry for anyone to ever want to join their cause except the fringe. One silver lining of the movement was that it found a Republican Party of old white men and left it with younger, more diverse officials. The old white men did not back Allen West, Nikki Haley, Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz, Tim Scott, and others. But the tea party movement did in its early days. Because of the tea party, for the first time since the Civil War, the congressional district wherein Fort Sumter resides had a black congressman and an Indian-American Governor. That congressman is now South Carolina’s Senator and that Governor may be a future Presidential contender. The group portrayed as racist by the media in 2009 and 2010 broadened the color spectrum of the GOP. That is worth remembering.

Bankrupting the TTF is a Pyrrhic victory

"A Pyrrhic victory is a victory that inflicts such a devastating toll on the victor that it is tantamount to defeat. Someone who wins a Pyrrhic victory has been victorious in some way. However, the heavy toll negates any sense of achievement or profit.  The phrase Pyrrhic victory is named after king Pyrrhus of Epirus, whose army suffered irreplaceable casualties in defeating the Romans at Heraclea in 280 BC and Asculum in 279 BC during the Pyrrhic War."  Pyrrhus said of his victory at Heraclea, "one more such victory and I will be utterly undone."

It is beginning to look as if elements of the GOP, the talk radio wing of the populist movement, and the petroleum industry (including AFP) have got their way so that in 16 short months we will see an increase in the tax on gasoline without any accompanying tax cuts.  The phase out of the Estate Tax -- long a conservative dream, long a priority of groups like AFP -- which was so close, will be gone, perhaps for a decade or two or forever. 

Economists will continue to advise people to take their money and flee New Jersey upon reaching retirement age -- so the flight of wealth, which could have been checked by the elimination of the tax on retirement income, will continue unabated.  Instead of making their donations to New Jersey charities, those donations will go to charities in states like Florida and North Carolina.

Early in 2018, the Transportation Trust Fund will finally be funded -- but low income working people and commuters and seniors and military veterans will not get their tax cuts.  They will be off the table -- and if they find their way back into legislation, the Republicans will have nothing to do with it.  It will be a gift, in whole, from the Democrats.

The crisis brought by willfully bankrupting the Transportation Trust Fund (TTF) is already causing county and local governments to consider raising property taxes to cover the shortfall in road and bridge repair funding that had been provided by the TTF.  The bill will come due next year -- when the whole Legislature and the Governor's office is up before the voters.  If a 23 cents per gallon increase in the tax on gasoline had been passed in June, the decline in the retail price per gallon since would have made up for that 23 cents and more.  The increase in property taxes brought on by the bankruptcy of the TTF will not be so painless. 

But still, there are some in the GOP who look on the "no gas tax" message as the gimmick they need to at least hang on to what they have in the Legislature.  It is easy to chant, so that even the very stupid can understand it.  It is to be the GOP version of "Black Lives Matter" -- and is meant to be just as angry and misdirected and violent.  For hatred of "the police", substitute "Trenton" and you have it in a nutshell (or case).

In fact, what the NJGOP needs are well-thought-out, adult, fully-fledged policies -- policies that are informed by principles.  Once you have these, any old advertising executive can figure out how to message it, package it, sell it.  The problem with the NJGOP is that they have nothing to sell.  So it ends up selling mistrust, anger, and even hate.  That's not a product to be proud of.

The conservative movement has found itself here before.  In the 1970's there were two competing brands -- the angry, emotional, populist "conservatism" of George Wallace (a Southern Democrat); and the optimistic, ideas-driven, ideological conservatism of Ronald Reagan (a California Republican).  Happily Reagan's ideas won out over Wallace's anger.  Today, it sometimes seems like it's anger on steroids.

The dearth of principle is such and the anger so keen that there are those out there who have turned a rather pedestrian decision about how to fund road and bridge maintenance (a users' tax on gasoline vs. property taxes vs. the general fund and so on) into a question as serious as "when does life begin"  or "does the state have the right to impose the death penalty"?  These are roads we are talking about -- there's nothing metaphysical about a road -- presumably we all agree that we need roads and we assume there's nobody out there who thinks they get built and maintained for free by the Keebler elves.

But the hatred -- both fringe and corporate -- has been astounding.  President Reagan himself believed in users' taxes as a fair form of taxation and raised the tax on gasoline as the fairest way to fund transportation projects.  But that hasn't stopped fringe folk like tea partier Mark Quick and NJ101.5's Bill Spadea from cranking up the hate.  They make it sound like a debate over transubstantiation. 

The world is going to hell and these people are making the means to fund road and bridge maintenance an article of faith.  How intellectually bankrupt must they be?

America is under an intense and sustained threat from abroad and elements of that threat are possibly slipping undetected through our borders.  Our economy has turned grey -- with unemployment and underemployment, foreclosure and poverty, as its major features.  Our culture is being frog-marched in a direction chosen, not at the ballot box, not by the people, but by elites in (of all things) the entertainment industry and their corporate and judicial fellow-travelers.  Nothing democratic about it.  In the history of this Republic, have people of faith ever been less fashionable and more under threat? 

Instead of standing up for freedom of conscience, what calls itself "Republican" now, what calls itself "conservative", the best they can muster is an appeal to a gimme.  The cost per gallon hasn't kept up with inflation, hasn't gone up in 28 years, states like Pennsylvania pay over 50 cents a gallon for their roads while we pay just 14 1/2 cents, but I don't care I want mine and I want it cheap, and I don't care if my daughter has to shower with a sex offender or if my church is closed down because its practice offends the ruling fashion.  I want cheap gas!

Well, for the next 16 months, you will.  While every other problem ignored gets worse.  This is what we are now.

Beck set off GOP primary stirrings for 2017

It started with GOP Senator Jennifer Beck, looking for an issue to run on next year, and soon got crazily out of hand.  Beck, a member of the GOP Senate leadership no less, got NJ 101.5's Bill "pulled-pork" Spadea to start the movement to publicly call for running primary campaigns against Republican legislators in 2017 and it took off from there.

Next it was taken up in the pages of the SaveJersey blog, with a call for open Republican-on-Republican warfare:

And who are these offending Republicans? Here’s the Rogue’s Gallery – read it and make them weep:

Jon Bramnick, LD 21 (Union, Somerset and Morris); Chris Brown, LD 2 (Atlantic):  Rob Clifton, LD 12 (Monmouth, Ocean, Burlington and Middlesex);  BettyLou DeCroce,  LD 26 (Morris, Essex and Passaic); Joe Howarth, LD 8 (Burlington, Atlantic and Camden);  Sean Kean,  LD 30 (Monmouth and Ocean); Nancy Munoz,  LD 21 (Union, Morris and Somerset); David Rible,  LD 30 (Monmouth); Maria Rodriguez-Gregg, LD 8 (Burlington, Atlantic and Camden) and Scott Rumana, LD 40 (Passaic, Bergen, Essex and Morris).

Note that many of this exceedingly motley crew are in the GOP leadership in the Assembly, including Assemblyman Bramnick, the putative leader of the caucus.

...For their support of the gas tax-hike abomination, the Gang of 10 need to be primaried, hounded, called out, denounced, condemned and run to ground as traitors to the state’s already oppressed taxpayers.

The writer also explicitly fingers the new GOP "Solutions NJ" super PAC as being "GOP up-and-comers who loathe the idea of a gas-tax hike." 

Why did the leadership of the Senate Republican Caucus encourage one of their members to negotiate a tax cut/TTF-funding deal, while a member of GOP leadership itself was allowed to publicly make war on that deal?  That miscalculation has opened up the possibility of primaries against legislative Republicans across the state.

The so-called "left" of the conservative movement in New Jersey -- represented by the anti-government, libertarian-leaning Liberty & Prosperity group of Atlantic and Cape May counties -- got into the act, calling for an Argentina-style "repudiation" of the $16 billion debt used to fund the TTF.  Yes, they want to default on the debt, walk away from it, and they have what could be a sound legal argument for doing so.  They also want to "identify, recruit, train, and support qualified candidates to run against (Assemblyman Chris Brown and others) in the Primary Elections next June."

Assemblyman Brown is one of three Republicans in the state who share a legislative district with two Democrats.  He is hyper-vulnerable in 2017.  If he is defeated for re-election, it will be the fault of Senator Jennifer Beck and the GOP Senate leadership for riling up and galvanizing the opposition against him.

Coming from the social-conservative "right" on this issue is the New Jersey Family Policy Council.  In an email blast in which they remind readers that they "don't usually get too involved in fiscal issues," the NJFPC goes after Governor Chris Christie, Assembly Republican Leader Jon Bramnick, and other Republicans for voting for A-12, which increased the gas tax while reducing the sales tax and eliminating the tax on retirement income for most retirees.

Curiously, the NJFPC uses the talking points of far-left former Democrat State Senator Gordon MacInnes' Policy Perspectives group, and lifts its points directly from another publication.  MacInnes is an old-Great Society social warrior and former White House staffer under LBJ (for those of you too young to remember, that stands for President Lyndon Baines Johnson).

This is being follow-up with a political campaign seminar tomorrow at the Church of Grace & Peace in Toms River.  The seminar is run by a campaign professional from out West named George Khalaf, dubbed by NJFPC's Len Deo as "the Lebanese Lion from Arizona."  We don't know a soul who calls him that, by-the-way, apart from maybe his pal Paul Weber. 

George Khalaf is the former political director of the Arizona Republican Party, who started his own polling and general consulting firm two years ago and is now out looking for new clients.  The seminar tomorrow promises to "change the culture by winning campaigns... at all levels of elected offices, from School Board to Town Council, to County Office and all the way up to the State and Federal elections!"

Well the Lion has come to the right place to do some hunting.  New Jersey is one of the last breeding grounds of that nearly extinct creature -- the culturally far-left Republican elected official.  These people can't even tell the difference between boys and girls.  They want adult male sex offenders showering with the high school girls' soccer team.  In Arizona, their heads adorn every political consultant's office in every county. 

But it gets better.  The NJGOP lost legislative seats even with a popular Governor at the helm.  The GOP couldn't pick up a single Senate seat even when the Governor was winning by 20 percentage points.  In contrast, in Pennsylvania the GOP won 12 new legislative seats while their incumbent Governor was LOSING by 10 points!  Going into 2017, the NJGOP isn't going to have enough money to protect its vulnerable incumbents in the GENERAL ELECTION.  Forget about having the spare money for one or two or more or a bunch of primaries.

And as a pollster of some repute, George Khalaf will soon discover that most Republicans in the Garden State are over 60 years old and think culturally more like average Republicans do in Arizona than GOP "leaders" do in New Jersey.  New Jersey Republicans are utterly turned-off by these creatures who claim to represent them, their culture, or their country.  So let the Lion loose and... good hunting!  Or should we say, good dining?

By-the-way, great work Senator Beck... great work!

Peterson dumps on GOP admin under Christie

When the genuinely deceitful want to ignore something they make the claim that it is "unknowable."  On Thursday, Assemblyman Erik Peterson was on the Bill Spadea spewfest and between the two of them they couldn't muster the brainpower to have a mature, deliberate conversation regarding the findings and the differences between the Reason Foundation study and the Rutgers University study into New Jersey's road construction costs.  Here, read both studies for yourself:

https://reason.org/files/21st_annual_highway_report.pdf

http://www.state.nj.us/transportation/publicat/2016studyconopmaint.pdf

First off, anyone claiming to believe that every position held by the Reason Foundation is infallible should know that in 2005, Reason changed its position on global warming, arguing:  "Anyone still holding onto the idea that there is no global warming ought to hang it up.  All data sets—satellite, surface, and balloon—have been pointing to rising global temperatures."   

Spadea, who exhibited the same verbal diarrhea he was known for as a political candidate, failed to give his brain a chance to absorb the data he was shouting about.   Did both Spadea and Peterson skip that science class at Cherry Hill East? 

Come on boys, our grandfathers lived in the time of Einstein, we live in the time of Hawking, do you really want us to buy your b.s. that while the universe may be knowable, the cost of constructing a highway in New Jersey is unquantifiable by modern science?  You people have either purposefully failed to apply yourselves or you are idiots and not fit to hold the jobs that you do.

If Bill Spadea is too dense to read and comprehend what is contained in the studies, he shouldn't have an equally stupid politician on his show to join him in obnoxious primate behavior, he should ask the writers of each study to come on and explain it.  That's if, of course, Spadea would stop hooting and hollering long enough to let them get a word in.

One remarkable aspect of the show -- and that's what it is, a show -- was the way in which these two "Republicans" blithely trashed the current Republican administration in New Jersey.  It sounded more like a discussion between two Democrat candidates for Governor than two GOPers.

Spadea announced that Governor Christie's property tax cap was a complete failure, claiming that his property taxes had gone up "twenty percent the last few years" under Christie.  We're looking into this claim and others made by Spadea, don't you worry. 

Not to be outdone, Assemblyman Peterson took a dump on the GOP Christie administration's handling of the state's roads and bridges these last 6 years and 6 months.  He told the NJ 101.5 audience that the Governor's people had no idea what they were doing and that they were completely unprofessional (aka not run like a business).  Peterson called the Christie administration "embarrassing" and added that it should be "embarrassed." 

Assemblyman Peterson then came up with his own figure for the cost-per-mile of a road in New Jersey:  $1 million, which he claimed came from the Department of Transportation.   He said that half of that cost was due to state required "studies and different types of engineering stuff."  Stuff?  Yeah, that's a technical term.

The Assemblyman doesn't appear to understand the federal requirement tied to transportation grants that mandates "prevailing wage" laws be obeyed.  But it is his (and Spadea's) attitude towards blue-collar workers that was most cringe worthy.  To them, it's quite alright that a lawyer be paid $400 an hour to practice his dubious profession, but it's a national outrage that a heavy equipment operator earn $60,000 a year for doing a far more important job.  Let's face it, when the blue-collar guy is finished, we have a road, a thing of value.  When the lawyer is through, we have a headache, a pile of bullshit, and a bill.

The Way of the Baboon (or why Spadea pissed on Reagan)

Baboons don't hunt other species.  Instead, they employ their ferocious looking teeth to attack and injure other baboons.  Some Republicans are like this too.

Unlike so many conservative websites in the past, this website has made a point to refrain from focusing on the sins of those in the nominally right-of-center party.  We figured they have problems enough, and there is so much ready trade amongst the Democrats, so much to criticize, that... why bother the GOP?  And so we have generally given Republicans a free ride, made them exempt from the focus of our criticism -- even as some of them have adopted social policies that would have made "the gimp" from Pulp Fiction wince.

If anything, we preferred the softly, softly approach with Republicans.  We tried to talk with them, even when our meetings were cancelled and our points of view dismissed. Once we even had to suffer a chief of staff whose demeanor towards us was akin to that of Miss Beulah Ballbreaker from the movie Porky's.

But even when showered with such rude affections from the leaders of our own party, we refrained from finger-pointing. 

Others have taken a different path.  Fox News and NJ 101.5's news host Bill Spadea -- a former candidate for Congress and the Legislature who collected tens of thousands in political contributions from his fellow Republicans , and who very recently fronted for a political action committee devoted to electing local members of the GOP, blithely accused a Republican legislator of criminal misconduct the other day.  And he did so with all the gravity one uses to direct someone to a toilet. 

To be fair with Spadea, he's been dumping on Republicans for some time.  Back when he ran the national College Republicans, then RNC National Chairman (and future Governor) Haley Barbour felt obliged to unfund Spadea's organization after it attacked both Presidents Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush for not being Republican enough.  It takes some kind of balls for a college kid to call out the father of the modern conservative movement for not being "pure" enough.

Some of the people Spadea had on his show are even worse.  They're members of a 16-person caucus.  Just 16.  It's like a big family.  16 is small enough that you should -- after 8 or 9 years -- get to know each other and be able to talk to each other.  But instead of talking, one of these 16 legislators put another one up to call out a third.  So this involved about a fifth of the caucus.  And what did the one put up to call the other one out accuse him of -- gross criminal misconduct and political corruption.  And the joke of it is, the one called out is probably the biggest boy scout in Trenton.

So this was just egregious, nasty, damaging behavior for its own sake:  Hurt and injure your own rather than going after the other side.  It's the way of the baboon. 

Sabrin: Trump vs. GOP insiders

By Murray Sabrin, Ph.D.

Simple Definition of scumbag : a dishonest, unkind, or unpleasant person

To ask the question whether GOP insiders are scumbags is to answer it. Donald Trump’s front runner status for the GOP presidential nomination is ripping off the facade that the insiders believe in "democracy,” namely, that primary voters should choose the party's presidential candidate. With Trump well on his way to winning the GOP nomination, the long knives are coming out from elected officials in Congress to current and former governors and former other elected officials who have gone on the record stating they will refuse to support the New York billionaire if he wins the nomination. In fact, many of them are already discussing a third-party "conservative" option or have expressed support for Hillary Clinton.

Once again, GOP insiders revealing their hypocrisy that the GOP is a "big tent." In fact, the GOP has become a single-issue party, unequivocal support for military intervention anywhere in the world.  If GOP candidates do not toe the line, so-called party loyalty is thrown out the window and the candidate is demonized in the most ugly ways possible. (Review the GOP's treatment of Ron Paul in 2008 and 2012 when he basically said the same thing about US intervention around the world that Trump is now saying.)

Donald Trump is speaking truth to power just as Ron Paul did in the last two presidential campaigns. The reason Donald Trump is getting so much traction is that the grassroots finally wised up to the mendacity of the political insiders and the GOP establishment in Washington DC, who lied us into war, spent like drunken sailors for several decades when they held the strings of power in the White House and Congress, and cut deals with Democrats to maintain the welfare – warfare state. In short, blowback is a bitch.  And the insiders can't stand it one iota.

Despite all his flaws on economic policies, a Trump presidency would be a success if he pursues a noninterventionist foreign policy.  Military spending is a huge drag on the economy and intervening around the world where our military is “pissing” on other people (killing innocents and destroying their property) at the behest of the warmongers and telling them it is raining is not the way to build friends across the globe. 

So Donald, embrace free enterprise and limited government and a noninterventionist foreign policy, and you will make America great again!

Murray Sabrin is a Professor of Finance at Ramapo College and the co-founder and president of Conger LH, www.congerlh.com