Trenton Democrats are making war on working mothers

Many working mothers depend on the flexible arrangements that working as an independent contractor provides them. But such arrangements could soon be illegal in New Jersey, if Trenton Democrats have their way.

Last week, Senate Bill S-4204 passed out of the Senate Labor Committee on a 3 to 1 vote. That’s three Democrat YES votes – Fred Madden, Joseph Lagana, and Jim Beach – to one Republican NO (Tony Bucco). The bill has one sponsor – Senate President Steve Sweeney.

On Monday, it was the turn of the Assembly Democrats, who passed their version of the bill out of committee on a 6 (Democrats) to 3 (Republicans) vote. Figures that creeps like Assemblyman Eric Houghtaling didn’t have the balls to take this vote before the election. In fact, the Democrats waited until after Election Day to introduce their bills in both chambers of the Legislature. Now it’s getting fast-tracked. How dishonest is that! Waiting until after the voters can do something about it – and then screwing mom. Hey, you know what that makes them?

As proposed by Sweeney, S-4204 “provides that, for the purposes of all State employment laws, individuals who perform services for remuneration are employees, not independent contractors, and are subject to the provisions of those laws… unless and until it is shown to the satisfaction of the Commissioner that:

a. The individual has been and will continue to be free from control or direction over the performance of the service, both under the individual’s contract of service and in fact; and

b. The individual’s service is either outside the usual course of the business for which that service is performed; and

c. The individual is customarily engaged in an independently established trade, occupation, profession or business of the same nature as that involved in the work performed.”

This is an incredibly stupid move for a potential candidate for Governor in 2021. Whoever advised Sweeney to do this must have been hitting the pipe overtime. But it gets worse because the guy Sweeney would be running against – incumbent Democrat Governor Phil Murphy – supports screwing over working moms too.

Why are they doing it in the face of data that clearly indicates the current structure helps working mothers? United States Census data has chronicled this common route back to work for women trying to balance motherhood with gainful employment. And there is a large academic literature on the subject. As New Jersey 101.5’s Bill Spadea noted:

That's right, If you're a working mom who took some time off to have and raise your children, you may be at risk.

The latest attack on our economy from the radicals in Trenton is a new bill that would all but eliminate the ability for a person to work as an independent contractor in New Jersey…

The restrictions placed on employers in order to essentially force them to hire W2 employees only will be most hurtful to working moms. So many mothers need the flexibility of returning to work and controlling their own hours like ride share drivers, food delivery, special education providers, among many, many others.

As we know, the so-called 'gender pay gap' is a very complicated issue and has everything to do with choices many women make to stay home with their kids for a number of years. Naturally, returning to the workforce after a gap in experience results in reduction in pay as many women are essentially starting again. The idea of returning to work as an independent contractor offers the kind of additional income and flexible hours, which empowers moms to continue managing their homes, balancing child care and of course, paying NJ taxes.

We heard from Alida Kass on Monday from the NJ Civil Justice Institute prior to her testifying before the Assembly committee discussing the new law. Then Jon Bramnick, the recently re-elected Assembly Minority Leader, explaining that this is all about new taxes for NJ businesses and another reason that many business owners will look to leave NJ. They can simply head across the river to PA or DE and not pay the additional taxes at all.

Read More: Murphy's and Sweeney's new tax target: Moms returning to work

Hear Bill Spadea interview Alida Kass…

The NFIB noted that the New Jersey Democrats are merely copying a FrCalifornia law that totally screwed working mothers and small businesses in that state, but apparently those pushing this legislation don’t care. The only kind of business they favor is the crony capitalist kind – businesses big enough to collect corporate welfare and then kick-back to the right politicians and their superPACs. Real dirtbag stuff.

Hopefully there’s a Republican on the horizon who will stand up for moms and cut the nuts off these Democrats.

Planned Parenthood refuses to account for spending

It is a neat trick to disguise your business as a cult.  Generally this is the domain of some dubious religious hucksters of questionable denominations, east and west.  But you got to hand it to Planned Parenthood, Inc.  They have their followers convinced that what they're doing is religion.

Hence, their resistance to open their accounts and explain what they're doing with all the money they get from taxpayers.  During an Assembly Budget hearing earlier this week, Planned Parenthood again refused to answer questions about their finances -- such as its annual budget, annual revenue and executive compensation -- put to them by legislators. 

The kicker here is that these legislators actually support Planned Parenthood in principle -- they just want to make sure that the taxpayer money spent by them isn't wasted.  But just like any corrupt religious scam job, Planned Parenthood holds that you don't ask questions of god... even if it is your job as a legislator to protect taxpayers.

What's at stake is a proposed $7.45 million supplemental contribution to Planned Parenthood from New Jersey's taxpayers.

Two weeks ago, at a different committee hearing, Assemblywomen Holly Schepisi and Nancy Munoz asked the same questions.  They requested a breakdown of how the money would be spent, what the organization’s annual federal and state revenues are, and how much it pays its executives.  Why Planned Parenthood needs $7.45 million in taxpayer dollars, and how those dollars will be spent, still has not been answered.

To answer these questions, Planned Parenthood sent its Political Director.  That's right, they pay someone to be their Political Director.  Why?  Are they in politics or women's health?

When asked to produce a budget, the political director looked for a time as if she was going to find one up her bottom, but it wasn't there.  So she had to reply to the committee that she had no budget to share with them.  No budget?  Who works that way?  She also couldn't produce an answer as to what Planned Parenthood's annual revenues were.  For that answer, she didn't even go through the motions of finding it up her bottom.  When asked about executive compensation (what rich know-nothings like herself pocket) she flatly refused.

Why would working class taxpayers wish to spend their hard-earned money on an organization that pays an arrogant white-collar hack like her?

We understand that for the uneducated few, Planned Parenthood is synonymous with "women's health."  But it's not.  It is only one of many providers all jostling for market share.

No, you say?  It's a non-profit organization?  Sure, and so was the NFL.  And so are a lot of organizations that make billions and pay their executives millions.  Setting up as a "not-for-profit corporation" is simply a business model -- it's not an "I'm not greedy" pass.

And Planned Parenthood is greedy.  It wants total market share.  That's why it organized the way does -- to spend millions on lobbyists and even more on grassroots marketing -- to convince American women that only they provide the services that, in fact, hundreds of other organizations provide.  We're sure Macy's would like to have the same deal.

Planned Parenthood uses well-paid lobbyists and political pressure to secure government money with as little questions asked as possible.  They want to keep all the vittles for themselves and starve their competition.  Planned Parenthood wants to have a monopoly -- and we all know what that does to consumers and taxpayers.  Consumers pay more and have less choice.  Taxpayers get ripped-off.

Planned Parenthood is a classic case of crony capitalism, delivered by that master of Wall Street chicanery himself... Governor Goldman-Sachs 2.0, Phil Murphy.  On Thursday, February 15th, the entire Assembly is set to vote to give that $7.45 million to a business that won't answer basic questions about how they spend it.

And if passed, you know that Governor Goldman-Sachs 2.0, Phil Murphy, will sign it -- no questions asked.  Just like those bailouts they gave to his corrupt friends on Wall Street.  No questions asked...

Bateman embraces the Big Lie (who will follow?)

Senator Kip Bateman has held elected office since 1983.  He's been in the Legislature for over two decades.  During all that time, while the fund that pays for our roads and bridges was running out of money, Kip Bateman did nothing but borrow more and kick the can down the road.

The gas tax has remained at 14 1/2 cents since 1988.  While every other state in America raised its gas tax to keep up with inflation, while President Ronald Reagan increased the federal gas tax to keep up with inflation, people like Kip Bateman did the politically popular thing of not raising the gas tax and instead borrowed more and more -- and New Jersey fell deeper and deeper into debt.

While everything else was adjusted for inflation again and again, the gas tax was not.  Why?  Because politicians like Kip Bateman could point to low gas prices whenever a property taxpayer complained about having the highest in the nation property taxes. 

As property taxes doubled and then doubled again -- costing taxpayers thousands upon thousands each year -- politicians like Kip Bateman would point to the gas tax and tell them that he'd save them a couple hundred. 

But he hadn't.  He just passed the taxes on to their children and grandchildren. 

The last time the gas tax produced enough revenue to pay for New Jersey's transportation needs was in 1990.  Because of the debt politicians like Kip Bateman allowed to accumulate, by 2015 the annual cost of that debt to taxpayers was $1.1 billion -- outstripping the $750 million revenue from the gas tax.

If Kip Bateman wants to know why it was necessary to raise the gas tax by 23 cents, he should look into a mirror and ask the question, because the answer is:  Senator Kip Bateman. 

23 cents a gallon, all in one hit, is what you get when politicians suspend the iron rules of economics and tell people that they can have something for nothing.  This is what happens when you don't adjust the cost of something for inflation.  A business would have gone bankrupt, but Kip Bateman knows that he can be a hero today and get re-elected, by passing the bill to a future generation.  It will be their problem, not his.

What Bateman and the other "Red Shirt" Republicans are doing to children, piling debt upon them so that their future begins in a hole, is made worse by the current lie coming out of the "Red Shirt" camp:  That the 23-cents increase applies to baby oil. 

This lie is up there with the "Protocols of the Elders of Zion," the "Flat Earth" movement, and George Bush "is responsible for September 11th."  What makes it even more disgusting is that those who are spreading this lie have consistently voted to kill unborn babies in the womb and have resisted humanitarian legislation to recognize (as does almost every other civilized nation outside of North Korea, China, and Vietnam) that 20-week old unborn babies feel pain. 

Europe recognizes this medical fact.  So does Latin America, Australia, most of Asia, and Africa.  But not New Jersey.  And it is because of those "baby oilers" that this state doesn't