NJGOP: Will Bob Hugin cause a civil war for Jack Ciattarelli?

By Rubashov

First, a hearty welcome to our new readers in the Washington Metro area.

Later today, former U.S. Senate candidate Bob Hugin will become the new Leader of New Jersey’s Republican Party. Ideologically, Hugin is very different from the last two men at the helm of the NJGOP. Outgoing Chairman Mike Lavery is a behind-the-scenes guy who shares a similar issue grid with the Chairman he replaced, Doug Steinhardt, an unashamed conservative on issues like the Right-to-Life, the Second Amendment, illegal immigration, taxes, and traditional values.

Of course, Hugin spent $36 million on a campaign to convince voters that he wasn’t a conservative. Nevertheless, he had more than enough connections with President Trump for the Democrats to define him. His campaign provided insiders with six-figure jobs, made some consultants rich, but was otherwise a disaster. While suppressing the GOP base, Hugin drove up swing Democrat turnout in several congressional districts that Hugin won – and the Republican Congressman or congressional candidate lost.

Last December, Hugin ran for Chairman of the NJGOP and came up short. Since then, the former Big Pharma executive has busied himself with changing the face of the GOP. Since his 2018 campaign, Hugin appears to have more deeply embraced identity politics.

For example, an independent expenditure committee controlled by Hugin called Women for a Stronger New Jersey spent around $30,000 on direct mail, text-messaging, robo-calls, and social media in an attempt to defeat a conservative State Committeewoman in Mercer County and replace her with what would have been the first transgender State Committeewoman to represent the GOP. The effort ultimately failed, but one can only ask why such resources – scarce in the best of times – would be wasted on such a silly primary, for such a silly cause. Surely, with so few legislators and counties in the GOP column, $30,000 would be better used to defeat Democrats.

Women for a Stronger New Jersey is run by Bob Hugin’s 2018 U.S. Senate campaign manager, who also benefits as a vendor to the committee. Hugin’s spouse is a member of the three-member board that runs the committee, according to its webpage. And as if anyone needed clarification as to the ideology of the candidates the committee is looking to promote, the Women for a Stronger New Jersey website is very clear on this:

“We're working to grow the number of women serving in elected office at the state and local level by building a diverse network of moderate Republican and Independent women throughout the state and expanding the pool of women considering public office.”

That’s right, conservative Republican women need not apply. But independents – as in non-Republicans – are okay. That’s kind of a sucky formula, isn’t it?

Earlier this year, when the state’s senior Pro-Life Senator decided to run for re-election, Women for a Stronger New Jersey was there wasting resources and urging a primary. And there was a primary – not for the Senate, but for the Assembly – with another enormous waste of resources. In total, Republicans have pissed away about $2 million on avoidable primaries – and that’s not counting the gubernatorial race. Insider vendors and consultants trouser the proceeds and benefit, but the party doesn’t. Because money doesn’t come easy.

Women for a Stronger New Jersey is not the only committee Bob Hugin has set-up that seems drawn to killing its Republican brethren. Jersey Real is a federal independent expenditure SuperPAC that has spent hundreds of thousands in Republican congressional primaries in seats that we later failed to pick-up. The Treasurer of Jersey Real happens to be that same candidate who was hoping to become the first transgendered Republican State Committeewoman. Small world.

Jersey Real is already active fomenting primaries in two congressional districts for next year: CD05 and CD03. Jersey Real’s choice in CD05 worked on Hugin’s 2018 campaign. It doesn’t appear to matter to anyone that the Democrat incumbent is sitting on $9 million. Nobody has asked, let alone answered, the question about how Republicans spending a million or more dollars bashing each other is going to help that arithmetic. Hey, the consultants and vendors will trouser a lot of cash – but the poor GOP donors shouldn’t expect a return on their investment.

One high-ranking party boss in South Jersey said that Bob Hugin told him the NJGOP wants “new” looking candidates… youth, women, “minorities”, anything but old white guys. What’s going on in your head doesn’t matter… issues, policies, ideas, solutions, ethics, integrity, honesty… these things don’t matter. It is all about how you look and how they can market you. Sad, especially because they almost always lose anyway.

After the scandal of Watergate, steps were taken to make our election process more democratic. In the time since, the Courts have destroyed those reforms, ruling that money is speech. Today, the average voter feels shouted down by a few very rich oligarchs who count for a very few votes but whose money allows them to scream very loudly and shout down millions of voters.

This disparity led a Princeton University study (Gilens & Page, 2014) to conclude: “The preferences of the average American appear to have only a miniscule, near zero, statistically non-significant impact upon public policy.” Voters believe in the ideal of democracy but increasingly understand they do not have it.

“The preferences of the average American appear to have only a miniscule, near zero, statistically non-significant impact upon public policy.”

In an opinion column, published in yesterday’s New Jersey Globe, Fairleigh Dickinson’s Peter Woolley wrote: “Jack (Ciattarelli) barely mustered half of the Republican primary vote though running against two candidates who were, to put it most charitably, marginal.”  It’s actually worse than that, because most Republican voters weren’t excited enough or mad enough to vote at all. 
 
Bob, you have been chosen to lead the NJGOP by the 2021 gubernatorial nominee.  His name is Jack Ciattarelli.  He is job one.  Along with every legislator and legislative candidate and all the county offices and local elected offices.  The party has candidates who face do or die THIS November. 
 
Don’t get ahead of yourself worrying about how to put your stamp on the 2022 congressional primaries so that the GOP establishment nominates a bunch of lefties nobody cares about.  If you are going to do that, you might as well take Alan Steinberg’s advice and just embrace critical race theory and then – for all your money – prepare to be the state’s third party.
 
Finally, you need to accept that this is a grungier, more blue-collar party now.  A candidate can get by perfectly well just by repeating the word “Trump”.  Of course, that is not a policy or a solution.  But neither is the first transgendered (fill in the blank).  More than branding, the GOP needs thinking.  Come up with solutions to the problems voters face and then tell the story of how you are going to do it, so that they believe at least you’ll try.          

“Every great cause begins as a movement, becomes a business, and eventually degenerates into a racket.”

Eric Hoffer

The Shocking Politicization of Everything

Suggested reading by Prof. Sabrin, Ph. D.

by RW

The head of a union representing flight attendants from 17 airlines said the people who stormed the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday should be banned from getting back on planes and flying home.

 “Some of the people who traveled in our planes yesterday participated in the insurrection at the Capitol today,”  Sara Nelson, international president of the Association of Flight Attendants-CWA said in a statement. “Their violent and seditious actions at the Capitol today create further concern about their departure from the DC area.”

“Acts against our democracy, our government, and the freedom we claim as Americans must disqualify these individuals from the freedom of flight."

Now, the House Homeland Security Committee is asking the FBI and TSA to add alleged perpetrators to the no-fly list.

But note well, no one has been convicted of anything. And if there are convictions, it is the job of a judge to determine punishment not the head of a flight attendants union or anti-Trump Democrats in the House.

Protest with BLM that includes rioting, looting and burning, and you get to walk (or fly) without any repercussions from the judicial system, try that in favor of Trump and the Left throws out the rule of law in favor of its own immediate punishment.

The country is going down a very bad road where the rule of law is trashed in favor of arbitrary determination of the guilty and bizarre selective arbitrary determination of punishment.

It is here, the politicization of everything. We have reached the next phase in a Mao-style cultural revolution in the United States.

Can Chinese-style social credit scores, which limit activities for those with low scores, be far behind? 

Will Steinhardt now disclose his clients who invest in Communist China?

By Rubashov

Did you hear… Jack Ciattarelli is a Commie!
 
Yep, the campaign of gubernatorial candidate Doug Steinhardt has followed up the announcement that “I’m not a politician, at all”, with a bigger, stupider lie. 
 
Yesterday, the Steinhardt campaign sent around an email that accused Ciattarelli of investing in “the Chinese Communist Party.”  The email went on to explain:
 
“As recently as 2017, Ciattarelli had ownership in several Chinese business investments all tied to the Communist Party of China (CPC).  It’s outrageous, but true - Ciattarelli actually owned financial interests in China Eastern Airlines, China Lodging Group and China Mobile Ltd.” 
 
The email included an image of Ciattarelli’s 2016 Personal Financial Disclosure Statement, filed with the New Jersey Legislature on May 2, 2017).  Steinhardt’s missive continued:
 
“At least two of his investments have direct connections to the CPC. According to Centre for Aviation, Shanghai-based China Eastern Airlines is one of China's 'big three' state-owned airlines. Moreover, China Mobile is reportedly controlled directly by the Communist Party of China. According to a report from Forbes, the Federal Communications Commission sought to reject China Mobile’s application to provide telecommunications in the United States because of its CPC influences.”
 
While it is true that candidates for public office are responsible for where they place their money and with whom they invest, it is also true that investments are often made without very much detailed geo-political information on the company invested in or the fund doing the investing.  Perhaps there should be federal labeling laws? 
 

True to its tribute band aspirations, the Steinhardt campaign goes on to level this attack against Ciattarelli:

“While Ciattarelli has been profiting from his investments in Communist China, President Trump and Doug Steinhardt have been promoting strategies that put America first, protect our Nation’s interests, promote election integrity, and hold China accountable for the spread of the COVID-19 virus.”

They even have a quote from Steinhardt – one in which he does the full Elvis impersonation…

“New Jersey needs a leader who will stand with President Trump’s ‘America First’ policies and against the Communist Party of China, not invest American dollars in the CPC. It’s time New Jersey leaders start protecting our financial interests instead of only worrying about their own. While conservative leaders who understand the threat the CPC poses seek to distance themselves from Communist China, Jack Ciattarelli has a long history of making money by investing in CPC linked companies. Voters must know that Jack is morally compromised on this important, national issue.”

Morally compromised? Didn’t the Philadelphia Inquirer report that Doug Steinhardt’s law firm wanted to buy a marijuana farm? Isn’t Steinhardt’s partner, the ever-so-conservative Jim Florio, the state’s biggest promoter of edible marijuana? You know, they put the stuff in chocolate bars, peanut butter cups, and gummy bears… and then the kids get hold of it and nobody is the wiser. A teacher or a parent or a cop can see when a kid is smoking a joint – but how do you effectively monitor candy? Guess “morality” must come in assorted flavors too.

But let’s place Doug Steinhardt’s questioning of Jack Ciattarelli's morality to one side for the moment.

We have to ask… Why doesn’t the Steinhardt campaign know that Donald Trump is heavily invested in China and that he does so much business with China, he maintains a bank account there? Given who is running the Steinhardt campaign… WTF!

If anyone missed it, the New York Times did a pretty big story on it at the end of October. Oh, and catch these dates…

“Trump Records Shed New Light on Chinese Business Pursuits... As he raises questions about his opponent’s standing with China, President Trump’s taxes reveal details about his own activities there, including a previously unknown bank account... President Trump at a 2017 meeting with the leader of China, Xi Jinping. Mr. Trump has a long history of chasing licensing deals in the country.”

One story from October 20, 2020, was particularly in-depth:

“Mr. Trump’s own business history is filled with overseas financial deals, and some have involved the Chinese state. He spent a decade unsuccessfully pursuing projects in China, operating an office there during his first run for president and forging a partnership with a major government-controlled company.

And it turns out that China is one of only three foreign nations — the others are Britain and Ireland — where Mr. Trump maintains a bank account, according to an analysis of the president’s tax records, which were obtained by The New York Times.”

The story notes that Trump paid China $188,561 in taxes – which is, by some accounts, more than he paid in the United States. Trump’s attorney would not identify the bank in China where the account is held, but the Times noted that China’s biggest state-controlled bank rented three floors in Trump Tower as late as 2019.

The Times continues:

“Mr. Trump has long sought a licensing deal in China. His efforts go at least as far back as 2006, when he filed trademark applications in Hong Kong and the mainland. Many Chinese government approvals came after he became president. (The president’s daughter Ivanka Trump also won Chinese trademark approvals for her personal business after she joined the White House staff.)”

“In 2008, Mr. Trump pursued an office tower project in Guangzhou that never got off the ground. But his efforts accelerated in 2012 with the opening of a Shanghai office… Mr. Trump found a partner in the State Grid Corporation, one of the nation’s largest government-controlled enterprises. Agence France-Presse reported in 2016 that the partnership would have involved licensing and managing a development in Beijing. Mr. Trump was reportedly still pursuing the deal months into his first presidential campaign, but it was abandoned after State Grid became ensnared in a corruption investigation by Chinese authorities.”

Doug Steinhardt should take a moment and read this and accompanying articles on Donald Trump’s business connections with China. We’re surprised nobody on his staff took the time to do so before issuing an attack that questioned Jack Ciattarelli’s morals – and by implication, those of President Donald Trump as well.

We would like to ask Doug, because he allowed his handlers to place a direct quote from him in their attack, do you now believe that Donald Trump is a Communist too? Does this mean that Jack Ciattarelli is more like Trump than Doug Steinhardt? That’s never good for a cover band, Doug.

But this get’s worse.

Doug Steinhardt allowed his team to put out this quote from him: “While President Trump and I were fighting to hold the CPC accountable, swampy politicians like Jack Ciattarelli were taking financial advice from the likes of Hunter Biden and making a personal profit off of questionable investments. I call on Jack Ciattarelli to immediately disclose all of his Chinese business holdings."

Hunter Biden? Where the hell did that come from?

See Doug, this is why you hire competent people. Sane people. People who don’t throw some name into the mix, simply because they heard it somewhere, regardless of whether it has anything remotely to do with what you are on about.

Can we flesh out this Hunter Biden thing? Does your campaign have any evidence at all that Ciattarelli took “financial advice” from Hunter Biden or, is the former top Republican in New Jersey (now a gubernatorial candidate) simply smearing the entire financial services industry? Shame on you for letting them put your name on that. It wasn’t smart.

Even less smart was them getting you to issue a call for Jack Ciattarelli to “disclose all of his Chinese business holdings.” You know you probably have all that information already. But now you’ve opened the door for him to ask you to disclose the Pandora’s Box of your clients – and all their dealings. And how many of them look at the geo-politics of a stock instead of its bottom line? Donald Trump doesn’t, for one. How about the Mayor of Jersey City? Isn’t he a client? Somebody pissed down their own leg.

See Doug, this is why you hire competent people.

“We have now sunk to a depth at which restatement of the obvious is the first duty of intelligent men. If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear. In times of universal deceit, telling the truth will be a revolutionary act.”

George Orwells

N.B. We welcome a conversation on this and all topics raised on this website. Jersey Conservative is entirely open to your ideas and opinions. To submit a column for publication, please contact Marianna at marianna@JerseyConservative.org.

One Giant Step That the President Can Take to Make America Great Again

by RW

President Trump is a New York City street hustler that somehow found his way to the presidency.

Having no principled foundational direction, by which he wanted to run his presidency after elected, he surrounded himself at the White House with establishment players who stabbed him in the back at every turn.

His recent pardons appear to be a combination of getting close friends out of hot water or correcting a misjustice fallen upon friends who found themselves on the wrong side of legal assaults because of being associated with him.

The only others that have been pardoned in the last couple of days are the few others that appear to have individuals in their circle with strong connections to Trump and those individuals are close enough to Trump to call in a favor.

But as the dark days of winter approach, if the President wants to take a deep step toward making American great again in a very significant way, he should pardon anyone who is in federal prison, or awaiting trial, for a drug-related charge.

Trump didn't end any wars overseas he merely lowered some troop counts. He has a chance to end the drug war.

The war on drugs, a favorite of the establishment, it could be argued is even a more vicious war than current overseas wars. By far, many more Americans are imprisoned because of the drug war, here in America, than the number of Americans captured and currently held overseas because of U.S. overseas military activity.

The Federal Bureau of Prisons reports that 46.3% of federal prisoners are in prison for drug offenses.

Trump should pardon them all and declare the war on drugs over. And he should do what he can to immediately shut down the activities of any agencies that are part of this ongoing vicious war that is nothing but an attack on the way individuals choose to live their lives.

Making America great again is about returning freedom to Americans. Trump has the power to take a significant step in this direction by freeing prisoners held on drug charges and doing what he can to shut down the drug war.

If he did this, it would make President Trump one of the most significant presidents of all time.

He would be a president that defied the establishment and moved the country away from a horrific domestic war that only damaged Americans.

No other president has reversed such an oppressive program. If Trump does it, it would make him unique---and a great president.

What if the populist wings of both parties started working together?

By Rubashov
In its political usage, the term “dog-whistle” has developed into something quite apart from what it originally meant. Wikipedia defines its use in politics as… “coded or suggestive language in political messaging to garner support from a particular group without provoking opposition… Dog whistles use language which appears normal to the majority, but which communicate specific things to intended audiences.”

Wikipedia cites popular writer and etymologist William Safire’s opinion that the term “dog whistle" may have been derived from its use in opinion polling. Safire quotes Richard Morin, director of polling for The Washington Post, as writing in 1988, “subtle changes in question-wording sometimes produce remarkably different results... researchers call this the 'Dog Whistle Effect': Respondents hear something in the question that researchers do not”. Safire’s Political Dictionary (2008) speculates that campaign workers adopted the phrase from political pollsters.

This usage doesn’t quite make sense. Apart from the fact that nearly all dogs can hear standard dog whistles, the idea of it being a secret “code” is fanciful, more a case of anthropomorphism. The dog whistle is a training tool. Period. By the repetitive use of a “dog whistle” (sometimes combined with other inducements) a dog can be trained to respond in a predictable way each time the whistle is used.

This knowledge allows us to see the term “dog whistle” in an entirely new way. For example, the use of the term “racist” may be seen as a “dog whistle” – by the use of which the “dog” can be trained to respond in a predictable and prescribed way. “Homophobe” is likewise a “dog whistle” – a training tool – the use of which will enable the user to obtain a predictable conformity from the “dog”.

This kind of “dog whistling” has long enabled corporate Democrats to prevent the party’s base from working with people of the same economic class. In the manner of an over-bearing mother, the Democrats tell their voters to “stay away” from “those bad people” because they are… (fill in the blank).

All this “dog whistling” about race and gender and sexual preference has divided America into camps based on surface “identity” markers and not on what really matters – economic power, the only “privilege” that matters. The scam goes like this: While most Americans want a future where the billionaire and the working person have an equal say in the process, the “identity” groups (funded by billionaires) distract from this and insist that it is the poor person of a different color or gender or sexuality who is the oppressor and the proper focus of group anger.

Because of this “dog whistling”, America has the least diverse political representation in its history. The lack of diversity with regards to economic class is an under-reported fact of American political life.

In his book, White-Collar Government: The Hidden Role of Class in Economic Policy Making (2013), Duke University Professor Nick Carnes reports on studies showing that while a majority of Americans work in blue-collar employment, only 2% of Congress were blue-collar workers before being elected and only 3% of State Legislators are employed as blue-collar workers. Carnes and others hold that this disparity reflects the economic decisions and priorities of legislative bodies in America – and it is an explanation of the gulf between the rhetoric and reality of legislation like the Cares Act. And it might explain why Governors like Phil Murphy appear so disconnected from the realities of working people, when they issue executive orders that destroy small businesses and jobs without a thought to how people will pay for health insurance and housing.

It is the disparity in economic power that led a Princeton University study (Gilens & Page, 2014) to conclude: "The preferences of the average American appear to have only a miniscule, near zero, statistically non-significant impact upon public policy." Americans believe in the ideal of democracy but increasingly understand that they do not have it.

The 2016 presidential election saw the rise of populist movements in both major political parties. Journalists like Glenn Greenwald and Matt Taibbi extensively reported on Establishment efforts by both parties to contain and dismiss the working class uprisings in their respective voting bases. The election of Donald Trump only confirmed the intensity of the pain being experienced by working Americans of all races, genders, and preferences. That pain has not gone away… it has only grown worse under government’s prescriptions to address the COVID pandemic.

Increasingly, populists on both the Left and Right are coming to understand – despite the designs of those who “dog whistle” identity – that their battle is not with each other, but rather with a political Establishment that screws all of them, while trying to stoke the fires of conflict and hatred between them. Here is a great video by Honest Left commentator and comedian Jimmy Dore…

In the post (from yesterday), Jimmy Dore includes some interesting videos from business owners who are suffering under the rules imposed on them by Democrat governors. He posted a recent article by The Intercept, titled, “The Unemployment Crisis is a True National Emergency: The incompetent criminals ruling the U.S. are about to push millions of Americans off a terrifying financial cliff”.

Another headline posted by Dore: “Yelp data shows 60% of business closures due to the coronavirus pandemic are now permanent”.

And another, from TIME magazine: “No Lessons Have Been Learned. Why the Trillion-Dollar Coronavirus Bailout Benefited the Rich.”

Dore notes: “We are turning America into Brazil… You want to know how you fight against fascism? You make sure people have a job.”

In the video, Dore blames Democrats like Tom Malinowski and Josh Gottheimer, who call suffering workers “white extremists” and “terrorists” – while voting for the very policies that cause the pain they are reacting to. Watch the video.

Dore points out that, according to PBS, the Federal Reserve plans to lend an additional $1 trillion a day to large banks. Dore then goes on to compare the support other nations are providing small to mid-sized businesses. He produces a graph from Public Citizen, showing the percentage of wages currently subsidized by governments for businesses closed due to COVID:

Japan – 100% for small Businesses. 80% for larger firms.
Netherlands – Up to 90%.
Norway – Up to 90%.
Germany – Up to 87%.
France – Up to 84%.
Italy – 80%.
United Kingdom – Up to 80%.
Canada – Up to 75%.
United States – 0%.

Dore also notes that billionaires have used the pandemic to increase their wealth by over a trillion dollars. He posts the following numbers:

Amazon profits up 100%.
Walmart profits up 80%.
Target profits up 80%.

All while 50 million Americans are facing food insecurity and 21% of small businesses have already closed permanently. Watch the video to see a list of the bonuses handed out to the CEO’s of major corporations during the COVID pandemic. Dore calls it a “rigged system in action.”

Are we getting closer to the predictions made about "fusion politics" by Ralph Nader, in his book Unstoppable: The Emerging Left-Right Alliance to Dismantle the Corporate State (2014)? Watch the video… Jimmy Dore is priceless!

“The entire business model of the Democratic Party is to avoid dealing with its own populists’ concerns, so they’ve never seen the Sanders wing of the party as anything but a threat to what they do for a living, which is basically take corporate money and then sell themselves as socially progressive. That’s what they do for a living. That’s their business.”

Matt Taibbi
Journalist and author of Hate, Inc. (amongst other books)

N.B. We welcome a conversation on this and all topics raised on this website. Jersey Conservative is entirely open to your ideas and opinions. To submit a column for publication, please contact us at info@JerseyConservative.org.

Democrat Malinowski likes to watch illegals “mow lawns”

The new “Left” is absurdly rich and doesn’t care about working people.  It doesn’t matter if they are American citizens, legal residents, or illegal immigrants.

Lisa Bhimani is running for the Legislature in Morris and Somerset Counties.  She claims to be a “fighter” for average folks but how?  She’s so average she not only owns a million dollar home in the district – she has a $1.6 million place in Manhattan.  Check the United States Census figures.  That’s not average, that’s being a at the top of the One Percent. 

What’s wrong with the Democrat Party in New Jersey?

The last two Democrat Governors have been Wall Street One Percenters.  Cory Booker is a Wall Streeter, as are many others… this is who dominates and runs the New Jersey Democrat Party.   Senate President Steve Sweeney, a blue-collar union guy, is the odd-man-out in a leadership that got rich playing with money, through crony capitalism, and government contracts. 

In his book, White-Collar Government: The Hidden Role of Class in Economic Policy Making, Duke University's Nick Carnes points out that while upwards of 65 percent of citizens are "working class" and 54 percent are employed in a blue-collar occupation, just 2 percent of the members of Congress and 3 percent of state legislators held blue-collar jobs at the time of their election.  How is that for a party that preaches diversity?

For non-citizen legal residents, the percentage in the working class is even higher, and for illegal immigrants higher still.  Not being eligible to vote, they are not represented at all – although the Democrats do make use of their bodies by carving out more Democrat districts by inflating the numbers with non-citizens.   

Not to worry… the One Percenters claim to be representing them.  Actually though, people like Lisa Bhimani and Darcy Draeger (formerly of UBS Investment Bank) and Tom Malinowski (scion of a wildly wealthy blue-blood family) support policies that pit the illegal gray economy against American workers.  What difference does raising the minimum wage make when a business is free to hire all the illegal labor it wants – courtesy of a Sanctuary State scheme?

Just a generation or so ago, wages were such that the American working class formed part of the vast “Middle Class” that was the cornerstone of America’s economic and political stability.  Read Elizabeth Warren’s The Two-Income Trap or       

The Fragile Middle Class (Americans in Debt) for more on what happened.  Now the working class are the punchline in a joke perpetrated by people like Tom Malinowski and Phil Murphy.

Our friends at Save Jersey posted the story and video below.  In it, Congressman Tom Malinowski identifies his audience as “elitists” who he publicly assumes would never get their hands dirty.  He goes on to explain that there are “a lot of jobs in our community… that Americans are not willing to take” and asks “who do you think is taking care of our seniors” and “who do you think is mowing our beautiful lawns in Somerset County.” 

https://savejersey.com/2019/08/tom-malinowski-congress-house-illegal-immigration-election-2020/

While the administration of President Trump has created unprecedented job growth, it will not last forever.  And while the unemployment rate is currently low, it does not reflect those who have stopped seeking employment.  There could be great opportunities for business ventures and employment in the fields Congressman Malinowski mentions – provided that profits and wages are not held artificially low through the use of near-slave labor.

That is what Tom Malinowski is celebrating… the use of near-slave labor for the benefit of wealthy elites.  They employ near-slave labor through the gray economy and then say that American workers don’t want the jobs.  Is it the jobs they don’t want – or the pay?   

And the idea that there is nobody in central New Jersey who would be willing to do those jobs – provided the pay was something you could live on – is nonsense.  The poverty rate in Trenton is 28 percent – and Trenton is a lot nearer to Somerset County than Guatemala.  But those trapped in poverty in Trenton will never get out of it if the only jobs available are those in the gray economy working for near-slave level wages. 

A legal economy would smash the modern wage slavers and allow wages to rise to livable standards in America.  Those employed could then organize and form unions to collectively protect their rights. 

Tom Malinowski supports the status quo.  He wants illegal immigrants to be paid near-slave wages to subsidize the rich lifestyles of people like him.  It is an old story and it got Julius Caesar in trouble, back in the day.

Near the end of the Roman Republic, the rich patrician class had made the working class poorer by bringing in vast quantities of slaves to take their jobs.  Caesar objected to this and pushed through a law that protected jobs for citizens.  The Roman Senate ended up murdering Caesar. 

Human beings go round and round, chasing their tails.  We learn, unlearn, and relearn… now as then.

Was Lonegan’s defeat an inside job?

Well, at least Jay Webber won… and Seth Grossman.

Bob Hugin won’t totally have his way in wrapping the State’s Republican brand in a plain brown paper.  He’s going to have a Reagan conservative and an eccentric libertarian to provide some color to the package – not to mention the incumbents, starting with the staunchly Pro-Life Chris Smith. 

What Hugin won’t have is a genuine Trump-style populist bouncing around in the orchestra, stealing the stage of an election that he plainly believes he is paying for.  Like Grossman, Steve Lonegan is decidedly his own article, but enough in the Trump mold to easily wear the costume.

McCann you say?  The most baldly dishonest campaign in memory will now be set aside, and with it, all the Trumpian rhetoric.  No, John McCann was not endorsed by President Trump, even though his campaign communications led you to believe he was.  More on this later.

It is enough for now to compare the post-truth campaigning style of a certain southern political consultant to the rather insufficient counter-measures of the Lonegan team, whose messaging was done by a consultant shared with the Hugin team.  Although completely false, McCann’s consultant had the discipline to dominate his candidate, confine him to those tasks of which he was capable, and to run the kind of sharp, focused, MESSAGE-driven campaign that we don’t often see here in New Jersey. 

If McCann’s consultant survives the recent raid on his office by the FBI, the inquires by the United States Justice Department and such, he could become a formidable presence on the field in New Jersey.  It takes a certain toughness to come up with a message so at variance with a candidate, to bully the candidate into silence, and then to brazenly run with it to victory.

Unfortunately, now the candidate will think the victory his… he will start to talk again.  Like he did last week when, in an unguarded moment, he let slip his true feelings about abortion (he won’t vote for ANY Pro-Life legislation if elected to Congress) and guns (he opposes the NRA and supports universal background checks).  Did the New Jersey Family Policy Council know this when its (c)4 lobbying arm was induced into doing an openly political mailer that buttered the Pro-Choice candidate but trashed the Pro-Lifer?  Or did they know and did they not care?  More on this later.

Not to worry though.  John McCann has served his purpose.  The candidate with the money lost (and now that candidate is a wounded, angry animal, sitting on a million dollar war chest).  But John McCann is broke.  He has eaten his seed corn.  Don’t look for him to trouble Josh Gottheimer.  And there might even be a reward in it for him.  Another lucrative patronage job perhaps?  He might end up a judge.

So the money that would have been spent in the 5th fighting off the visceral attacks of a Lonegan candidacy will now be heading… where?  Which Democrat will be the beneficiary of yesterday… perhaps they will all share in a piece of it?

Among the other lessons learned…

The party potentates who opened the bottle  of a Tony Ghee candidacy did so before its time.  They gave the newcomer no time to breathe.  It’s a solid vintage that will hopefully be available again.

And speaking of which.  We learn from the former Wally Edge that Peter Murphy is about to assume the throne of the GOP in Passaic County – the place he occupied before a certain United States Attorney, named Chris Christie, sent him away.  It’s a bad business – especially for Bob Hugin, who has made political corruption his ONLY issue.  Lonegan’s polling showed Murphy’s support to be the strongest negative against McCann.  More than 80 percent of Republicans were less likely to vote for a candidate who had his support… that’s REPUBLICANS.  You would have hardly guessed it from Lonegan’s campaign communications, but there you have it.

Surprisingly enough, Lonegan did have coattails of a sort.  In Sussex County, Lonegan-backed challengers to two incumbent Freeholders annihilated the incumbents.  It is the first time in living memory that a ticket with two incumbents was defeated in Sussex County.

Dawn Fantasia is the principal at a charter school.  Josh Hertzberg is an administrator with the ILA union.  These are what Republican candidates look like in our populist era.  Fantasia supported Senator Steve Oroho’s negotiations over the refinancing of the Transportation Trust Fund.  She learned about it and patiently explained the details to others – and ended up cutting a radio spot to that end. People warned that it would hurt her politically, because the final deal raised the gas tax, while cutting or eliminating a host of taxes (including the estate tax) and providing property tax relief.  Another lesson learned?

John McCann injected himself into the Freeholder race, on behalf of the incumbents, who supported him.  He ran a radio spot that attacked Senator Oroho by name on the gas tax.  Former Congressman Scott Garrett came out in support of the incumbents and ran a robo-call on their behalf.  More lessons?

Lonegan won Sussex County, but by a much smaller margin – about 500 votes.  Why the difference?  Well, in Sussex, the Lonegan freeholder ticket had a strong message that they pursued relentlessly – and were quick and sharp with their counterattacks.  The Lonegan campaign itself lacked this, especially the quick counterpunches.  Fantasia and Hertzberg also had the full attentions of Kelly Hart, who had been “let go” by the Lonegan campaign in April.  She had been field director for Sussex County.

Curiously enough though, when the dust settles after the General Election, the only big changes to the line-up of elected officials in CD05 will be the election of Lonegan’s running mates in Sussex County.  Everyone else… McCann and all his running mates in Bergen and Passaic will have lost.

A few years ago, Ralph Nadar wrote a book called “Unstoppable” – in which he predicted the rise of populist movements on both the Left and the Right in response to the disconnect with the mainstream political parties.  He suggested that Left and Right reformers had much in common and therefore, the basis of a genuine “resistance” movement.

How will this translate with Dr. Murray Sabrin on the Libertarian Party ticket for U.S. Senate is anyone’s guess, but there are Libertarian candidates in Districts 5 and 11, and a Constitution party in District 3.  A Center-Left populist, Wendy Goetz, is also running in the 5th.

And finally, election night parties.  The people you meet at such things are not average Republican voters.  Many earn a living from politics – whether as a lobbyist or a vendor, a job holder or a consultant.  They are in the business of politics – even those that just secure from it a certain status, as a member of a local government perhaps, or a school board.

That is not the case with 99 percent of Republican voters.  All they get out of voting is the idea that they are checking the box for someone who thinks like they do.  Most have a general idea of what the Republican Party stands for and that they stand for that too.  That “general idea” is provided to them, largely, by the mainstream media.  And yes, it includes the points that Republicans are Pro-Life and pro-Second Amendment. 

New Jersey’s Republican political class needs to learn to live with this.  Bring to a close their 40 years war with Reagan and their contempt for our base.  Trying to pretend that you are something else or “a different kind of Republican” is not a message, it is a deflection.  For all his money spent on advertising, Bob Hugin was able to convince just 52 percent of Republicans in Sussex County to vote for him.  He will need to do a great deal better.

Let the political class make its money… but leave average GOP voters someone they can vote for.

Sadly, the party took a step back yesterday.  They took away someone who meant something to a great many average Republicans – and they did so by telling voters that McCann was just a newer Lonegan, only more conservative, and that Donald Trump endorsed him.  We all know that isn’t true. 

And on that note, we begin the General Election.

Sussex Democrats use vigil to attack opponent

Last month, dozens of Sussex County residents met on the Green in Newton to hold a vigil in support of efforts to end opiate addiction.  Most were there for an honest, solemn purpose.  Some were there to get dirt on their neighbors.

It is no secret that Kate Matteson wants Parker Space's job.  She wants it bad enough to try to damage his business.  She wants it bad enough to try to turn a solemn vigil into a political sting operation.  While everyone else was praying to end the community's curse of opiate addiction, Matteson was trying to screw somebody over.

In a Politico column published yesterday, Democrat candidate Matteson admitted that her operatives used the vigil to try to lure her opponent into a conversation, tape it, and then use it as a kind of blackmail.  Perhaps the goal is to force Assemblyman Space out of office, much as the Left has attempted to force President Trump out of office?  This would represent a direct challenge to democracy and the will of the voters because Assemblyman Space is one of the highest vote-getters in the Legislature of either party. 

The question is this:  What kind of person would use a vigil for this purpose?  The vigil was to be a non-political gathering of concerned residents.  Who would authorize such an action?  Who would attempt to sell it to the media?

Democrat Senate candidate Jennifer Hamilton dismissed the whole affair as a personal clash between Matteson and Space, telling Politico that she believed it was about "Parker Space venting his frustration about what he perceived as an attack on his family business.  And that was the premise of the conversation. That was the build-up to that moment.  I don’t feel I need to be brought into peoples’ personal disagreements or battles with one another in terms of their personality conflicts. I think it’s clear from what we’ve seen in our local media that there is conflict between the two of them [Space and Matteson]."

As it turns out, the recording is not a very professional one and contains a number of garbled voices.  It is unclear if Assemblyman Space's is even among the voices present on the tape, while another voice (a woman's voice) apparently agrees with a negative assessment made of candidate Matteson, and still another voice repeats the phrase "elitist one-percenter" when referring to Democrat Matteson, the well-to-do-spouse of a wealthy doctor.

In the article, Matteson, who only began voting in 2016, actually tries to compare Assemblyman Space to President Trump -- fiercely attacking both in the process.  She may have only started voting last year, but she seems determined to make up for it with an extra dose of venom.

This isn't the first time candidate Matteson has used a solemn occasion for political purposes.  On September 11th, she and her running mate, Gina Trish, attended their first 9/11 observance and promptly turned it into a campaign photo opportunity.  It was rather disgusting and occasioned the remarks of many present for its gross lack of class.  Candidate Matteson might be upper class when it comes to having money, but she lacks it when it comes to manners.