Should Democrat legislator resign over conviction?

We've been waiting for the campaign of U.S. Senate candidate Bob Hugin to step up and fire back at the group of hypocritical Democrats who accuse him of "racism" because he sought the endorsement of a conservative Assemblyman who attended a Hank Williams Jr. concert and who was photographed standing near a Hank Williams Jr. band banner (which consists of Hank Williams Jr.'s face, some lyrics to a Hank Williams Jr. song, and the rebel flag).  The worst this Assemblyman could be accused of is poor taste.  Racism is a lot deeper than that.

Of course, one would have to be a person of more than Twitter depth to actually understand that racism isn't about one's fashion accessories.  And as this is the Democrat Caucus of the New Jersey Legislature, you are not going to get much in the way of deep thinking.  This caucus has already done so much to infantilize political discourse. 

Instead of remaining silent, Hugin's camp could have reminded these Assembly Democrats that they have in their caucus, at least one member who has faced criminal charges and who has been convicted of a federal crime.   And maybe they should do something about it, before going after someone who has questionable taste, but who hasn't broken any laws.  Oh, but wait, the hypocrites will say... he has a Dukes of Hazard tattoo!

What a bunch of handjobs... they probably watched the show themselves (and perhaps salivated a little over the bodacious Daisy Duke). 

The Assembly Democrats need to clean up their own caucus, starting with this guy...

Are NJ Republicans heading for civil war?

By Rubashov

Remember the great culling of 2007?  That's when a bunch of young up and comers like future Bridgegate figure Bill Baroni, future LGBT lobbyist Tom Wilson, and a number of individuals associated with the Chris Christie project decided that some incumbent legislators had been there too long.  They were members of the Great Generation, had fought our nation's wars, and had rebuilt our party after the Watergate debacle.  But the youngsters said they were old, their time was up.

And so they set upon them and worked from within and without to push them, unceremoniously, from office.  Guys like Senator Bob Littell resisted such rude attentions, so they circulated rumors about his health and attacked him on blogs like the old PoliticsNJ.  In fact, the genesis of this blog can be traced from those efforts to defend that old gentleman. 

It is a decade later, and another culling is afoot.  Only this time, it is being led by the fag end of a depleted and demoralized party who strangely believe that the road to salvation is to become as close to the Democrats as possible on issues like abortion, LGBT, the Second Amendment, climate change (or global warming or whatever they are calling it this week), crime, Abbott Districts, COAH, and pretty much everything except a few balance sheet issues and the hobby-horses of this lobby group or that.

The voices in favor of this culling are not just limited to the metro-sexual wing of the Young Republicans.  Younger party leaders, some quite powerful, will assure you in all seriousness that the future of the Republican Party is about identities instead of ideas.  They earnestly believe that we must compete with the Democrats in having our very own LGBT or Muslim contingent.  Some will insist that only a set of breasts and a fashionable haircut will win the day.

As with any culture brought up on watery advertising, they eschew data and have developed myths and mythological figures.  Chief among these is the "soft Republican."  They will tell you that we must ignore all those old-timers who still judge people by their ideas and conduct, instead of their identity or surface appearance.  "Soft Republicans" (limp dicks?) is where it's at.  These softies -- in both mind and groin -- constitute a great untapped vein of young voters.  "They are the future!"  Or so we are endless told.

So here is a wake-up call for the metros who seem to run the party these days.  The data is in, and you are going to have to wait awhile for that coming day of the 57 genders.  The old f*cks aren't dying off quick enough and they'll dominate the party until some of you are well into middle age.

Nearly half a million registered Republicans, 43 percent of all Republicans in New Jersey, are aged 60 or older.  Another 31 percent are middle aged -- 45 to 59.  10 percent are 35 to 44.  9 percent are 25 to 34.  With just 6 percent 18 to 24.  The Democrats are not so much a young party as a middle aged one, with their two youngest groups coming in at just 8 and 13 percent, respectively.  37 percent of their voters are aged 60 or older.

The truth is that young people really don't like political parties.  They don't trust them.  So if you really want to appeal to the young -- quit party politics and organize a group around an issue that matters, like human trafficking and the sexual exploitation of children.

Political party organizations are about as exciting as newspapers and about as relevant.  Except for the BCRO, whose website currently features a couple in a rather explicit situation.  But old people like them -- political parties and newspapers, that is -- and so for the next few more years we will have them.  But nothing is following.  There will be no GOP metro-sexual new day.  There will be something else, but it won't be a party as we know it today.

Now don't all you metros go running to the lavatories at once.  Your sperm counts weren't that much to begin with.  Have a good cry on your best mate's shoulder and buck up.  Because the old f*cks are still here... and so you still have a party.  But you are going to have to cater to them.  Or lose even more than you lose now.

Democrats to allow convicted criminals to lobby elected officials

The Democrats have a new demographic to practice their identity politics on... convicted criminals.  That's right.  The Democrat Party in New Jersey wants to give convicted criminals -- including those behind bars -- the right to vote.

Yep, a week after the Brady gang, NOW, Action Together, and the new Weather Underground (aka ANTIFA) held rallies across the state to protest the NRA, their party announced its support for turning cell blocks into voting blocks and prison gangs into GOTV operations.  One group of liberals is rallying to take away your ability to protect your family from murder, rape, and robbery; while a different group of liberals is giving electoral power to murderers, rapists, and robbers.  Such symmetry.  It's liberalism at its most brilliant.

Now we all know what happens when a politician smells a vote.  They're going to give something away to get it.  Laws are going to get progressively weaker and weaker.  Especially when the Star-Ledger reports that there are 100,000 criminal votes to be had in New Jersey.  That many votes could easily swing a statewide election and a large prison population would certainly shift the balance in a legislative seat or two.

Imagine Shawn Custis as a prison ward leader, lobbying the Democrat-majority Legislature, organizing a petition drive (doubtless with the help of Action Together and the Women's March) to get Governor Goldman-Sachs 2.0 and Tammy Jane Fonda to sign into law a community release program that gets him out of doors again... Coming to an average door in an average community like yours.

And you won't have a weapon to defend yourself when it happens, because the other set of "enlightened folk" will have already solved that for you.  Let's vilify law-abiding gun owners while we pander to actual convicted criminals.  Makes sense... if you want a Mad Max kind of world.

So who is the new political leader from Rahway?  Why it is the Honorable Mr. Custis.  Oh, you don't know him?  Well here, why don't you catch some of his work...

We'd like to hear from NOW... the Women's March... Action of the Hand... and other Democrat groups.  Rally about this, why don't you?

Lonegan: GOPers who push "moderation" while cutting deals with Dems are an existential threat to our party.

An important and timely message from the father of New Jersey's conservative movement:

Fellow Republicans,

You all know me.

No matter what you think of me, you all know where I stand on the issues. Some of you might accuse me of being too unwavering, unwilling to compromise, but nobody has ever doubted where I'm coming from.

As we watch the Christie era in the rear-view mirror, we need to decide on what kind of party we intend to be. We need to chart a course for the road ahead.

That's very easy for someone like me. The course is free market conservatism, defending freedom at home, and our interests abroad. It is the message of our Republican Party Platform. Simple enough. If you call yourself a Republican, you should value Republican principles.

Unfortunately, that is not who is leading the Republican Party in Bergen County these days. There are too many who look to cut deals with the Democrats -- and not for idealistic policy aims -- but for their personal benefit. Their vision of the Republican Party is a defeatist one, where they seek to benefit from the crumbs swept from the Democrat table. The policies they advocate consist of slavishly mimicking a watered down version of the Democrats' own post-Western, post-Christian, anti-Freedom agenda.

You've probably heard it around the county, and around the state, that a conservative cannot win -- anything. The fact is that the only Republican to win statewide office in over twenty years was both Pro-Life and Pro-Second Amendment. The fact is that those Republicans who get the most votes in New Jersey are consistently the most conservative. The liberal wannabe Republicans can't turnout their base and those they want to convince have someone better to vote for -- a Democrat.

This "moderate" nonsense is like a religion with some of our so-called "leaders" -- those who practice the Janus-faced religion of being all things to all voters. Even though every study and every poll shows that they will not convince a Democrat to vote Republican in this starkly divisive climate, they hold true to the faith that turning-off a dozen conservatives is worth every liberal vote they pick-up.

The way forward is clear for 2018: Maximum Republican and conservative turnout. A full effort.

Of course, there are some within our party who are working against this. Some who are personally enmeshed with the Democrats. It's happening in other parts of the state as well. Democrats are playing in our primary. In every congressional battleground in the state, there is a former Democrat running as a Republican or a liberal Republican with Democrat-ties claiming to be a conservative. Every one.

They are there for one reason: To make us spend money so we won't have it to hit the Democrats in the General Election. Here in Bergen County, I am facing an opponent who was described by the Bergen Record as the "right hand man" to Democrat Sheriff Michael Saudino. Let's not forget that it was Saudino's feud with the Republican County Executive that lost us control of our county. Saudino, followed that up by joining Hillary Clinton and Josh Gottheimer on a ticket that crushed the BCRO. Through it all, my opponent remained employed by Sheriff Saudino, as his trusted consigliore, and actually started his campaign while still on the Democrat's payroll.

Now we all know where Sheriff Saudino stands on this election. He's backing fellow Democrat Josh Gottheimer for re-election this year. So are Mayors Harry Shortway of Vernon and Harry Shortway of Midland Park. They held an event for my opponent at their family bar in Passaic County. Did you follow that? They are endorsing Democrat Josh Gottheimer in the General Election but held an event to help my opponent in the Republican primary. Meanwhile, in a neighboring district, the insider-backed "Republican" candidate wouldn't tell a room full of Republicans how he voted for President in 2008 (Obama vs. McCain), 2012 (Obama vs. Romney), or 2016 (Clinton vs. Trump). And like my opponent, this fellow seems to be allergic to voting in a Republican primary.

Our party faces an existential threat from those who cut deals with Democrats and then preach the religion of "moderation" while pushing fake Republican candidates on us. We must resist them, whether they are well-meaning and stupid or slick and treacherous. It is time to use the Republican Party Platform and our conservative principles as the measure by which we judge our candidates. If some of our so-called "leaders" don't like that platform or our principles, they are free to leave the party and start their own. I, for one, am sick and tired of being dictated to by a small group of professional political "leaders" who are totally out of touch with the thoughts and views of most Republicans. It is time for them to go.

A party that knows what it is about, is a party that can convince people to get involved, contribute, and win. This holds true up and down our ticket. The message of lower taxes, less government, and individual freedom is a winning one. The Democrats' warmed-over socialism, leavened with coarse identity politics has, in the end, always lost.

Thank you for your time and I hope I will have your support to secure our primary in June and defeat the Democrats in November. If you have any insights you would like to share with me, please feel free to send me an email at steve@lonegan.com.

Thank you,
Steve Lonegan

Are endorsements more important than issues?

Endorsements can be powerful tools to reinforce or create perceptions.  When they make sense.  When they don't, it usually backfires on the endorser, like when Newt Gingrich foolishly joined with Nancy Pelosi in an ad campaign to address climate change. 

It didn't move a single Republican vote.  Conservatives looked at it as a gross betrayal, and it essentially f*cked Newt Gingrich's chances of ever being the Republican nominee for President.  Again and again, the poor idiot had to disown his own words.

Newt's a pretty smart guy.  Taught college, wrote dozens of books, given hundreds of speeches, masterminded the Republican takeover of Congress, became the first Republican Speaker in half a century.  And even he couldn't come up with a good reason for his F-up.

Recently some GOP insiders have been putting the cart before the horse.  They have recruited some very interesting first time candidates that they are enthusiastically pushing.  They are on an endorsement hunt, except that they have yet to sit down with their candidates to honestly figure out where they stand on the issues that matter to that unwashed conservative mass who constitute the great majority of the party that they lead. 

Elected officials who endorse candidates who have no record on the issues are all potential sin-eaters, in that one day soon those candidates will have to take a position and then that position will become your sin.  That's why it is so important to get the issues clear -- up front.  Remember poor old Newt. 

And it will be no picnic for the endorsee either.  For a candidate to announce an endorsement in February, take a position opposite the endorser in March, only to have the endorser (under intense and sustained and constant grassroots pressure) publicly state that they oppose the candidate they endorsed on one or many hot button issues, is not a good plan.  So then the narrative for April is... "even so-and-so, who endorsed this candidate in February, now thinks his position on X sucks large."  And the direct mail, cable, radio and all the rest is about how the prominent elected official who endorsed you has broken with you over the important issue of X.  Both endorser and endorsee are left with a sore ass.  Watch, because this will happen. 

Issues always come first.  Issues are the WHY.  Get them right and everything else  follows.  Issues matter.

Arizona politician who opposed religious freedom bill, endorses McCann

Candidate John McCann stumbled again today, rolling out the endorsement of the Arizona politician who opposed religious freedom .  McCann's campaign today announced that he has been endorsed by former Arizona Governor Jan Brewer. 

In 2014, Brewer became notorious for her flip flop on religious freedom.   As Governor, she vetoed legislation (SB-1062) that gave individuals and legal entities an exemption from state law if it substantially burdened their exercise of religion.

Brewer allowed government to force people to do things that run counter to their religious beliefs.  Brewer placed commerce above spirituality.  Despite SB-1062 being passed by a large majority in both houses of the Arizona legislature, Brewer vetoed the bill. 

This is just another indication of where the McCann campaign is heading.

For an "outsider" Ghee has some strange bedfellows

By Rubashov

We don't know Anthony Ghee. 

Ghee calls himself an "outsider."  If he is, then he is the weirdest outsider in memory -- one who has taken great care to surround himself with, and seek the anointment of, the strangest collection of questionable characters since Dr. Moreau's Island of Lost Souls. 

Ghee openly acknowledges that he was recruited by party bosses, one of whom had some trouble a few years back with the federal government for what can politely be termed "public corruption."  We thought this fellow's re-entry into politics would stay below the radar.  We thought he'd be cool.  But it looks like he wants to swing his pecker into places that are decidedly un-machine. 

Now this particular boss has a chairman under his thumb who actually worked against the incumbent conservative Republican congressman in 2016 and provided great assistance to the liberal Democrat -- now Congressman -- Josh Gottheimer.  Following his master, this creature has enthusiastically thrown his support to Anthony Ghee. 

So have others.  Supplicants all (as will be demonstrated in great detail, so please, stay tuned).

The curious thing about this fellow -- the boss, not his creature -- is that he has decidedly bi-partisan tastes.  One would expect a stricter diet from someone who fashions himself the boss of a particular party, but this fellow is an omnivore. 

He's the kind of Republican who hangs out with the Murphys -- Phil and Tammy, that is -- and that was when Phil was starting out his campaign.  The boss enjoys hiring Democrat operatives for his vassals' campaigns.  And his best buddy/ business partner is a county boss himself -- albeit a Democrat.  They do lots of deals together... perhaps Ghee is one of them?

Word has it that this boss would gladly swap a congressional seat for the chance to keep the county clerk's office.  The boss, this fellow, can count the patronage jobs at the county clerk's office.  What he can't comprehend is the damage that turning Congress over to a Leftist Democrat majority would do to the United States of America.  As he isn't the boss of the United States of America, he doesn't care.

For 2018, the Democrats have clearly made playing in the Republican Primary a priority.  We have witnessed the unprecedented emergence of "machine" candidates to block the rise of Republican candidates who clearly represent the views of the GOP's conservative base.  It happened in the neighboring 5th District, where godfather-wannabe Paulie DiGaetano engineered the candidacy of "Stumbling John" McCann.  McCann cared so little for party opinion, that he actually began campaigning while still working for the Democrat Sheriff.   And the Sheriff has endorsed the incumbent Democrat!  So have a number of other McCann "supporters."

The boss doesn't understand ideas and ideology makes him uncomfortable.  He counts philosophy among the diseases.  So he is no conservative, is he?  He went so far as to forbid his county clerk from filling out a Right-to-Life questionnaire during her re-election campaign.  Remember, the boss understands patronage jobs, not ideas.  He would exchange our Party's Platform for a list of elected officials and the number of patronage jobs assigned to each of them.  Is this really who we want to be selecting REPUBLICAN candidates for Congress?

It was one thing for him to be the petty terror of a town... or even a county, but now he wants to determine the balance of the United States Congress.   So how should we confront such an existential threat to both our Party and our Republic?

Rubashov asked some conservative activists for their ideas and they offered these:  (1) They said to write about him... endlessly.  Fashion him into a nice plug of lead to fit around the necks of those he anoints.  And as he threatens the entire country, take him national.  (2) Debate him, drag him out into the sunlight, make the puppet master talk.  (3) Run a conservative reformer in the general election... for county clerk.  After all, in a world with more than two genders, there's no reason for having just two parties.

John McCann hurt police officers. Read their stories.

A federal lawsuit filed last year contains the personal testimony of dozens of veteran law enforcement officers who fell victim to a power play by the Democrat Sheriff of Bergen County.  According to the Bergen Record, John McCann was the Democrat Sheriff's "right-hand man" and a major cause of what went down.  Many police officers had their lives changed.  Here are a few of their stories:

"In 2014 my wife and I decided to have our 2nd child even though there were talks of merging the Bergen County Police with the Sheriff's Department.  We both agreed that we could afford to make this life changing decision based on the fact that the merger specifically stated there would be no layoffs, and no decrease in pay.

We had purchased a smaller home, which needed improvements... We are not going to be able to make these improvements or expand our home due to the impending layoff or pay decrease.  In fact we may lose our home if these changes take place.

My wife and I were discussing the possibility of having a third child as recently as February of this year.  However this will not happen now because of these layoffs."

***

"In 2015, I got engaged.  In 2016, I got married and purchased a home.  In 2017, I welcomed another child into my family... I have a wife and two children, ages 6 and 3 months.  Now with the threat of a potential layoff, not only will my life be affected, but my family will be negatively affected as well."

***

"I have been employed by Bergen County as a Police Officer since July, 2004.  I have recently re-financed my 30 year mortgage to a 15 year mortgage due to the promise that the Sheriff, County Executive, and Freeholder Board made that my job was safe when they merged us.  I am also the caregiver to my elderly parents... If I am demoted, I will not be able to afford the extra payments that a 15 year mortgage brings as well as care for my parents in a way that they deserve."

***

"I can personally say the moral and pride I had as a County Police Officer has been stripped away and this entire process has affected me personally.  I never knew what it was like to go to work and be unhappy.  I've always loved my career and the organization I worked for.  There are often times I get sick to my stomach thinking of how the politicians have destroyed this place and everything it represented.  My mind is consumed with thoughts of whether or not I will be able to retire..."

*** 

"I am a single father of two children.  I have full custody of my children... I had financial plans in place to send my oldest daughter who is currently in high school to attend specific colleges she had picked out.  With this demotion I will no longer be able to pay for my daughter's college education..."

***

"In August of 1996 I joined what I believed was a dedicated profession and well known department... I joined the United States Marine Corps Reserve in 1982... I was activated in support of Operation Desert Shield/Storm... I retired with 20 years of service in 2003.

...I have made many life choices on the promises and assurance my family and I would be able to live without the threat of losing our home or not being able to afford the basic simple lifestyle we have had in our lives.  Upon the assurance of the County of Bergen, the politicians and the Bergen County Sheriff my family committed to providing an education for my son that now involves the payment of an incredible amount of education loans."

***

"I am currently a Police Officer with the Bergen County Sheriff's Department... I am also a United States Disabled Combat Veteran.  I served four and a half years with the 82nd Airborne Division, with a fifteen-month deployment to Iraq as an Infantryman... With the promise of job security, I continued my life as any other reasonable person would have.  I recently purchased a home and have plans to marry my longtime girlfriend, whom this layoff also affects tremendously..."

It's no wonder then that candidate John McCann is so agitated by questions regarding the accumulation of power by Democrat politicians (and the concurrent loss of power of local elected Republicans).

Democrat shill Friedman digs for dirt on Singh

Let us never forget on whose knee this critter was raised.  Matt Friedman learned his trade from the notorious Wally Edge (AKA David Wildstein of Bridgegate).  Like Wildstein, whose blog was an integral part of the Christie project, Friedman uses his position at Politico to push a specific political agenda.

Instead of reviewing public documents put out by the Office of Legislative Services and discovering that Senator Jeff Van Drew (D-01) is abandoning his conservative past now that he's a candidate for Congress, Friedman is trolling the college-era Facebook posts of Van Drew's Republican opponent, Hirsh Singh.  Is that a handjob move by Friedman or what?

Friedman ignores real policy switches like this:

Van Drew recently took his name off two very important bills, according to the New Jersey Legislative Digest, put out by the Office of Legislative Services:

http://www.njleg.state.nj.us/legislativepub/digest/012218.htm

Co-Prime Sponsors Withdrawn:

S539(Van Drew,J)Death penalty-reinstates certain

SCR35(Van Drew,J)Minor child med procedures-notify parent

S-539 would restore the death penalty for persons convicted of certain murders.  The bill's statements lists the following:  "(1) the victim was a law enforcement officer or correction officer and was murdered while performing his official duties or was murdered because of his status as a law enforcement officer or correction officer; (2) the victim was less than 18 years old and the act was committed in the course of the commission of a sex crime; (3) the murder occurred during the commission of the crime of terrorism; (4) the defendant was convicted, at any time, of another murder; or (5) the defendant murdered more than one person during the same criminal transaction or during different criminal transactions but the murders were committed pursuant to the same scheme or course of conduct."

http://www.njleg.state.nj.us/2018/Bills/S1000/539_I1.HTM

Yes, Jeff Van Drew took his name off this legislation.

SCR-35 is a proposed amendment to the state constitution stating that "the Legislature may provide that a parent or legal guardian shall receive notice before his or her unemancipated minor or incompetent child undergoes any medical or surgical procedure or treatment relating to pregnancy, irrespective of any right or interest otherwise provided in the State Constitution."

http://www.njleg.state.nj.us/2018/Bills/SCR/35_I1.HTM

This legislation simply applies the same parental notification standards to the evasive medical procedure of abortion, that exist for every other medical procedure.  It looks at abortion as a medical procedure... not as a sacrament or mystical rite of passage.

And Van Drew withdrew his name from this as well.

Instead of real reporting, on real issues, Freidman has turned Politico into a kind of "Mean Girls" online "burn book." Freidman has never met a policy debate he could understand, so for him it must be all about the shoes.  "Oh, that's so fetch... on Wednesdays we wear pink."

Friedman has done this before.  We all remember how he tried to personally destroy the reputation and future well-being of Synnove Bakke.  We also remember how he, and others, refused to take a polygraph to determine if they had made similar comments in unguarded moments. 

We remember too how another website had weirdly endorsed the Orwellian idea that there should be permanent corporate surveillance of Twitter and Facebook.  As well as a "news" blog, never forget that Politico is a vendor for corporate lobbyists and the political establishment.  As with all such ventures, Politico is the sum of its paymasters.

Matt Friedman has become the bully boy of Establishment Democrats in New Jersey.  He picks on weak candidates or those without the experience to defend themselves -- and he does so by invading their private space, trolling on Facebook to find something from long before they had entered public life.  Knowing what he got up to in his younger days, he uses that as a mirror to his victims.

Bullies like Matt Friedman need a take down, so let's turn it over to...

Soros hack disagrees with Lonegan's call for prayer

By Rubashov

The Huffington Post... named for a somewhat sad, but very rich, white lady, whose search for celebrity is a kind of cautionary tale.  The name itself, a cry for attention.  

Over the weekend, the now foreshortened HuffPost (for that fame purchased is soon forgotten) launched an attack on the idea that prayer is a reasonable response to the inexplicable.  The target was that redoubtable warrior of the right -- Steve Lonegan -- father of the modern conservative movement in New Jersey.  The delivery system, one Amanda Terkel, late of the George Soros-backed... United Arab Emirates-backed... Walmart-backed... Citigroup-backed Center for American Progress.

Terkel is what passes for a journalist today.  A once proud profession, hollowed out, they travel in schools, mouths open, looking to attract the bait.  The lucky ones get to swallow a greasy plug of warm cash (courtesy of those corporations, foreign governments, "investors", and their like, mentioned above).  They console themselves with having "a writing job."  Yes, it is that.  For the moment.

Terkel is no Glenn Greenwald.  Her leash is obvious.  But at least she gets the spelling right.  Containing all the requisite snark, she leaves out the questions.  No place for curiosity.

Does prayer help?  Terkel appears to say no, that only "real" measures matter.  To end gun violence the government must make laws and send men with guns to enforce them.

Let government launch a war on gun violence -- like they did a war on drugs -- and all will be...

All will be... All will be?

Maybe it is time to grow up.  Put aside the fairy tale that government can protect us.

It cannot.  It will not.

And there are no sanctions if it fails to protect.  You cannot sue government because you died, not having a means to protect yourself, when the local rapist came a calling.  Again and again the American courts have ruled that government has no obligation to protect us. 

It is our responsibility and not our government's.  Which kind of makes sense.  Us being a Republic -- and, ideally, the government. 

Feudal peoples trade freedoms for the myth of protection.  Maybe that's what we are becoming. 

But the world grows more and more inexplicable.

Who can explain the epidemic of school shootings?  Or the epidemic of teachers sleeping with their students?  Or the sudden multiplication of genders... almost like an ad campaign, a product launch... new for this year... don't get passed by! 

Or those military-training-grade video games children learn on.  Or the 12,000 acts of violence the average child sees each year.  The 8,000 ersatz "murders" he and she witnesses by the time they leave elementary school.  It's been almost twenty years since President Bill Clinton released an investigation showing that violence was being intentionally marketed to children.

Or the modern slave trade which provides both cheap clothing and the sexual exploitation of children. 

Or the opioid epidemic.  Explain that again?  Who did that to us? 

Or the coming "show-down" with nuke-packed Russia -- brought to us by those same government intelligence services who assured us that there were WMD's in Iraq.  Only we'll surpass the dead and wounded in all Iraq in the first hour of such a "show-down."

In a world so inexplicable, maybe prayer isn't such a bad idea after all. 

Is Gottheimer-loving Shortway all in for McCann?

Harry Shortway is the Mayor of Vernon Township, in Sussex County.  Shortway, a Republican, in 2016 stabbed fellow-Republican Scott Garrett in the back and endorsed Democrat Josh Gottheimer for Congress.  Gottheimer was running on a ticket headed by Hillary Clinton.

Ever since, Harry Shortway has allowed Democrat Congressman Gottheimer to use Vernon as a foothold in Republican Sussex County and a source of endless media publicity.  The New Jersey Herald ran another photo of Gottheimer in Vernon less than a week ago.

Harry Shortway's father -- also named Harry Shortway -- is the Mayor of Midland Park, in Bergen County.  Harry was a retired police officer when he was hired by Michael Saudino to be a Bergen County Undersheriff.

Later this month, the Shortway family is hosting an event for candidate John McCann, at the family business -- Shortway's Barn, in Hawthorne. 

Many see McCann as a Democrat straw man.  The Bergen Record has identified McCann as the "right hand man" to Democrat Sheriff Michael Saudino.  It was Saudino's feud with the Republican County Executive that undermined and ultimately lost Republicans control of Bergen County.  The coup de grace came when Saudino, a one-time Republican, joined Hillary Clinton and Josh Gottheimer on a ticket that crushed Republicans in Bergen County.  McCann remained Saudino's consigliore through all of this and ran for Congress (as a Republican) with Saudino's blessing and while still on the Democrat's payroll.

Sheriff Saudino has formally endorsed fellow Democrat Josh Gottheimer for re-election this year.  All this meddling in the Republican primary has the Democrats resembling the Russians.

McCann skips GOP primaries but works for Democrats

Every Republican with a pulse knows what happens in a primary.  Two or more candidates duke it out -- sometimes it gets downright nasty -- but after the votes are counted and the dust clears, all sides get together behind the winner of the Republican primary and go and beat up the Democrat and win the election in November. 

That's how it was in 2016, when a lot of good conservatives worked for presidential candidates like Marco Rubio, Rand Paul, Ted Cruz, and Chris Christie, among others.  They fought for their candidates and against Donald Trump, but then got behind Donald Trump once he became the Republican nominee at the convention. 

Some Republicans, like Lt. Governor Kim Guadagno, said that they couldn't support Donald Trump for President.  But at least they didn't support the Democrat ticket led by Hillary Clinton.   Later, Guadagno would be forgiven by many Republicans, including Mayor Carlos Rendo, who agreed to serve on her ticket in last year's gubernatorial race.

A very few Republicans, like candidate John McCann, continued to serve their Democrat paymasters (in McCann's case, Bergen Sheriff Michael Saudino) while Saudino was running for re-election as a Democrat on Hillary Clinton's ticket.  In our view, this is unconscionable.  Any Republican with a spine and worthy of the name should have campaigned against Michael Saudino in 2016.  He shouldn't have been taking a check from him.

But maybe John McCann doesn't understand the primary process too well because he doesn't vote in Republican primaries too often.  If his voting record is correct, McCann has showed up for one Republican primary in the last decade.  That's pretty darn lame.

Many see McCann as a Democrat straw man.  The Bergen Record has identified McCann as the "right hand man" to Democrat Sheriff Michael Saudino.  It was Saudino's feud with the Republican County Executive that undermined and ultimately lost Republicans control of Bergen County.  The coup de grace came when Saudino, a one-time Republican, joined Hillary Clinton and Josh Gottheimer on a ticket that crushed Republicans in Bergen County.  McCann remained Saudino's consigliore through all of this and ran for Congress (as a Republican) with Saudino's blessing and while still on the Democrat's payroll.

Sheriff Saudino has formally endorsed fellow Democrat Josh Gottheimer for re-election this year.  All this meddling in the Republican primary has the Democrats resembling the Russians.

Have a good weekend.

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...

Is Sen. Jeff Van Drew moving Left on Pro-Life and the Death Penalty?

State Senator Jeff Van Drew (D-01) has played the conservative Democrat most of his public life.  But now that he's a candidate for Congress (NJ-CD02), in a deeply polarized environment, is that beginning to change?

Van Drew recently took his name off two very important bills of importance to conservatives.  According to the New Jersey Legislative Digest, put out by the Office of Legislative Services, Senator Van Drew recently withdrew as a prime sponsor from two bills:

http://www.njleg.state.nj.us/legislativepub/digest/012218.htm

Co-Prime Sponsors Withdrawn:

S539(Van Drew,J)Death penalty-reinstates certain

SCR35(Van Drew,J)Minor child med procedures-notify parent

S-539 would restore the death penalty for persons convicted of certain murders.  The bill's statements lists the following:  "(1) the victim was a law enforcement officer or correction officer and was murdered while performing his official duties or was murdered because of his status as a law enforcement officer or correction officer; (2) the victim was less than 18 years old and the act was committed in the course of the commission of a sex crime; (3) the murder occurred during the commission of the crime of terrorism; (4) the defendant was convicted, at any time, of another murder; or (5) the defendant murdered more than one person during the same criminal transaction or during different criminal transactions but the murders were committed pursuant to the same scheme or course of conduct."

http://www.njleg.state.nj.us/2018/Bills/S1000/539_I1.HTM

Yes, Jeff Van Drew took his name off this legislation.

SCR-35 is a proposed amendment to the state constitution stating that "the Legislature may provide that a parent or legal guardian shall receive notice before his or her unemancipated minor or incompetent child undergoes any medical or surgical procedure or treatment relating to pregnancy, irrespective of any right or interest otherwise provided in the State Constitution."

http://www.njleg.state.nj.us/2018/Bills/SCR/35_I1.HTM

This legislation simply applies the same parental notification standards to the evasive medical procedure of abortion, that exist for every other medical procedure.  It looks at abortion as a medical procedure... not as a sacrament or mystical rite of passage.

And Van Drew withdrew his name from this as well.

What is going on here?  And what do his Assembly mates Bob Andrzejczak and Bruce Land have to say about it?

Perhaps you should ask them...

District Office:  School House Office Park, 211 S. Main St., Suite 104, Cape May Court House, NJ 08210  (609) 465-0700

District Office:  219 High Street, Suite B, Millville, NJ 08332  (856) 765-0891

District Office:  1117 E. Landis Avenue, Vineland, NJ 08360  (856) 696-7109

NJBIA hires Buteas, or why NJ will remain last place in business climate

Year after year after year, New Jersey remains the worst place to start a business in America.  The worst business climate in America, the worst taxes, the worst regulations.

https://taxfoundation.org/publications/state-business-tax-climate-index/

A big part of the reason for this is the lack of a tough, no-nonsense pro-business voice in Trenton.  You can't win if you don't fight your corner.

What was once called the "business-lobby" in Trenton has become so hollowed out and so filled with accommodationists that it recently attacked the Trump/GOP tax cuts just to curry favor with the incoming administration of Democrat Phil Murphy.  What in the hell is going on when business attacks a corporate tax cut on behalf of a governor who has promised to raise taxes on millionaires???

Welcome to the new age of corporate cronyism.  Phil Murphy is a Wall Street capitalist, masquerading as a social justice warrior, who understands very well the uses of government.  There is a corporate model that has adjusted to an era of a declining middle class, permanent foreign sources of near-slave domestic labor, and the taxpayer-supported off-shoring of jobs; when legislation can be bought, winners chosen, regulation used to destroy competition, eminent domain used to clear a corporate path; when the income taxes of working families are used to subsidize the property taxes of rich corporations and their corporate favorites; when bailouts are provided to counter huge corporate screw-ups.

So the corporate community is adjusting too.  Going with the flow and getting in line to suck-up and earn rewards.

Of course, this is only an option for those really big corporations who play it crooked, hire insider lobbyists, make fat political contributions -- and fatter donations to the approved "not-for-profits" -- and who maintain the "right" points of view.  The remainder -- those 99 percent of business enterprises in New Jersey -- they aren't going to get in on any deals.  Not big enough.  What is big enough is the shaft that will be progressively forced up their bottoms.  More regulation (both real and "feel good"), more and higher taxes of every variety, and less freedom -- freedom to think, to speak, to associate, to earn a living, to exist outside of government or corporate favor. 

And so we come to a small concession to Governor Goldman-Sachs 2.0 by the former "business lobby" over at NJBIA.  Who can blame them?  As students of history, they know that even under Stalin a favored few capitalists prospered (even as most starved).  They want to represent "the favored few."

So who can blame them for hiring yet another organization Democrat.  This one as Chief Government Affairs Officer.  Fresh from the Murphy transition team, Democrat Councilwoman Chrissy Buteas is also president of the far-left Women's Political Caucus of New Jersey.  The Women's Political Caucus is an anti-traditional values organization that calls itself "multi-partisan".  Hey, they have a point.  In a world with 57 genders, why have just two parties?

Here's to another decade of being in last place!  And its millions of lost dreams.

Planned Parenthood's Cannibal Comedienne wants your money

We live in interesting times.  Government and the corporate state -- which promoted the use of opioids before spending billions to address the resulting crisis -- is now busy promoting gender dysphoria, so that in a few years time they'll be asking the question:  Where have all the young men gone?

Of course, there are other forms of dysphoria -- branch outs from that promoted by government, the corporate state, and cultural "fashion" (aka marketing).  These include everything from old people who believe they are toddlers to human beings who "feel better" thinking they are cats... or lizards... or even dragons (even though dragons are not "real" all one needs to make something "real" is to "feel").

So it should come as no surprise that, at a recent fundraising telethon held by supporters of Planned Parenthood, one woman -- a comedian -- "came out" as a cannibal, stating that laws banning the use of aborted fetuses in food products “would make me want to eat an aborted fetus.”  So is fetus the next sushi?  Don't put it past them.

We live in an era when you need a "consent app" to have sex but will soon be able to eat your fellow man.  How long until this culture disappears up its own bunghole?

Meanwhile, Assemblywoman Holly Schepisi (R-39) is continuing her call to see the financial records of Planned Parenthood.  Schepisi is actually a supporter of funding Planned Parenthood, so her call to see the organization's financial records is not part of the Pro-Life/Pro-Abortion divide.  It is just good fiscal sense to find out how an outfit spends its money before the administration of Democrat Phil Murphy goes and throws millions in taxpayers' money at funding it.

“It’s $7 million of public money and if they are unable or incapable of providing something such as a budget,  they should not receive a dollar of public money until they’re willing to do so,” Schepisi told NJ TV.

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.

As Murphy's Wall Street pals cut through middle America like a scythe, Murphy's party is out there dividing the working  class majority along lines of race and ethnicity and gender, hoping that they won't notice the suppository being forced upon them.  Keep them fighting amongst themselves, says Murphy.

McCann doesn't do primaries but works for Democrats

Every Republican with a pulse knows what happens in a primary.  Two or more candidates duke it out -- sometimes it gets downright nasty -- but after the votes are counted and the dust clears, all sides get together behind the winner of the Republican primary and go and beat up the Democrat and win the election in November. 

That's how it was in 2016, when a lot of good conservatives worked for presidential candidates like Marco Rubio, Rand Paul, Ted Cruz, and Chris Christie, among others.  They fought for their candidates and against Donald Trump, but then got behind Donald Trump once he became the Republican nominee at the convention. 

Some Republicans, like Lt. Governor Kim Guadagno, said that they couldn't support Donald Trump for President.  But at least they didn't support the Democrat ticket led by Hillary Clinton.   Later, Guadagno would be forgiven by many Republicans, including Mayor Carlos Rendo, who agreed to serve on her ticket in last year's gubernatorial race.

A very few Republicans, like candidate John McCann, continued to serve their Democrat paymasters (in McCann's case, Bergen Sheriff Michael Saudino) while Saudino was running for re-election as a Democrat on Hillary Clinton's ticket.  In our view, this is unconscionable.  Any Republican with a spine and worthy of the name should have campaigned against Michael Saudino in 2016.  He shouldn't have been taking a check from him.

But maybe John McCann doesn't understand the primary process too well because he doesn't vote in Republican primaries too often.  If his voting record is correct, McCann has showed up for one Republican primary in the last decade.  That's pretty darn lame.

For so many reasons, John McCann is a non-starter.  And this being America, we thought that we were free to express our opinion under the First Amendment in the Bill of Rights of the United States Constitution.  Apparently, there are those who believe these rights should be suppressed by political power.  To this end, the first threats have arrived, from elected officials and those who are employed by elected officials.  We will be collecting them, so please, feel free to keep sending them.

Of course, those who wish to suppress us could send along their thoughts and ideas and join in the discussion that is democracy.  We would be happy to publish their thoughts and ideas if, indeed, they have any thoughts and ideas.

Have a good weekend.

McCann campaign caught exaggerating again

The statement from John McCann's campaign reads:  "Dr. Darrell Scott endorses John McCann for Congress."

Who is Darrell Scott? 

His Wikipedia page states:  "As a minor, Scott aspired to be a drug dealer and pimp; Scott sold drugs, used cocaine, stole automobiles and took his father's 9mm pistol to school at age 16 and was expelled for it.  While in his 20's, Scott became a born again Christian after being inspired by his wife who was born again months earlier, after a neighbor had urged her to attend church. 

Scott is the founder and pastor of New Spirit Revival Center, in Cleveland Heights, Ohio.  Scott's non-denominational church operates out of a former Jewish Synagogue built in 1924, a 115k square foot facility, that has a daycare, banquet hall and radio station, with 3,500 members as of 2005.  The radio station broadcasts under call sign WCCD (1000 AM) – branded Radio 1000. WCCD."

In the 2016 presidential election, Darrell Scott became a prominent African-American supporter of Donald Trump.  Speaking of Darrell Scott, candidate John McCann said: "Dr. Scott is an inspirational leader fighting for change in Washington.  I look forward to going to Washington to work with our President and Dr. Scott to revitalize our communities and win for every American."

What does this mean?

Well, in March of last year, Darrell Scott suggested to the President of the United States that he was in contact with the "top gang thugs" in Chicago and that they would agree to "lower the body count" if the Trump administration would agree to "come and do some social programs."

Yeah, no shit.

There was a huge and damaging (to Trump) outcry over these comments and Darrell Scott had to walk them back.  His excuse was that he was tired when he made the comments.

Here is a video and story from Fox News in Chicago:

http://www.fox32chicago.com/news/local/ohio-pastor-walks-back-comment-chicago-gang-leaders-trump

But what we're interested in is where that title "Doctor" comes from.  As Darrell Scott is a pastor, we are quite content to honor him with the title "Reverend," but "Doctor" indicates that he holds a "Doctorate" in some subject and Wikipedia doesn't list any institution of higher education that he attended. 

So we looked into it a bit, and we discovered that Darrell Scott's "doctorate" is an honorary one, from an unaccredited institution.  Out of respect for Darrell Scott, we will not go into the details, but we suggest to the McCann campaign that they update their statement to read "Rev. Darrell Scott" and leave "Dr." for those who have earned that title.

McCann campaign confirms he's full of blarney

Since last summer, while he was still directly employed by the Democrat Sheriff of Bergen County, John McCann has shopped around a tale about how he stopped HillaryCare and saved America.  Here is a transcript of a video recording of McCann telling his tall tale to the Sussex County Republican Committee on December 27, 2017. 

"I'm the only candidate with an actual proven record of doing things... I was gone (sic) to the United States Senate to take on the Clinton Health Care Plan.  I designed a chart, it was presented to the country, and the chart was credited -- by others, not by me -- with saving the United States from 16 years of government controlled healthcare." (Candidate John McCann, on video)

Many people familiar with the long battle to stop the Clinton Health Care Plan disputed John McCann's story.  They said they never heard of him and accused him of taking credit for the work of dozens of others.  They noted that there was a plethora of graphs and charts but that only one got national coverage.  It wasn't John McCann's.

The Clinton Health Care Plan began with a speech by President Bill Clinton in September 1993.  Legislation was introduced in November 1993.  Hearings were held and the debate went into 1994.  In January 1994, Senator Arlen Specter (R-PA) unveiled his famous chart that detailed the bureaucratic morass that was the Clinton Health Care Plan.  As the legislation was amended, dozens of subsequent charts were built off this one, noting those changes and updates.

Last week, we published a link to a C-Span video of the United States Senate Floor on January 27, 1994.  The video is 11 hours long and unedited.

https://www.c-span.org/video/?54084-1/senate-session

At two hours and thirty minutes (2:30) into it, Senator Specter speaks on the issue and appears with his famous chart.  About six minutes into his speech, he explains that staffer Sharon Helfant was responsible for creating it.  He goes on to explain how the Washington Post had a story a day earlier mentioning Helfant and her role in developing the chart.  Numerous national newspapers covered it, and in each story, Sharon Helfant is credited with creating the chart.  John McCann is not mentioned.

C-Span caught the whole thing and it is now part of history.  Numerous newspapers wrote about it.  But yesterday, the campaign of candidate John McCann disputed that history.  Presumably with their candidate's approval, they issued a media statement that made this boast by the candidate:  "Yes, I authored the chart that killed Hillarycare."

The statement by John McCann's campaign continues:  "On Friday, a conservative blogger made an accusation regarding my involvement in stopping Hillary Clinton’s healthcare proposal back in the early 90s when I was a fellow in former Senator Arlen Specter’s office (R-PA), insisting that I have overstated my role and plagiarized a graph used to stop Hillarycare.

The basis of these accusations stems from a CSPAN video in January 1994 where my boss at the time, former Senator Specter, credited Sharon Helfant (whom I never worked with) for creating a chart (I never saw) to help explain how bad Hillarycare was for American taxpayers."

The McCann campaign then includes a paragraph from the Congressional Record for August 10, 1994, at the tail end of the battle to stop the Clinton Health Care Plan.  By this time, it had been amended and re-amended.  The legislation went through more than 130 permutations and, in the end, was scrapped when the Democrats lost control of Congress in November 1994,and were unable to bring the bill up in 1995, as they had planned.  Here is that snippet from the Record:

Read it carefully.  "John McCann, an intern on my staff who helped me prepare the chart on the Mitchell health care bill."

Thousands of names of individuals and groups are read into the Congressional Record each year for everything from boy scout troops to the winners of fishing tournaments.  It is a  small favor, often bestowed by members of Congress.  Rarely does it become the centerpiece of someone's candidacy for Congress.

The McCann campaign also included a paragraph from a letter from Senator Specter's office to John McCann's professor at the Fels Center of Government, where he was a student:  "In the summer of 1994, the Senate rejected the Clinton proposal to take over one-seventh of the entire U.S. economy in large measure because of John McCann’s charts and graphs which clearly showed the flaws and weakness of the proposal."

Again, read it carefully:  "John McCann’s charts and graphs..." 

Plural.  As an intern, John McCann obviously worked on many updates and permutations of the original chart (which he now claims not to have seen, despite the news coverage of it, or Ms. Helfant, who he claims not to have known, despite her prominence on the Specter staff and her preeminence within that staff on matters related to health care). 

Of course, it is a grandiloquent letter of recommendation, which either means that Senator Specter's office was prone to that sort of thing or that they liked and appreciated John McCann's work as a college intern.  Neither alters the record, which is now clear.

Labor must stand up to Murphy to protect job creation

"Once you get to Wall Street, no matter how you got here, you give up your right to say you are a man of the people." (BBC:  The Last Days Of Lehman Brothers)

Does Phil Murphy have any empathy with New Jersey's working class at all?

During the campaign, his professional spinmeisters made much of his college job washing dishes but let's not confuse that with having a perspective that understands the needs and wants of the working class majority of the state he now leads.  Murphy spent decades in board rooms dedicated to increasing profits at the expense of working men and women.  Murphy fully embraced the globalist philosophy that places profits before all else.

Conservatives -- traditional conservatives -- are conservatives of place.  As President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's great advisor Arthur E. Morgan wrote, the small community is the foundation of democratic life and the source of civilization.  The preservation of the small community -- whether a town or a neighborhood -- and the families and individuals within it, is the highest duty of public policy.  This stands in stark contrast to the Darwinian view taken by Phil Murphy.

In Murphy's world there are winners and losers -- and somebody must lose so that people like him can grow monstrously rich.  Murphy views government as an agency by which those in power can choose winners and losers.  It's called crony capitalism.  Murphy doesn't see communities, he just sees consumers -- individuals to be categorized and placed into silos -- the better to market to and to control. 

Like most modern Democrats, Phil Murphy elevates social distinctions above economic ones.  Seeking to divide the working class majority, Murphy and the Democrats focus on such things as the color of your skin, or who you sleep with, and they try to convince you that this is more important than having a job or keeping your home out of foreclosure. 

When a police officer is sent into a community to enforce a law made by the Democrat-controlled Legislature -- and someone is shot during the enforcement of that law -- people like Murphy tell you that it is the fault of the blue collar police officer, not the white collar Legislature.  They tell you it is about race, so that working class black people will distrust working class white people.  Getting people with the same economic interests to distrust each other is a trick that has been used to govern many times over.

From his years at Goldman Sachs -- and especially from his time in Hong Kong, at Goldman Sachs Asia -- Phil Murphy understands the uses of cheap, often illegal, labor to drive down costs and drive up profits.  The fact that these practices destroy small communities and cause economic migration means nothing to someone with homes in Germany and Italy, as well as New Jersey.  Phil Murphy is a citizen of the world, not a person of place. 

Once upon a time, there was balance in America.  The Republican Party was the party of business and represented the interests of business at the bargaining table that is the Legislature.  Back then, the Democrat Party represented the interests of Labor.  That day is long gone.  The Democrats do not nominate labor leaders to statewide office in New Jersey -- they nominate Wall Street millionaires and white collar professionals.  With its record of electing Democrats to the United States Senate, both Senators could easily be of blue collar vintage, but decidedly, they are not. 

Apart from a few individual legislators in both parties, the working class does not have an advocate in New Jersey.  No party is going to place the interests of class above those of the fashion statements and virtue signaling of the day.  The pussy hat brigade are largely professional women and the wives of professional men.  Check out the hands of all those "resisters" and you will find few with indications of ever having done honest labor.  Bring back the draft and the ANTIFA crowd would scoot off to Canada, for few could face the controlled menace of a drill instructor.  The "revolution" is an inverted one -- of, by, and for the Elite (and, as Phil Murphy said of Wall Street:  "We are the Elite...").

That's not to say that there isn't a populist Left.  But it gets stepped on and ignored.  Nobody speaks to its needs.  It says "jobs" and the reply is "more condoms."  And if it doesn't go along with the program of "more condoms" it gets ostracized.   

Labor must pick through the remains of both parties to find people for whom their home town or county still means something.  People who want to see their neighbors and community prosper.  People who understand that charity begins at home and that the false narrative of the "global" community is bullshit marketed to people so that they will welcome the slave labor that will take their jobs.  That narrative destroys two small communities -- that of the migrant willing to work at slave wages and of the neighbor who must agree to work for less to compete.

As the Democrat Party starts down the path of Governor Goldman Sachs 2.0, it is incumbent upon Labor to hold this phony to account.  Labor can do it.  Labor has been in worse places before and had to fight every inch to gain a place at the bargaining table.  It lost its place by not paying attention.  It is time then, to pay close attention.

The Cause of Labor is the Hope of the World.