Gas-Tax Repeal Rally a No Show

If the gas-tax repeal is Senator Tom Kean Jr.'s plan to save the endangered liberals in his caucus, it totally crapped the bed on Saturday when the kick-off rally to a series of rallies across the state was cancelled and a pro-Senator Steve Oroho rally popped up in its place.  The repeal is being pushed by "Red Shirt" movement leader Bill Spadea, cultural leftist Senator Kip Bateman, and the petroleum lobby. 

Slated for Newton Green on Saturday, October 22nd (11am-2pm), the rally was organized with support from the petroleum lobby by people claiming to represent the Tea Party and other groups.  The run-up to the rally benefitted from paid advertising and media coverage, including a front page story on the New Jersey Herald the day before.  Organizers claimed that the response had been huge and claimed to had lined up a dozen speakers -- including 5th District congressional candidate Michael J. Cino. 

Cino, has attacked conservative Congressman Scott Garrett and the Republican majority in Congress for its "traitorous" votes.  Cino runs a group known as the "Red Dogs" who are described as a sort of vanguard in the "rebellion against the establishment."  We don't know if there is a relationship between the "Red Shirts" and the "Red Dogs."

The morning of the rally was rainy and the forecast called for a light drizzle.  The rally was set expressly "rain or shine" but was canceled a couple hours before it was scheduled to begin "due to weather."

Having explicitly described the rally as "public" in its advertisements, gas-tax-repeal organizers became concerned when they heard that people who didn't agree with them were thinking of attending their public meeting.  The gas-tax repealers asked the police to intervene to "segregate" the rally.  The gas-tax-repeal camp was asked about the criteria they intended to use to "segregate" members of the public at a public rally.  They wouldn't provide a criteria.

A building trades union representing thousands of families in Northwest New Jersey stepped in and obtained  its own permit, which lay outside Newton Green.  But in the end, it wasn't necessary, because with Newton Green vacated by the gas-tax-repeal organizers of the advertised public rally, the people who they had attempted to keep out had the Green to themselves.    

So at 11am on Saturday morning -- instead of the gas-tax-repeal rally that was advertised -- 250 people showed up in support of the Tax Restructuring plan passed by the Legislature and signed into law by Governor Chris Christie.  They came to support conservative Republican Steve Oroho, who has been under attack by the Legislature's two most liberal Republicans -- Kip Bateman and Jennifer Beck -- and they came to combat the lies put out by the petroleum lobby that the 23-cent increase applies to home heating oil and baby ointment and polyester clothing.  All lies designed to frighten people and to inflame hatred and even violence.

The facts, as provided by the Office of Legislative Services, are that nothing new is taxed and that all the exemptions that were in place remain in place. This means the increase does not apply to home heating oil or baby ointment or polyester clothing.  In fact, the law now INCREASES the number of exempt products.  We will discuss these additional exemptions in detail in an upcoming column.

Saturday's crowd -- numbering more than 250 -- was made up largely of trade union members and their families, but many local Republicans turned out, including two Sussex County Freeholders and several local elected officials and GOP municipal leaders.  About a dozen Pro-Life activists were present as well as that many grassroots Second-Amendment campaigners.  About a half dozen people attended who were drawn by the newspaper coverage. 

Three speakers addressed the crowd.  Rev. Greg Quinlan of the Center for Garden State Families reminded those present that Senator Oroho is a leader in the fight to preserve traditional values in New Jersey and America.  He added that those who want to drive Senator Oroho out of office are followers of the two most culturally left-wing members of the GOP in the Legislature and that earlier this week the two had celebrated the deaths of millions of unborn children by honoring the racist memory of eugenicist Margaret Sanger and her Planned Parenthood organization. 

Economics professor Murray Sabrin explained how the gas tax is a user tax and that this is a moral form of taxation.  The gathering was reminded that President Ronald Reagan, the founder of the modern conservative movement, favored user taxes and used the gas tax to fund road and bridge construction in America.  Sabrin went on to remind the audience that those "Red Shirts" who are trying to make the gas tax the big issue of 2017 are doing so to deflect attention away from the real problem tax in New Jersey -- the property tax -- which is a driver of the state's highest in America foreclosure rate.  Those who say the gas tax is the problem do so to support the Abbott-system of spending the state revenue from income taxes.

Finally, a union leader from Sussex County reminded the rally that "this was supposed to be their (the petroleum lobby's) rally" and that they had been there to spread lies about the Tax Restructuring plan and hatred for Senator Oroho.  He went on to thank the working men and women present from Sussex, Warren, and Morris counties and the thousands of union families they represent who live, work, and vote in the 24th Legislative District.  He promised that they would be back again and again and again and again, door-to-door, to carry the message to EVERY household in the 24th District.

The event was topped off with two announcements:  First, that Franklin Mayor Nick Giordano, who had been moved to oppose Senator Oroho after listening to the propaganda of "Red Shirt" lies, had written a letter endorsing the Senator and the Tax Restructuring plan.  And second, that the Senator's youngest daughter had safely delivered a child.  Steve Oroho's new grandson.

Tea Party aims at Oroho... hits Garrett

The Skylands Tea Party claims to be conservative -- and yet, while the most conservative Congressman to represent New Jersey in decades is fighting for his political life, they have been focused on attacking a conservative Republican legislator.  That's become the role of the Tea Party.  They don't care about defeating Democrats because in a General Election setting, they're a joke.

Remember this Tea Party candidate:

And she's right... she is them. 

Yep, Republicans should have taken the United States Senate in 2010.  Instead, it took Republicans three election cycles to capture the Senate.  In 2010, the GOP was poised to capture both Houses of Congress like they had in 1994, but nobody had factored in the Tea Party (which didn't exist in 1994).  The deftness with which the Tea Party regularly shit the bed allowed the Democrats to hang on in 2010 and 2012 -- losing only in 2014, but setting them up for a comeback this November.

And they are doing it in Northwest New Jersey, where solid-conservative Congressman Scott Garrett is in a dogfight with Clintonista Josh Gottheimer.  The election is a month away and what is the Tea Party doing?  They are trying to screw a conservative legislator who believes debt needs to be addressed and  who successfully negotiated the largest tax cut legislation in New Jersey history.  They say it isn't the way they wanted it to be and so it's "let's kill our fellow conservative!"

When Tea Party Assemblyperson Gail Phoebus addresses a Tea Party rally in two weeks time, it will not be to help Scott Garrett or even to beat liberal Democrat Gottheimer, it will be to screw the Republican legislator she shares an office with -- the guy who endorsed her and helped her win an election less than a year ago. 

Yeah, these people do have darn short memories.  The operating principle of the Tea Party is to talk bad about liberals and Democrats but keep the screwings within the family. 

Tea partier Phoebus, a sort-of unofficial editor over at the NJ Herald, has been lobbying local mayors to screw her fellow Republicans.  Taking her advice, Franklin Mayor Nick Giordano threatened to recall and then run against Senator Oroho -- although he quickly denied doing so.  Not so with Vernon Mayor Harry Shortway, who formally endorsed liberal Democrat and former Clinton apparatchik Josh Gottheimer for Congress against conservative incumbent Garrett.  This is what happens when you save the screwings for fellow conservatives and Republicans. 

Now are you happy, Gail?

Why does the Tea Party focus all its hatred on fellow Republicans?  Because that is all they are capable of.  The Tea Party has never been known to do a Democrat any harm in New Jersey.  What they can do is shit up a primary and, if lucky enough to win, nominate a candidate so bad that even in Northwest New Jersey a Democrat can beat him.  What kind of candidate? 

This is a recent post from a Tea Party candidate who challenged Congressman Garrett in a primary and claimed that one vote he disagreed with made Garrett "a liberal":

Because of limped dicked conservatives we got the present problem and nobody is willing to vote for liars and thieves in different suits. So our representatives don't get to expand and we remain screwed...... Money whores fucking the working guy.

Yes, that is how they talk. 

The great problem with the Tea Party is that they lack humanity, humility, and common decency.  Like fascists, they treat those they disagree with like pests to be exterminated, not like people with a different point of view. 

Memo to Bill Spadea and others... your armbands are showing.