McCann, DiGaetano have turned Bergen GOP into a monkey circus

by Bob Taschler

BCRO is still not organized. 

In an attempt to try to appear politically relevant DiGaetano called a meeting of municipal chairs. It had no real political purpose in that no political decisions were going to be made. DiGaetano was going to make all of the decisions by himself regardless of what anyone else says.

Only about 20 of the muni-chairs showed up. With DiGaetao's minions, YRs, candidates and candidate aides there were about 50 in attendance.

Sen. Cardinale entered the room while Lonegan was speaking. DiGaetano tried to throw him out because he was not a muni chair all the while the YRs, who are not muni chairs, were furiously texting after each question was asked and after Lonegan gave his answers. Could it be that the YRs were communicating with McCann who was hiding in the back office? Sen. Cardinale stayed. So much for the chairman being in charge of his own meeting.

After speaking to 9 people who were in attendance here is what I have learned:

1. The BCRO still does not have a slogan. In spite of claims to the contrary even DiGaetano had to admit that he does not have control of "the slogan". People were alternatively advised to leave the slogan blank on their local petitions, use the old slogan anyway because they were going to get it, or change to a new slogan after they have filed on April 2nd. This means that John McCann and anyone running with him may or may not have a slogan by the deadline and therefore may or may not be in a column. Their names will be stuck somewhere in right field on the primary ballot. This whole issue has left nearly 1,000 county committee without clear direction. Such is the rudderless ship SS BCRO.

2. John McCann is beginning to back-pedal on that $37,000 legal bill he initially claimed against the BCRO for trade-mark or copyright legal work over the slogan. Now he is beginning to imply that the $37,000 might be a contribution in kind. This for writing a legal brief to request the return of control of the old slogan that DiGaetano failed to secure last year. That is $37,000 to write a letter? Even at $740 an hour that is 50 hours to write a letter. Do you think John McCann's legal mind is worth $740 an hour? Seems to me that an MBA graduate of Wharton Business School, as McCann has claimed he is, could write a letter in a bit less time, don't you think? I think I will call the alumni office at Wharton to confirm that MBA McCann claims he has. I wonder what they will say.

3. DiGaetano stated that he made no financial agreement with McCann about any legal bills. So it seems that DiGaetano and McCann can't get their story straight. DiGaetano then asked if there were any attorneys who would work for free to defend the suit that Bob Yudin has against the BCRO. That suit is for the $10,000 Yudin lent to the BCRO but suddenly disappeared off of the BCRO's NJ ELEC reports. Funny how easy it has been for DiGaetano to make money disappear from the BCRO.

4. It was asserted that John McCann failed to vote in the last 12 Republican primaries. McCann never refuted this. Perhaps he was spending too much time writing legal briefs to take the time to vote?

5. It was asserted that McCann was at the epi-center of the feud between County Executive Kathe Donovan and Sheriff Saudino That very public feud soured rank and file voters which resulted in the loss of our freeholder majority, the county executive seat and Sheriff Saudino flipping to the democrat party. It turns out that McCann's actions were the Bergen County Democrats most valuable asset in those years and resulted in their complete domination of county politics.

6. Steve Lonegan articulated clear Republican principles. He has raised over $1.4 million, received endorsements from the majority of the state senators and assembly members representing parts of NJ CD-5 as well as many elected officials outside the area and many political luminaries. I believe that Steve Forbes has endorsed Steve Lonegan and will be holding a major fundraiser for Lonegan sometime next week.

7. John McCann now claims that he has raised $50,000 for his campaign. I can't wait to see his next Federal Election Commission report. This begs the question - Who will help the county and local candidates more? A congressional candidate with $1.4 million to spend or one with only $50,000 to spend being managed by a chairman who lost 40 local seats over the past two years?

8. DiGaetano claims that McCann will have the better chance of beating Gottheimer in November. Given DiGaetano's candidates have an unbroken losing streak since winning the chairmanship and the fact that he is in the clear minority opinion among elected officials it appears to me that DiGaetano is trying to sell political snake oil. His next job could very well be as a used car salesman at one of the lots on Route 46. He would likely do very well in that environment. 

9. While the HQ is still filthy, at least they managed to put paper products in the women's room and served some coffee.  

10. The BCRO and Republican brand has been so trashed by DiGaetano's antics that it no longer has any credibility or value. Better if a candidate were to avoid it as much as possible It does not raise money. It does not attract volunteers. It does not command respect among voters.

McCann anti-prayer operatives at it again

Operatives associated with candidate John McCann have once again attacked conservatives in New Jersey.  These are the same operatives who a few weeks ago attacked Steve Lonegan for supporting prayer in schools.  

Two operatives for candidate John McCann's congressional campaign went on a Facebook rant against the suggestion that prayer in public schools might be a helpful deterrent to school shootings.  The suggestion was made in a Fox-TV interview by Republican candidate for Congress Steve Lonegan, known as the father of the modern conservative movement in New Jersey.

The two McCannites practically spit on prayer as a solution to anything, one writing of Lonegan that "mentally he's in Fantasyland and has been for some time."  This was a daring statement, considering his own candidate's challenges, and clearly showed contempt for cultural and religious conservatives.

It also ignores the data and the very low incidence of school shootings among, for instance, the 7,498 Roman Catholic schools in the nation.  A daily regimen of prayer does appear to work.  Although this could be merely coincidental, the suggestion should not be so rudely discounted -- and surprisingly by people calling themselves "Republicans."

While one McCann operative called John McCann a "fiscal conservative" (the same camouflage Bill Clinton used to describe himself), the other McCann operative mocked prayer as "a losing issue" and divisively wrote, "I wonder if Steve (Lonegan) would support a Muslim prayer, or a prayer in Spanish."  It goes to show where the McCann campaign's head is and makes you ask how different are these people from far-left Democrats?

Both McCannites are affiliated with the Young Republicans organization, and one was recently active in the campaign of the Morris County Sheriff.  This leads us to wonder if the Sheriff shares these anti-prayer views too.

More and more, this Young Republicans group in New Jersey is beginning to resemble a metro-sexual finishing school for socially-challenged post-adolescents.  Their commentary is cut and paste from the script of "Mean Girls."  Yes, Lonegan is in their "burn book."  "Oh, that's so fetch... on Wednesdays we wear pink."

Isn't it time for a little intellectual vigor?  They can start by asking themselves if they really want to be Republicans and how comfortable are they with the party's conservative platform.  Perhaps they'll discover that they're closet Democrats but unaware of it?

It is also time for cultural conservatives to start their own public policy-centered youth organization.  There are thousands of meetings held across New Jersey by people who do believe in the power of prayer.  These meetings are attended each week by hundreds of thousands of people and the beliefs they represent are shared by millions in the state.  According to the Pew Research Center for Religion & Public Life, 67% of adult New Jerseyeans identify themselves as "Christian."  Of these, 34% are Roman Catholic, with 13% Evangelical Protestant, and 6% Black Protestant.  Mainline Protestant, Orthodox, independent Christian, Mormon, and Jehovah's Witness comprise the remainder. 

Of the non-Christian faiths (14% total), Jewish comes in at 6%, Hindu at 3%, Muslim at 3%, Buddhist at 1%, and other religions 2%.  Although so ascendant in political circles, in academia, the media, and in the cocktail parties of the one-percent -- only 2% identify themselves as atheists, with 3% calling themselves agnostic.  Apparently, the YR's are recruiting heavily from these very tiny groups.

Oh, and the Wiccans -- that group particularly beloved of the pussy hat brigades and whose "religious" symbol is given equal billing with the Christian cross on the flags carried at rallies by Democrat Party operatives -- their actual numbers are so small (outside the aforementioned circles of politics, academia, the media, and the one-percent) that they fail to register.  Small, but as we see from the legislation they get passed, very powerful.

Yep, the nation needs all the prayer it can get.

McCann comments on Moore... after the race is over.

A profile of courage it isn't.  On the afternoon after the Alabama special election in which Republican Roy Moore was defeated, candidate John McCann issued a press release saying that candidates like Moore were "unacceptable." 

Hey, Stumbling John, the election is over.

And what does McCann mean by "unacceptable"?  Social conservatives?  Pro-lifers?  Born-again Christians?  Pro-Second Amendment?  Was McCann referring to the allegations by women against Moore?  He doesn't say.

What he does say is that it is "the loss of another seat in the United States Senate."  Another?  Is McCann referring to Al Franken, the Democrat Senator from Minnesota who recently resigned?  What is McCann referring to?

McCann has been trying to style himself a feminist -- and to contrast his feminism with what he claims is Lonegan's anti-feminism.  In a recent Politico column, McCann brought up his tax liens and suggested that they arose from his wife's medical practice and that Steve Lonegan was somehow an anti-feminist for raising the issue.  Someone looked into this and suggested to us that candidate McCann was being less than honest with Politico. 

Candidate McCann's first IRS lien was filed September 8, 2011 for $17,704 against John McCann's legal practice (John McCann/Law Office of John McCann) and not his wife's medical practice (she is a doctor in New York City).  McCann's wife does not use his last name in connection with her practice.  This first lien appears to cover several quarterly tax periods beginning in 2010 and ending in March 2011. This lien in no way directly involved either his wife or her practice.

That lien was prepared by the IRS in Detroit, Michigan, for filing in Bergen County, New Jersey.  Separately, the IRS office in Baltimore, Maryland, also prepared a duplicate of this lien that was separately filed in Hillsborough County in Florida, where McCann owned property. This is done to ensure the debtor's judgment is paid if the real estate he owns is sold.  This tax lien was paid in December 2011 and released. 

The second lien -- for $118,295 -- was filed in February 2014 against both McCann and his wife.  This lien came was filed 2 1/2 years after the first, and doesn't impact on his earlier business lien.  Now, it has come to light that there are more liens, but that is for another day...

McCann's is a very strange candidacy.  It seems entirely spent on dishing out DCCC talking points on Republican Steve Lonegan.  When asked to comment on an actual issue -- like the Republican Tax Bill -- McCann clams up.  The best the New Jersey Herald could get from him is "noncommittal." 

Why?  Well remember where John McCann came from.  He put together his campaign for Congress while a political patronage employee for Democrat Sheriff Michael Saudino.  The Bergen Record said he was Saudino's "right-hand man."  Yes, this Michael Saudino...

That was posted just a few days ago, before McCann's latest round of DCCC talking points inspired attacks on Republican Steve Lonegan. 

Oh, and did we mention that John McCann is the lawyer for the NJ Sheriffs' Association?  You know, the same folks who put out a press release yesterday lauding Democrat Gottheimer and attacking the Trump administration.  And guess who was quoted?  Yep, McCann's boss...

“Last year, Bergen County taxpayers received more than $500,000 back from the federal government through the SCAAP program, and almost $7 million through a cooperative agreement with the federal government at our correctional facility in Hackensack. I applaud Congressman Gottheimer for fighting to make sure local law enforcement here in North Jersey has the resources needed to fulfill our mission, protect our communities, and save taxpayers money.”  said Bergen County Sheriff Michael Saudino. (InsiderNJ, December 13, 2017)

Like we've said before, John McCann's candidacy seems designed to screw up GOP chances in the 5th District.