The Rogers-Murphy alliance. Is Rogers off his rocker?

Maybe he really believes his own bullshit?  Maybe he thinks he really is the Steve Rogers?  The Captain America of the comic books!

Rogers reminds us a lot of Dick LaRossa.  They both ran non-campaign campaigns for statewide office.  LaRossa got 25,608 in the 1996 GOP primary for U.S. Senate and came in last place.  Rogers got 14,187 in last year's GOP primary for Governor and came in last place.

Otherwise, Rogers is a candidate from central casting.  He looks like a Governor.  He's an attractive man.  Something tells us that he knows it. 

But he came in last, and like every attractive person who is rebuffed and who cannot understand why, Steve Rogers now carries around with him the burden of having been offended by the world-at-large.  And so you get pronouncements like the one today:

"During the 2016 presidential election many of us worked very hard to elect Donald Trump to the presidency. Sadly, there were too many Trenton politicians who didn’t stand with us when they could have. I won’t be endorsing any of them,” said Rogers, who ran unsuccessfully for governor in 2017. “I am, however, willing to endorse candidates who will support President Trump’s efforts to Make America Great Again. To that end, I’m pleased to endorse Tony Ghee, a fellow military officer, an outsider from the swamp, and a man who will energize our party in 2018 and beyond. The GOP must begin to embrace and engage people from all walks of life. In my view, Tony Ghee is the face of a new dynamic GOP that will welcome the Republicans long forgotten by the establishment. I support Tony because I have full faith in him. He will help Make American and New Jersey Great Again."

Come again? 

You are endorsing someone who wouldn't tell a group of Republican Trump supporters who he voted for in the 2016 Presidential election, which means one of three things:  (1) He voted for Hillary Clinton, (2) he voted for Donald Trump but is ashamed of saying so, or (3) he skipped over that office or voted for a third party candidate.  In any case, Rogers should cut the Trump shit.

Hey, we LOVE Tony Ghee and think he will make a great candidate... one day.  But you can't get much "swampier" than being hand-picked by a corrupt convict of a party boss.  That doesn't make you an "outsider" -- it makes you a ward heeler.

Now Tony is young and new and idealistic, and isn't used to traveling in the low-life circles he now inhabits.  He's a good family man and an upstanding member of the community.  How is he to know what lurks behind the grin of that cherubic, whiskey drinking, boss?

Peter Murphy, the GOP party boss of Passaic County and the man who recruited young Tony Ghee, is the kind of guy who will cut the throat of his own candidate if there is a deal to be had.  He's done it before and he'll do it again.  Tony will learn.

As for the rest of Rogers' blather, may we remind him that the NJGOP is still in the process of getting over an eight-year cult of personality.  Let's not make our party about cult personalities or demographic groups.  We are a party of ideas.

Ronald Reagan wasn't a cult figure.  We didn't elect him and then learn what he was about.  Reagan was the culmination of a decades-long process of discussing and testing ideas.  The ideas carried Reagan.

Ideas matter -- and it is on his ideas that we should judge Tony Ghee.  Now he's new, and hasn't had time to consider much of what a candidate needs to consider, but he needs to start.  Because Tony, you are not running to be a celebrity, you are running for Congress -- to go there and vote on ideas that will have a profound impact on our economy and culture.

So don't let a convict do your thinking for you.  No good will come of that.

McCann thinks he's backed by the wrong Steve Rogers

We all know who Steve Rogers is.  He is the character behind the mask in those Captain America comic books.

So when someone named "Steve Rogers" endorsed John McCann for Congress, McCann responded by calling him "an American hero."  He must have been thinking it was Captain America.

But it wasn't.  This Steve Rogers, the one who endorsed McCann, ran for Governor in the GOP primary last year and came in... fifth place.  Fifth place out of five candidates running. 

Rogers picked up 14,187 votes to Rudy Rullo's 15,816 votes to Hirsh Singh's 23,728 votes to Jack Ciattarelli's 75,556 votes to Kim Guadagno's 113,846 votes.  Rogers picked up just 858 votes in Bergen County.

We don't know how he managed it, because Rogers has all the makings of a good candidate.  He is articulate, handsome, with a good resume... but somehow he didn't click with voters. 

We know that he put off many movement conservatives -- especially donors -- by assuming that he had become "the leader of the conservative movement in New Jersey" just because he offered himself as a candidate.  Rogers' support of career liberal McCann won't strengthen his image among movement conservatives,  who remember McCann when he ran for Congress in 2002 as a clone of liberal U.S. Senator Arlen Specter.  McCann said that he wanted to give voters "a choice" besides Pro-Life conservatives Scott Garrett and Gerry Cardinale.  He soon dropped out due to lack of money.

McCann went on to become  what the Bergen Record (November 18, 2017) called the "longtime right-hand man to Bergen County Sheriff Michael Saudino" -- a Democrat who ran on the same ticket as Hillary Clinton in 2016.  How Rogers squares this is a matter for his conscience and we wish him well.

Seth Grossman stands up for Tom MacArthur

Seth Grossman, one of the state's foremost libertarian-conservative leaders, has come to the defense of Congressman Tom MacArthur.  Seth, who some at Jersey Conservative have had policy differences with, particularly on social issues, has made a well-reasoned argument in support of the Congressman:

Two months ago, Republican leaders in Congress (including South Jersey Congressman Frank LoBiondo) met in secret and tried to ram though an Obamacare replacement that was just as bad as Obamacare.   They were stopped only by the determined opposition of some three dozen conservative Congress members known as “The Freedom Caucus”.    

For weeks, it looked like no repeal of Obamacare was possible.   That was when our own Republican Congressman Tom MacArthur of Ocean/Burlington County stepped forward and became a game-changer. 
 

Tom MacArthur reached out to conservatives in the Freedom Caucus and found common ground with Republican moderates.   MacArthur almost single handedly worked out the compromise that includes some very good conservative ideas.  If Republicans in the Senate do their part, MacArthur’s bill can bring free markets, competition, better care, and lower prices back to our health care system. 
 

The Republican Establishment is now punishing MacArthur for doing the right thing.  Earlier this week, they forced MacArthur out of the “Tuesday Group”– some 40 “moderate” Republicans who include anti-conservative NJ Republican Congressmen like Leonard Lance, Frank LoBiondo, and Chris Smith. These “Tuesday Group” Republicans are generously funded by “the swamp” that Trump promised to drain.  

It is not enough to just criticize and politicians when they oppose us.  We must also thank, support, and help officials when they do the right thing--even when they are not Constitutional or conservative on some other issues.   That is why every conservative in New Jersey should now publicly thank and support Republican Congressman Tom MacArthur. 

The compromise package he put together is not the simple and complete repeal we favored.   However, it is much better than what we have now.  It also gives President Trump and the states new power to restore individual choices and costs in the future.    Finally, it also won recognition and respect for conservative, Freedom Caucus members who are too often ignored or marginalized by Establishment Republicans.

Please contact Tom MacArthur's office and thank him yourself.  Please visit is webpage for contact information at https://macarthur.house.gov/contact 

Also, please forward copy, paste, email, “like” and “share” this post with everyone you know in MacArthur’s district of Ocean and Burlington Counties.  Please do it every way you can. 

Please post your support in the comments section of newspapers like the Asbury Park Press at www.app.com.     You can submit a letter of 200 words or less for publication there to yourviews@app.com

For more information or help, please contact me at info@libertyandprosperity.org or at (609) 927-7333. 

And let's talk more about it over breakfast.   This and every Saturday morning at the Shore Diner, 6710 Tilton Road, Egg Harbor Township/Northfield, NJ.   Thanks.

Seth, who is supporting Jack Ciattarelli for Governor, has some insights into the upcoming Republican gubernatorial primary on June 6th.  It must be noted that some of our contributors here at Jersey Conservative are supporters of Pro-Life, pro-Second Amendment candidate Steve Rogers.

This is what Seth has to say:

The Governor's Race:   Conservatives have no interest in who gets the Democratic nomination this year.   At the debates, all Democratic candidates agreed, "We are all progressives!".   Here is the latest Stockton University poll for June 6 Republican primary:  
Kim Guadagno:   37%
UNDECIDED:        31%
Jack Ciattarelli:    18%
Steven Rogers:      4%
Joseph Rullo:         3%
Hirsh Singh:           3% 

Republicans have 12 days to stop this trainwreck.  Guadagno is tied to a very unpopular Christie. She also improperly let top officials collect both salaries and state pensions as Monmouth County Sheriff.  Many local Republican officials privately worry that Guardagno will be an anchor around the neck of every Republican candidate in Atlantic County this November. But they publicly support her.

Polls eight years ago showed only 11% of Republicans undecided in the primary battle between Chris Christie and conservative Steve Lonegan. Today, 31% are undecided. That is more than enough to tip the election to conservative Jack Ciattarelli.   

However, this poll indicates that there are not enough undecided voters to elect Rogers, Rullo, or Singh.   The only way Ciattarelli can defeat Guadagno is if most undecideds and some Rogers/Rullo/Singh supporters switch to conservative Ciattarelli.  

 Seth Grossman, Executive Director. Liberty and Prosperity

Poll: Oroho strong re-elect, Phoebus upside-down

A recent survey of 425 likely Republican Primary election voters in New Jersey's 24th Legislative District throws cold-water on the attempt by certain political insiders to promote the candidacy of Gail Phoebus.  The poll, which was conducted before Phoebus announced that she was challenging incumbent Steve Oroho for the Senate seat, indicates that Oroho is in a strong position to be re-elected, while Phoebus would have work to do to hold on to her Assembly seat.

Here are snapshots taken directly from the poll's "toplines":

Phoebus is under water:

The poll was conducted by Magellan Strategies of Colorado, a nationally recognized polling firm that has conducted thousands of surveys for national and statewide candidates, congressional and legislative candidates, state and national party organizations, and business interest groups.  Legislative District 24 is made up of all of Sussex County, eleven towns in Warren County, and one town in Morris County.  Some of the other details in the survey include:

And in the Sussex County portion of the district, which makes up about 70 percent of the electorate, the survey indicates that the most popular local elected official by far is Sussex County Sheriff Mike Strada.

While the least popular elected official in Sussex County is the outgoing Freeholder Director, George Graham:

Phoebus' supporters -- primarily cabal of lawyers associated with the Morris County Improvement Authority's Sussex solar scam -- will have a difficult time selling her candidacy with numbers like these.  Jersey Conservative will be releasing more data as we receive it.

Dirtbag behavior: Sad to report, it's not only the Left

Last week, we all witnessed some of the more ridiculous antics of the Left, and there has been a lot of commentary about how certain people allowed their emotions to get the better of them.  Madonna made her threats, while others went in for displays of very bad taste.

Jersey Conservative reported on this, and we were quickly reminded that such poor behavior doesn't begin or end with the ideological Left.  Those reminding us were none other than those denizens of the new ideological "Right" -- the Tea Party.  Not everyone in the Tea Party behaves like a 15-year-old who got into his parents' liquor cabinet, but enough do to give the movement a bad name. 

Last week, an innocent family had an aerial view of their family home placed on a public Facebook page with the words "target acquired" posted underneath and the statement, "got to love drones LOL," posted under that.

The organizer of a draft campaign committee for Gail Phoebus publicly posted those personal details, believing that they belonged to a "political consultant" who works in Sussex County.  But as with so much that comes from these people, the Phoebus campaigner -- who is also a key figure in the Skylands Tea Party of Sussex County -- got it all wrong.

The home "targeted" by the Phoebus campaigner/ Tea Party activist is in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, and it belongs to a perfectly innocent family with young children.  It is not the home of the "political consultant" that Mr. Tea Party seemed intent on injuring.

After a Sussex County blog reported this, the Phoebus campaign "administrator" appealed to his fellow Tea Partiers.  They responded with threats of violence and personal harm:

The "political consultant" (who is, in fact, a free lance writer) has already been the"target" of malicious and injurious acts by officials in Andover Township, where Phoebus once served as mayor.   They will have to shoulder some of the responsibility if one of their more emotional "supporters" gets a little too motivated and acts out against the consultant or even an inadvertent "target" of their hate.

If what these people post on their Facebook pages is anything to go by, they are certainly able to back up their anger with something a lot worse than words.

Instead of hate, maybe these folks should try calming down long enough to have a polite, rational, dignified policy discussion.  As the writer Isaac Asimov reminded us, "violence is the last refuge of the incompetent."

But this keeps going from bad to worse.  Earlier this week another "administrator" of the Phoebus campaign and Tea Partier decided that he wasn't going to be outdone by the Left when it came to posting tasteless images.  He took the image below and explored an even lower range of human discourse.

Yes, this Tea Partier photoshopped the images of several Sussex County Republicans onto vaginas.  The images included a Republican State Senator, a Republican Assemblyman, a Republican candidate for Assembly, a Republican candidate for Freeholder, and a Republican free lance writer from Bucks County, Pennsylvania.  The photograph of the last, courtesy of Andover Township, New Jersey.

Mind you, the person photo-shopping Republicans onto vaginas isn't a member of some Left-wing organization protesting Donald Trump.   This person claims to be a Right-winger and member of the Tea Party, who had his photo taken earlier this month with Steve Rogers, the GOP candidate for Governor he says he's supporting.  Everyone involved is a Trump supporter.  This is how crazy some people act when they disagree with someone who agrees with them most of the time, imagine how nuts they'll get when it is someone on the other side?

The people trashed by this Tea Partier are among the most conservative in New Jersey, with perfect voting records on the Second Amendment and the Right-to-Life; top ratings from Americans for Prosperity and the American Conservative Union; who have consistently been there for the conservative movement and the Republican Party.  Heck, the free lance writer once worked for the National Rifle Association as a congressional district Election Volunteer Coordinator. 

Now we know people in the same Tea Party group -- the Skylands Tea Party.  They have names like Tom and Doug and Roseann and Sue.  They are grandparents and business owners and professionals.  How would they explain these images to their grandchildren?  Would they teach their grandchildren how to photo-shop the images of people who have helped them and their community onto a vagina?  Would they explain to them that this is the right way to deal with people when they fail to agree with you 100 percent of the time?  It's 100 percent or your face goes on a vagina! 

In closing, let us leave you with this image, posted at Halloween, by one of your members.  Our advice to you is to chill.  Push the restart button and begin to act like responsible adults.  End the rhetoric of hate.

Steve Rogers: Conservative hope for Governor?

Well he certainly looks and sounds like a Republican Governor.   If he were playing the part on TV, he'd be totally believable.  And he has a resume packed with interesting experience:

Commissioner Steven L. Rogers

Steven L. Rogers is currently serving his first term on the Township of Nutley Board of Commissioners. Elected in May 2012, he is the Director of Public Affairs.

Commissioner Steven L. Rogers served in the U.S. Air Force during the Vietnam War era, achieving the rank of Sergeant.  He was discharged from the Air Force in 1974 and became a police officer in East Orange, NJ. In 1976 he joined the Nutley Police Department, where he served until July 2011, retiring at the rank of Detective Lieutenant. In 1986 he graduated William Paterson University with a Bachelor’s Degree in Criminal Justice.

Commissioner Rogers became an expert in Community Policing and wrote two books on the subject. He lectured throughout the country on the effectiveness of community policing and was invited to address the command staff of the Israeli Police Academy, in Israel.

Commissioner Rogers enlisted in the U.S. Navy Reserves in 1981 – and studied U.S. military intelligence and other national security subjects at many schools including the U.S. Naval War College Newport, R.I.  In the mid 1980’s he was assigned to brief U.S. military personnel on military matters related to the Soviet Union and other nations hostile to the United States.

Soon after the terrorist’s attacks on the United States on September 11, 2001, Commissioner Rogers was recalled to active duty and assigned to the U.S. Navy Office of Naval Intelligence in Norfolk, Virginia. He was promoted to the rank of Lt. Commander and assigned to the U.S. Northern Command as a Senior Naval Intelligence Officer for the FBI National Joint Terrorism Task Force in Washington D.C.

Commissioner Rogers returned to the Nutley Police Department in 2004 to continue as Commander of the Nutley Police Department Detective Bureau.  In 2005 he traveled to Louisiana where he led an Animal Rescue Team in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

In 2009 he was elected to the Nutley Board of Education and completed one full term before being elected to the Nutley Board of Commissioners in 2012.

Commissioner Rogers is the author of several books and a frequent commentator on CNN and FOX News.  (Source: Nutley website)

Rogers writes mainly about his experiences as a police officer and the ideas for reforms that have come from that experience.  Some of his work is listed on Amazon.com:  Cops and God (1997), 21st Century Policing: Community Policing, A Guide for Police Officers and Citizens (1998), and Proven Strategies for Effective Community Oriented Policing (2008).

Steve Rogers  was a Trump delegate and an early supporter of the incoming President, which says something for his political radar.  In his speeches, Rogers is less a movement conservative than a populist.  In contrast to outgoing Republican Governor Chris Christie, Rogers appears to have no problems with public employee unions.  He is more like a traditional conservative when it comes to discussing his belief in God.  And Rogers is by far the most solidly pro-second Amendment candidate running. 

It is natural to compare Rogers' candidacy with that of Steve Lonegan, the former Mayor of Bogota.  Both candidates had solid municipal credentials, but in their speeches, Lonegan was the more ideological of the two. 

Compare Lonegan...

...with Rogers.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/1777969852416770/permalink/1817759875104434/

The next hurdle for Steve Rogers is to collect the first $430,000 in campaign contributions to qualify for gubernatorial matching funds.    Under the new thresholds announced last June, gubernatorial candidates who qualify for public funding can spend a maximum of $6.4 million in primary elections, and $13.8 million in general elections. Under the Gubernatorial Public Financing Program, candidates are eligible to receive up to $4 million in public funds during the primary election, and $9.3 million during the general election.

After raising $430,000, Rogers will qualify to receive $2 from the state for every $1 he raises from private sources.  Running as a third-party candidate for Governor on the Libertarian Party ticket, Professor Murray Sabrin reached this threshold in 1997.  Needless to say, Mayor Lonegan easily reached the qualifying threshold.  It is important to remember that qualifying for matching funds guarantees a place at the public debates.

So this is doable and it has been done in the past by conservatives like Sabrin, Schundler, and Lonegan.  And they did so before there were all these Tea Party groups to go to and ask for their help. Steve Rogers has a road map.  Will the groups that form the Tea Party focus and provide the help he needs?