CD 12 Debate

Scott Sipprelle and Rush Holt will debate this morning, 11:45-12:45 at Rider University.

The debate will be webcast live and can be viewed by clicking here.

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A Little Puzzling

By Art Gallagher

Three weeks before the election and CD-6 candidate Anna Little is introducing the “Fair Tax” into the debate.

Yesterday before the Asbury Park Press editorial board and last evening before the Northern Monmouth Chamber of Commerce’s candidates forum, Little proposed eliminating the federal income tax and replacing it with a 23%  sales tax.  She spoke frankly of expanding the pool of taxpayers to the 50% of workers who do not now pay federal income taxes. 

The state Democratic Committee and the Pallone campaign were both taping her remarks at the Northern Monmouth Chamber event.  The sound quality was poor.  Little should hope that it is not usable for Frank Pallone’s next commercial.  She should stop talking about the fair tax and increasing taxes on people who don’t pay them now for the rest of the campaign.  She should talk vaguely about reforming the tax code, if she must.

The fair tax is not necessarily a bad idea.  However it is a radical change from our present system and easily demagogued.  Little doesn’t have the resources to explain it and sell it to the public in the next three weeks.  She has the resources to win, just barely.

45% of the voters don’t know enough about Anna Little to form an opinion, according to the Monmouth University poll, yet she is within single digits of knocking off the 22 year incumbent Pallone. 

With three weeks to ago, Little can win if she addresses the voters anger over the economy and Pelosi-Pallone’s reckless spending.   She can win if she returns to the empathetic and optimistic message she delivered so well early in the campaign.

Now is the time to keep it simple.  Make Pallone defend himself.   If Little spends the rest of the campaign defending her proposals, she looses.  If she relates to voters concerns, which no one does better than she does when she is on her game, and reminds voters of the numerous reasons for vote against Pallone, she wins.   Little doesn’t have the resources to convince voters to vote for her.  The voters are already inclined to vote against Pallone.  They just need a Little push.

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Closing Statements by CD-6 Candidates Before the APP Editorial Board

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The Road To Hell

By Thomas Stokes, Middletown

The road to hell, it is said, is paved with good intentions.

The current economic crisis, resulting from the sub prime mortgage meltdown, is certainly a perfect example of this.

Politicians had the major role in creating the current problems, starting with the admirable intention of having low-income families own their own homes.

The Community Reinvestment Act, passed by a Democrat Congress in 1977 to reduce alleged discriminatory credit practices in low income areas actually encouraged lending to uncreditworthy borrowers. Amendments to the CRA in the mid-1990s, raised the amount of mortgages issued to otherwise unqualified low-income borrowers, and allowed the securitization of CRA-regulated mortgages, even though many were subprime.

Those who opposed this faced charges of racism from the more liberal politicians and activist groups like SEIU and ACORN (both of these organizations are international and no information is provided as to foreign funding of their political activities in the US).
In 1982, a Democrat Congress passed the Alternative Mortgage Transactions Parity Act (AMTPA), which allowed creditors to write adjustable-rate mortgages, including option adjustable-rate, balloon-payment and interest-only mortgages.

Approximately 80% of subprime mortgages were adjustable-rate mortgages.

 
By 2008, the Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac owned, either directly or through mortgage pools they sponsored, $5.1 trillion in residential mortgages, about half the total U.S. mortgage market.

 
When concerns arose in September 2008 regarding the ability of Fannie and Freddie to make good on their guarantees, Washington placed the companies into a conservatorship, effectively nationalizing them at the taxpayers’ expense.

What has been the result of this?

The worst economic crisis since the Great Depression of the 1930’s. In 2009, almost 3 million homeowners faced foreclosure. Huge drops in home values for those who manged to keep their homes with many now “under water” (values below the mortgage owed). Double digit unemployment, poverty levels higher than when President Johnson waged a “War on Poverty”. This attempt to help people has not only hurt those same low-income families. but has also hurt each and every one of us.

In New Jersey, politicians have created the Council on Affordable Housing (COAH) which imposes mandates on communities, like Middletown, to provide low-income, high density housing at taxpayer expense. This has a major impact on services, especially schools, and the property taxes we pay.

Professional politicians, of both parties, always searching for more votes, ignore the unintended (but not unforseen) consequences of their actions. Yes, the road to hell is paved with good intentions.

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Pallone and Holt Rated ZERO By Small Business Council (Adler Not Far Behind)

By Mark Falzon, VP Jersey Shore Tea Party

Thursday 10/14:  In their report issued this week http://www.sbecouncil.org/scorecard/ the Small Business Entrepreneurship Council released ratings for both the House and Senate for 2010.  Both Central NJ Democratic congressional incumbents Frank Pallone and Rush Holt rated ZERO OUT OF 100.  This information contradicts anything Pallone and Holt have been chirping on the campaign trail.  Whatever boasts they have made about being a friend to the American small business owner are statistically laughable. To absorb the enormity (or lack thereof) of this rating, consider Tea Party favorites like congresspersons Ron Paul-Tx 95%, Michele Bachmann-MN 100% and senator Jim DeMint SC-100%.
 
In a slightly higher rating than Pallone’s and Holt’s dismal performance, NJ congressman Adler scored 23%
 
The business group itself issued the following guidelines to analyze the ratings:
 
Champion of the Entrepreneur:  90% – 100%
Advocate of the Entrepreneur:  80% – 89%
Friend of the Entrepreneur:  70% – 79%
 
Notice how the business group did not provide a scorecard key for ratings under 70%, instead leaving it to the savvy American voter to draw their own conclusion.  A low rating is one thing, but ZERO?  Our elected officials voted without fail against small business every and all the time? 23% for Adler?  He didn’t come close to a 70%
 
So who exactly are these three gentlemen supporting?  Who exactly are these men representing?  Certainly not the heart of the American experience, our small businesses.  Certainly not the constituent struggling to earn a living, raise a family and pay the bills
 
The Tea Party Movement and groups in NJ are careful to vet candidates before publicly releasing support.  This cycle Ms. Anna Little, a staunch conservative and the THE banner person for the NJ Tea Party Movement is locked in a race with Pallone.  I am comfortable in assuming Ms. Little’s congressional scorecard would be more in line with a Bachmann, a Paul or a Demint.  Do we want our 6th CD congressperson on the side of American small businesses?  I would hope so.  It is quite apparent Pallone is not.
 
In the other races, Sipprelle (vs. Holt) has picked up some Tea Party support and is the product of the private sector himself and has built and operates a mid-sized financial firm.  Do you see Scott voting 100% NO against small businesses, or even 23% of the time?  I don’t.  What is Rush Holt voting for? In the 3rd CD, challenger Runyan has opened lines of communication with local Tea Parties.  Do we see Mr. Runyan improving on Adler’s 23% rating?  I do.
 
If there was ever hard statistical data to prove the arrogance and unknown goals and aspirations of central NJ’s congressional incumbents, this is it.  What are they thinking?  What playbook are they following?  Whose agenda are they supporting?  I don’t have the answers to those questions but I do know two things; 
1) American citizens yearn for a vibrant economy, energy independence, liberty friendly regulations and a government that knows its place in our lives.
2) All three of these congressmen do not share the vision of a vibrant, economically healthy America with a blossoming middle class.  They do not share the vision of an realistic energy independent America.  They do not share the vision of a liberty driven, business friendly atmosphere.
 
To return these three incumbemts to office would be an American travesty.  To send Anna Little, Messrs. Sipprelle and Runyan to DC would be a Walls of Jericho trumpet blast to the detached inhabitants of congress and DC that we indeed, have had enough.

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Pallone and Little to Debate on Sunday

More Middlesex Musings heard it from the Pallone campaign.  MoreMonmouthMusings got confirmation from the Little campaign.

Congressman Frank Pallone and Mayor Anna Little will debate on Sunday evening, 7 PM at Temple Shalom, 5 Ayrmont Lane , Aberdeen.  The debate is being sponsored by the League of Women Voters.

Little campaign manager Larry Cirignano said Little will leave her rally with Governor Christie, scheduled for 5PM in Piscataway, in time to debate the congressman in Aberdeen at 7.

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Don’t Be Trashy, Recycle

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Monmouth Poll: CD-12 Holt 51% – Sipprelle 46% Margin of Error 3.9%

The Monmouth University Polling Institute released a poll of NJ-12 this morning indicating that Congressman Rush Holt leads GOP candidate Scott Sipprelle in their race to represent the district by a margin of 51% -46%.

A copy of the poll release can be found here.

According to the poll, Holt leads Sipprelle by a wide margin in the western parts of the district; Mercer County and part of Hunterdon, 63% to 33%.  Sipprelle leads Holt in Monmouth County 58% – 33%.  In the central part of the district, parts of Middlesex and part of Franklin Township in Somerset, Holt’s lead is 4%, 50%-46%.

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Sipprelle Earns Endorsement of Recreational Fishing Alliance (RFA)

Princeton, October 13, 2010 – Calling incumbent Congressman Rush Holt (NJ-12) a “disaster” on issues affecting saltwater fishermen, the Recreational Fishing Alliance (RFA) formally endorsed challenger Scott Sipprelle for Congress in the 12th District.

The RFA has a history of endorsing both Republicans and Democrats running for office.

“We are proud to Scott Sipprelle for Congress in New Jersey’s 12th District,” said RFA Executive Director Jim Donofrio. “Congressman Holt has been a disaster for anyone who fishes in saltwater and the small business owners who makes their living off of the sport fishing industry. Frankly, Congressman Holt has been MIA on all of our fishery and coastal issues. In clear conflict with the district he is supposed to represent, Congressman Holt continually sides with the radical environmentalists whose mission it is infringe upon our rights as fishermen and small business owners.”

“I am humbled by the support I’ve received from fisherman and sportsmen all across Central Jersey,” said Sipprelle, who called the RFA’s endorsement “critical” in Monmouth County. “As a Congressman, I pledge to recognize the importance of my constituents who fish and the small businesses they support. I look forward to working with respected organizations like the RFA to manage our nations’ fisheries with sound science, support reforming arbitrary fishing laws, and backing candidates for the Mid Atlantic Fishery Management Council that best represent the interests of our fishing community and their businesses.”

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LITTLE: I GET IT. DOES PALLONE?

(HIGHLANDS, October 13) – Republican Congressional challenger Anna Little – an independent wife and mother who, unlike her 22-year incumbent opponent, Frank Pallone, has never voted for, and will never vote for, Nancy Pelosi to be Speaker of the House of Representatives – today reiterated that she “gets it,” and asked if her opponent even understands the term.
 
“People greet me all the time when we’re out knocking on doors,” said Little, “and household after household, I hear the same thing – ‘Anna, you get it.’
 
“When working families in the Sixth District tell me they’re having a hard time making ends meet, I get it.
 
“When they tell me they’re upset that the politicians in Washington don’t seem to care about what their constituents back home think, I get it.
 
“When they share with me the difficulties of trying to make the mortgage payment, save for the kids’ braces and maybe put away a little something for college or even a weekend getaway down the Shore, I get it.
 
“When mothers tell me of their concerns over the government takeover of healthcare, and their fear that they’ll no longer be able to see the doctor of their choice, whether for themselves or their children, I get it.
 
“When seniors tell me of their anger that the bill Frank Pallone voted for cuts Medicare by $500 billion, I get it.
 
“When I’m told that taxes are too high, and government spends too much, and we’re drowning in a river of red ink thanks to politicians like Frank Pallone, I get it.
 
“That’s why 200 people came out to walk with us in the Columbus Day Parade in Long Branch on Sunday,” continued Little. “But 200 people didn’t come out to walk with Frank Pallone. Fewer than a dozen did.
 
“I guess that’s because Frank just doesn’t get it. Does he even understand the term?
 
“Remember, you cannot change Washington without changing the people we send to Washington!”

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