While most of the media is justifiably covering the events in Libya and Egypt today, I thought I’d bring some attention to a foreign policy issue in the Middle East that has been going on for two years involving our junior New Jersey U.S. Senator Bob Menendez that has escaped the attention of the New Jersey media.
It came to our attention today, via the president of Azerbaijan, that Menendez has been similarly abusing his senatorial courtesy power in the domain of foreign affairs.
Yesterday, President Ilhan Aliyev said that Menendez is racist and that he is cooperating with a political adversary of Aliyev’s on behalf of the Armenian lobby in his country.
His compatriot Breivik killed about 80 people and he was sentenced to 21 year imprisonment. And it means that he got 3 month of imprisonment for each people.Is that possible? Why does he keep silence about this? Or there is one pro-Armenian Senator Menendez and he is against Azerbaijan and Islam. His last work was that he was not allowed to extend the term of the former U.S. ambassador to Azerbaijan and to prevent his nomination for two reasons. The first reason is that the US ambassador does not recognize the so-called “Armenian genocide”. And he should not recognize as the U.S. government does not recognize this “genocide”.
The second reason is that the ambassador’s wife is of Turkish origin. It is racism. However, I want to stress that no one can affect my will, opinion, action, and have never affected.’
The ambassador that Aliyev is talking about is Matthew Bryza.
President Obama nominated the career diplomat Bryza to be the ambassador to Azerbaijan, an oil rich former Soviet state which is a rare constitutional secular republic with a predominantly Muslim population, in 2010. Menendez and California Senator Barbara Boxer put a hold on the nomination because, The Washington Post Editorial Page Editor says, of the senators ties to (and donations from) the Armenian community.
Azerbaijan and Armenia are long term geopolitical and cultural rivals.
Obama made Bryza a recess appointment. Menendez continued to oppose his nomination and Bryza’s diplomatic career came to an end this past January. Because Bob Menendez and Barbara Boxer get political donations and support from Armenians, a talented ambassador to an important Middle Eastern country was sent home.
MMM knows little about the Azerbaijan/Armenia conflict. We highly doubt it will be an issue in the campaign between Menendez and GOP nominee State Senator Joe Kyrillos, as Kyrillos has exceptionally close ties to the Armenian community. Joe’s wife Susan is of Armenian descent. The conflicts between the two countries and cultures is not the point.
The point is that Menendez has a pattern of abusing his power for his own personal and political interests, to the detriment of our national interests.
New Jersey’s mainstream media has not covered the Menendez/Bryza disgrace. Yesterday the President of Azerbaijan gave them a reason to cover it. When the head of state of a foreign country calls a U.S. Senator a racist, that should be news. MMM is happy to point the story out to our mainstream media friends, just in case they missed it with all the other pressing foreign affairs news.
“Please file an amendment to your report to accurately disclose your financial activities.”
The Federal Election Commission wrote Anna Little’s congressional campaign three times during the month of August to demand that her campaign finance reports comply with federal law.
The letters were addressed to Little’s opposite sex husband, Robert Lee Little III, the campaign’s fourth treasurer this year.
On August 24th FEC analyst Carolina Cavana wrote the male Little informing him that the campaign’s April 2012 quarterly report failed to adequately disclose the identity of donors who contributed $200 or more to the campaign. The campaign must disclose the missing information or prove that it made a good faith effort to obtain the information. The answer is due by September 28th and there will be no further notice given, unless Rob reads MMM.
Another FEC analyst, Brian Jones, wrote to Little III, who is Treasurer IV, on August 27 to inform him that the 12 day pre-primary report, filed on June 27 three weeks after the primary, is also missing the donor information that April report was missing. The answer to that letter is due on October 1.
Jones wrote again on August 28 detailing 4 problems with the July 2012 quarterly report including contributions accepted for the primary campaign, post primary, beginning balances that did not match ending balances for the April report, and a ending cash balance of negative $11,321.08 in the July report.
Your report discloses a negative ending cash balance of $11,321.08. This suggests that you have overdrawn your account, made a mathematical error, or incurred a debt. If your committee has incurred a debt or obligation, please itemize this debt on Schedule D, show a zero balance on Line 8 of the Summary Page and include the amount on Line 10. If the negative ending cash balance is a result of an overdraft, it may constitute a prohibited bank contribution unless it is made on an account that has automatic overdraft protection with usual and customary interest rates and a definite repayment schedule. Please file an amendment to your report to accurately disclose your financial activities.
The answer to the August 28 letter is due on October 2.
MMM readers are invited to submit their 9-11 memories in the comments of this post. If you would like your story published on the front page, start you comment with “Art, put this on the front page.”
MY 9/11 memory, by Charles Measley
It was a morning very similar to this as I sat in my six grade English class at
Holy Trinity School in Long Branch. When a teacher from across the hall came in
and instructed us to turn on the news, that there was some sort of accident in
New York City.
As we turned on CNN we saw a gaping hole on the side of a skyscraper as the
reporters struggled to understand how a pilot could make such a horrific mistake on a clear day like this. As we sat there and watch without warning we saw an airplane coming from behind and slamming into the next tower with a horrific fireball. At that moment the attitude of everyone change , the reporters said with certainty that this was no accident, but intentional.
Shortly after that my father came and picked me up early, he drove me down to the beach in West, a section of Long Branch. As we stood there on the sandy
beach with the crystal clear sky in front of us we could see the smoke billowing
from the city. In the back of my mind I was wondering if my mother, who worked in the city was okay.
We went back home and put on the news and watch as one tower fell, and then
another, and then a plane crashing into the Pentagon and then another plane
smashing into a field in Pennsylvania. Luckily that day my mother never made it in, she left late and got stuck in traffic on the parkway by Perth Amboy.
The weather was wonderful on Sunday, much as it was on September 11, 2001.
As I gazed over to New York and noticed the Freedom Tower in the distance, I turned to my friend and said, “it is just not the same.”
Life will never be the same for those who lost husbands or wives, brothers or sisters, aunts or uncles, friends and lovers that day. Life will not be the same for those who fled lower Manhattan to physical safety but still bear the psychological and emotions scars.
Life will never be the same for the families of the first responders who perished that day, or have perished since or are still hanging on, due to poisonous air that guaranteed a slow death.
Life with never be the same for the young men and women who have served bravely in Afghanistan and Iraq, even if they came home unharmed physically. Life will never be the same for their families.
Life will never be the same for a nation that has traded freedom and privacy for security.
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The Office of Legislative Services released a report this morning stating that New Jersey’s state government revenues for last fiscal year were $253 million short of the Christie administration’s projections. Last month OLS said the FY2012 shortfall was $542 million.
The Obama campaign is so confident of winning New Jersey comfortably that the prime responsibility of its New Jersey staffers is to recruit volunteers to go to Pennsylvania for the rest of the campaign, according to a high level Democrat who spoke to MMM on the condition of anonymity.
“Menendez will win by at least 10 points,” said the source, “the internal numbers have Obama up by 18 and Menendez up by 12. Elsewhere in the country, the Senate and Congressional candidates are doing better than Obama, but not in Jersey. Menendez needs Obama’s coattails, but he’ll have them.”
The source said Menendez is working harder than he ever has in his life. “He’s out shaking hands with commuters every day at 5:30am and doesn’t stop campaigning until midnight.”
“We don’t see Kyrillos working that hard,” the source said as a dig to the GOP challenger.
Menendez 2012 Communications Director Paul Brubaker has still not called back.
Middletown, September 10… Today the Joe Kyrillos for U.S. Senate campaign formally announced that attorney Lawrence E. Bathgate II, of Lakewood, has been named Finance Chairman.
“Susan and I could not be more pleased and humbled that such a well-respected and influential fundraiser, business and community leader, has joined our ranks as Finance Chairman,” said Senator Joe Kyrillos. “My friend, Larry Bathgate is a man of integrity, and I know with his hard work and leadership, we will have the means necessary to beat our opponent, Bob Menendez, in November. I appreciate his acknowledgment of how important this election is not only to the future of our state, but also of our nation. Larry brings decades of experience to my campaign and will be a tremendous leader of our finance team.”
“I know that Joe Kyrillos is the right man to represent New Jersey in the U.S. Senate,” said Mr. Larry Bathgate. “I am proud to join the Kyrillos team and together, we will bring the same kind of reform that Joe Kyrillos has brought to New Jersey’s capital to the nation’s capital.”
Mr. Bathgate served as Republican National Finance Chairman under Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush and also served in the same capacity for Governor Tom Kean. He is the co-founder and senior managing partner of the Bathgate, Wegener and Wolf law firm and has been recognized as one of the 100 most influential lawyers in America by the National Law Journal.
