Governor Chris Christie will Co-host the Boomer and Carton Show tomorrow morning with former Jets quarterback Boomer Esiason and former NJ 101.5 “Jersey Guy” Craig Carton.
The show starts at 6am and is broadcast live on WFAN 660 radio and on cable TV on the MSG Network
Posted: May 5th, 2011 | Author:Art Gallagher | Filed under:Chris Christie | Tags:Chris Chirstie | Comments Off on Christie To Co-Host The Boomer And Carton Show Friday Morning
President Barack Obama will visit Ground Zero today for a wreath laying ceremony.
New Jersey Governor Chris Christie and Senator Robert Menendez will be among the dignitaries attending.
Published reports say that former President George W. Bush declined Obama’s invitation to attend today’s ceremony, siting his desire to stay out of the public eye during his post-presidency.
While I respect the dignity with which Bush has conducted himself since leaving the White House, I think his appearance with Obama to celebrate the death of Osama Bin Laden would have been an opportunity for the nation to come together, if only for a moment.
H.R. 3, the No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act, championed by Congressman Chris Smith, passed the House of Representatives this week, 251-175. All Republicans in the House and 16 Democrats voted for the bill’s passage.
The bill would make permanent the Hyde Amendment, which prohibits federal funding of abortion through Medicaid and other federal programs. Additionally “indirect subsidies” like tax credits and deductions for abortions, insurance premiums on policies that cover abortion, and the use of tax-exempt savings plans to pay for abortion, are prohibited by the measure.
The bill has less of a chance to pass the Democratically controlled Senate than a African American or Hispanic fetus has of surviving its mother’s visit to a Planned Parenthood clinic.
The fallout associated with the financial mismanagement of Brookdale Community College continued today with the resignation of Howard Birdsall, the chairman of the board of trustees. Birdsall served on the board since 1998. His resignation is effective Friday, according to The Asbury Park Press.
The Star Ledger is reporting that the Treasury Department has initiated an investigation into sheriff’s officers in Essex, Monmouth and Union counties who are collecting pensions from the state Police and Firemen’s Retirement System (PFRS) whilecontinuing to perform as law enforcement officers, but with civilian titles, allowing them to “double dip”….collect a pension and a salary for job that would not allow for collecting a pension if it were properly classified.
In addition to the Treasury Department probe, John Scierchio, chairman of the PFRS board of trustees, has asked the Attorney General’s Office to launch a criminal probe into three sheriff’s officers suspected of circumventing pension guidelines, according to the StarLedger.
The three officers are Monmouth County undersheriff Mickey Donovan, formerly the chief warrant officer, Essex County chief warrant officer John Dough, and Union County sheriff’s chief Harold Gibson.
This issue was first raised publically regarding Donovan, who retired from the Monmouth County Prosecutor’s Office in 2005 and was hired as Monmouth’s chief warant officer by then Monmouth County Sheriff, now Lt. Governor, Kim Guadagno in 2008, last October by NJ Watchdog.
NJ Watchdog alleges that Guadagno, as Sheriff, eliminated the chief warrant officer position on September 16, 2008, but then gave Donovan that title a week later, even though he was hired in reality to be the chief law enforcement officer, so that he could collect a pension of $85,000 per year and a salary of $87,500 per year.
In a piece published on April 11, 2011, NJ Watchdog says that Donovan has improperly collected $227,000 in pension payments since 2008. Additionally, he should have contributed $18,000 to the pension system, according to NJ Watchdog.
Guadagno declined to comment when MMM raised this issue with her when it became public in October.
Shaun Golden, then Acting Sheriff, told MMM in October that he had discussed Donovan’s employment status with state pension official months earlier and offered to make any changes they required. There were no changes required at the time. Golden said he told the officials that if they require changes in Monmoth County that they should also look into Essex and Union Counties.
Governor Chris Christie and Senate President Steve Sweeney announced that they had reached a compromise over the nomination of Anne Patterson to the NJ Supreme Court.
Christie nominated Patterson to the court one year ago today to fill the seek of John Wallace. Wallace’s term was expiring but he had not reached the age of mandatory retirement. Christie acted within his constitutional authority but broke with tradition by not reappointing Wallace.
Christie’s Democratic critics, in the legislature and the media, charged that the governor was interfering with the independence of the judiciary. Christie countered that he was fulfilling his campaign promise to reshape the court which has a long history of overstepping its bounds and legislating from the bench, especially with the Abbott decision which mandates education spending and the Mt. Laurel decision which mandates the development of affordable housing. These two judicial decisions are responsible for New Jersey’s highest in the nation property taxes.
Sweeney pledged that Patterson would not get a hearing in the Senate and that her nomination would not be voted on until Wallace, who hails from Sweeney’s home county of Gloucester, reached the age of retirement; March of 2012. For a year the Wallace seat has filled by appellate Judge Edwin Stern who was appointed by Chief Justice Stuart Rabner as a temporary fill-in.
As a result of the “compromise” announced yesterday between Christie and Sweeney, the governor will withdraw Patterson’s nomination to Wallace seat and nominate her for the seat of retiring Justice Roberto Rivera-Sota. Sweeney pledged a fair hearing for Patterson, and that timely hearings will be held for the Wallace seat and the seat of
Justice Virginia Long who reaches the mandatory retirement age in 2012.
I fail to see the “deal” here. Where’s the compromise? What did Christie get? Christie could have withdrawn Patterson’s nomination for Wallace’s seat and nominated her for Rivera-Soto’s seat without consulting Sweeney. Sweeney keeps the Wallace seat filled by Stern until March. Was Sweeney threatening to hold up the nominations to replace Wallace and Long beyond their retirement dates? Would Sweeney allow three seats on the seven member court to be held by temporary Justices appointed by Rabner?
The other thing I don’t like about this deal capitulation, is that it is an indication that Christie assumes that Sweeney will be Senate President next year. While that may be a realistic expectation given the new gerrymandered legislative map, it is disappointing to think that Christie, as the leader of the Republican party, has already given up on trying to win control of the Senate in the legislative election this November.
If Christie has given up on winning control of the Senate, who am I to argue that it is possible?
World War II Battle of the Bulge survivors will be together once more when the World War II Battle of the Bulge Monument, which is presently located at Fort Monmouth, is relocated to the Thorne Middle School in Middletown, New Jersey. Principal Thomas Olausen announced that the monument will be installed at the school and a survivors’ reunion and a “rededication” ceremony will take place on Thursday, May 26, 2011.
“We could think of no better location to place this monument then right here on our school grounds”, Mr. Olausen noted. The Thorne Middle School is named for Corporal Horace “Bud” Thorne, Congressional Medal of Honor recipient, who was killed in December 1944 during the battle that the monument commemorates. Surviving members of the Battle of the Bulge, from different parts of the country, will be in attendance. Principal Olausen further stated: “It is a wonderful honor for us to be able to host these members of the Greatest Generation and their families as we rededicate this symbol which honors the sacrifices made by so many. It will be a lasting and productive educational tool for our students as well.”
The event will commence at 9 AM in the school auditorium and the Middle School students will read essays especially prepared for the occasion. The Corporal Thorne Award will be presented to an 8th Grade Student who exhibits the attributes of Pride, Respect, Integrity, Determination, and Excellence, which are the standards of Thorne Middle School’s Character Education Program. The school’s Chorus and Band will participate in the event. The monument will then be rededicated in an outdoor ceremony. Following the ceremonies there will be a reception at VFW Post 2179 in Port Monmouth. Special awards will be given to all of the surviving members of this historic battle who are in attendance. All World War II Battle of the Bulge survivors and their families are encouraged to register for the event. The Thorne Middle School is located at 70 Murphy Road in Port Monmouth. VFW Post 2179 is located at 1 Veterans Lane, also in Port Monmouth. For more information and to register for the event please contact (732) 233-9443 or (732) 747 0160.
As for the killing of bin Laden, you know, so you will recall, I was nominated to United States Attorney by President Bush on September 10, 2001. And the job that I accepted that day from the President became significantly different about eighteen hours later. And for me it was also extraordinarily personal. My wife was two blocks from the Trade Center when the attack occurred. She had come through the Trade Center that morning with my brother who was working down at the New York Stock Exchange at the time. Both of them had to go through escaping from Manhattan that day, after the attacks, after the buildings had come down. And so this was not only professional for me, in terms of taking over as the state’s chief federal law enforcement officer in the immediate aftermath of that attack, but also personal as well, given the experiences, and the fortunate experiences, of both my wife and my brother being in lower Manhattan that day. And so, I think there’s an extraordinary sense of closure for a lot of people that the person who masterminded and ordered these attacks that killed 3,000 of our citizens has now been brought to justice himself. And I can’t think of anything better for Osama bin Laden than to have met his end at the hands of the American military and to be buried at sea. It’s exactly where he belongs.
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I don’t think there’s any doubt in anybody’s mind that the President would get up last night and tell the world that Osama bin Laden’s dead unless Osama bin Laden’s dead. And so, I have complete confidence in the President’s statements and unless proven otherwise, complete confidence in his judgment on how they move forward with this. We’re not going to sit here behind this podium in Trenton and second-guess what the President of the United States is doing in Washington. And that’s what I said last night in my statement. I commend him and his administration. If you read the stories of the extraordinary work that went into this operation, the intelligence portion of it and then the execution of it, the President, as the Commander in Chief deserves extraordinary credit for what he was able to do here and I commend him for it. Because these decisions are never easy. They always look easy in retrospect. When you’re the person sitting in the chair having to make some of these calls, you recognize that these are really difficult decisions to make. He’s putting men and women in harm’s way and just as well as things went, they could’ve gone poorly. And then there would’ve been a whole chorus of second-guessers out there who would’ve been second-guessing the President’s judgment in every step along the way. So if they’re going to do that, when it goes real well, like it did for our country last night, then the man in charge deserves the credit. The President deserves the credit for doing really an extraordinary job.
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To the families and friends of those who perished on that day, you know, nothing’s going to bring their loved one back. And vengeance at times is a difficult thing. You may think that seeing bin Laden dead will make you feel better, and in some respect it gives us all I think a sense of justice being done. But I think what the families will be left with, is the idea that their loved one is still gone. And I don’t know how they deal with that from day to day. I think only if you walk in their shoes do you know how they deal with it. And so what I’d say to those families today, is that our prayers and our thoughts are with you today in just the same way they’ve been with those families every day for nearly the last ten years. All of us, I suspect, in this room, know someone who lost someone dear to them on September 11th. I know Mary Pat and I have unfortunately a number of friends whose children are now without a father, who go to school with our children, a member of our parish who was killed that day. A number of people very close in our lives, with daily contact with some of them, those families have never been the same. The fact that Osama bin Laden is now dead will not restore to them the presence of a father or mother or sister or a brother, husband or a wife. It won’t do that. But, this is someone who deserved to meet this fate much sooner than he did. But, in this instance, justice delayed is not justice denied. Justice has been done. The President deserves great credit for that and I hope that the families today, at least for a short period of time can feel some measure of solace about the fact that the man who perpetrated these crimes is now sitting at the bottom of the sea somewhere. Hopefully that gives them some measure of solace.
“The world’s most notorious terrorist died as he lived his life; as a coward. Our brave soldiers and intelligence officers deserve our eternal gratitude for their sacrifice and devotion to their mission of protecting America from those who wish to destroy us. I thank Presidents Bush and Obama for pursuing justice to its conclusion and hope that this achievement will reunite Americans behind the global War on terror that our incredible military and intelligence personnel fight for our protection every day. My family has worked to move beyond the tragedy that Bin Laden brought to us on September 11th, 2001. He took my brother and countless friends that day, and it is on their behalf that I feel a measure of satisfaction in Bin Laden’s demise.”
Seantor Joe Kyrillos issued the following statement this morning:
“Nearly ten years after the unspeakable attack on America on 9/11 justice is done.”
“Monmouth County paid a disproportionate price that day, losing 147 of its residents who never came back home.”
“I speak for all New Jerseyans and Americans in acknowledging the relief and sense of justice felt by the victim’s families as well as the pride we all feel in the heroic efforts of America’s armed forces and national security professionals stationed here and abroad.”
“Today all the world sees the determination and perseverance of America and its citizens to protect and secure our great nation.”
