If Frank Pallone or Rush Holt or John D’Amico sent out taxpayer funded automated phone calls at 10:00pm at night two weeks before an election, how would YOU react? I recall my friend Art Gallagher often saying that the art of franking, sending out taxpayer funded newsletters during an election year is wrong. I agree with him. So I ask not only Art but conservatives who claim to believe in smaller government, those who consider themselves members of the Tea Party movement, how would YOU react if Frank Pallone or Rush Holt sent out a taxpayer funded robocall two weeks before an election urging people to recycle?
Because thats what Middletown’s Mayor Gerry Scharfenberger did. Then he sent another taxpayer funded robocall apologizing for sending out the late night call. So how come those, whom call themselves members of the tea party movement or conservatives, how come they don’t speak out about Mayor Scharfenberger’s actions? Or is it basically hypocrisy 101 – hear no evil, see no evil when it comes to Republicans. Is that it? If thats it, thats fine but lets just put it out on the table and lets understand that this movement is NOT about stopping taxpayer abuse but it is simply to elect Republicans. As long as everyone is honest, it make its much easier to communicate if that is indeed what the tea party movement is about.
Middletown has a mayor who spends taxpayer money like water, he supports a patronage mill-filled Middletown Arts Center, which the entire town pays for even though a small percentage of residents use it. Now the Mayor wants to discuss privatizing or selling the taxpayer funded swim club – after 6 years in office, now he brings it up after pressure from the lone Democrat on the committee, Sean Byrnes, who urged the mayor that government should not be in the business of running a pool club. But you won’t see Scharfenberger and his buddies go after the unnecessary Sewage Authority – why would you, when their attorney, Middletown political boss and GOP Chairman Peter Carton has the most to lose from a missing sewage authority. At every turn and every corner, under Mayor Scharfenberger’s watch, Middletown’s taxes skyrocketed more than any other municipality in Monmouth County. The few short examples I listed is just a piece of Scharnfeberger’s record of being a tax and spend politician.
I love the attacks that Mayor Scharfenberger has gone after Sean Byrnes on in his attack mailers….that he is a career politician (Sean has served 2.5 years on the Middletown Township Committee, 1 year as a prosecutor in Atlantic Highlands and 22 years in the US Coast Guard) meanwhile the Mayor has been elected in Middletown for almost the past 6 years and runs a patronage mill in town.
So is the Tea Party in Monmouth County nothing more than an umbrella group trying to convince us to defeat Democrats? Is this an organization that will look the other way on their own fiscally irresponsible members if they simply have an R next to their name? I seriously question the integrity of anyone who says they want to stop the abuse of taxpayers but who say nothing and look the other way when the mayor of the county’s largest municipality sends out a taxpayer funded robocall 2 weeks before the election asking voters to recycle.
Yes, I’m a Democrat because I believe in certain core principles of my political party. I didn’t vote for Ellen Karcher and I didn’t vote for Jon Corzine. I wrote out about the disgusting tactics of those Democrats in South Jersey who tried to create a fake candidate in the 3rd Congressional District in order to manipulate and deceive voters. I like to think, even though I vote Democrat more often, I still have a mind of my own and when members of my own party who are not fiscally or ethically responsible, that we have a moral right to call them out. I question why my counterparts in the other party don’t do the same. Is it because all they are about is politics and elections and not about public policy? I hope that’s not the case.
So as you are reading this, Mayor Scharfenberger and his friends will attack me in the comments section and elsewhere, they will quickly attack Sean Byrnes, making up things that have nothing to do with his taxpayer funded automated phone calls and they will quickly attack anyone else because they are unable to justify why it was necessary to spend taxpayer money 2 weeks before an election urging voters to recycle. They will try to distract the voters and they will be unable to defend the question at hand – why they are sending out taxpayer funded automated phone calls 2 weeks before an election asking voters to recycle. Watch them – watch their excuses.
I have many close friends who are members of the Tea Party. My business partner hosts tea party meetings at his restaurant. But as I watch this, I now question the integrity of this organization of self-proclaimed conservatives who continue to support a Mayor who is responsible for the largest tax hike in the history of Middletown. While Fair Haven’s conservative mayor was able to stabilize taxes in his town, Mayor Scharfenberger skyrocketed taxes in Middletown and yet the Tea Party leaders and conservative leaders all over Monmouth County seem to support him.
Is that what it comes down to? The Tea Party is okay with anyone fiscally irresponsible as long as they have an R next to their name?
The President and the First Lady will celebrate the election of the 112th Congress with a two day visit to India.
A visit with commercial sex workers in Kamathipura is on the First Lady’s agenda, according to a report in The Economic Times.
This will be an expensive trip:
“A team of secret service agents has already arrived, and has surveyed the areas of his stay and the roads and places on his itinerary,” the officer said.
To ensure fool-proof security, the President’s team has booked the entire the Taj Mahal Hotel, including 570 rooms, all banquets and restaurants. Since his security contingent and staff will comprise a huge number, 125 rooms at Taj President have also been booked, apart from 80 to 90 rooms each in Grand Hyatt and The Oberoi hotels. The NCPA, where the President is expected to meet representatives from the business community, has also been entirely booked.
The officer said, “Obama’s contingent is huge. There are two jumbo jets coming along with Air Force One, which will be flanked by security jets. There will be 30 to 40 secret service agents, who will arrive before him. The President’s convoy has 45 cars, including the Lincoln Continental in which the President travels.”
Since Obama will stay in a hotel that is on sea front, elaborate coastal security arrangements have been made by the US Navy in consonance with the Indian Navy and the Coast Guard. “There will be US naval ships, along with Indian vessels , patrolling the sea till about 330-km from the shore. This is to negate the possibility of a missile being fired from a distance,” the officer said.
The President will be accompanied by his chefs, not because he would not like to savour Indian cuisine, but to ensure his food is not spiked.
(HIGHLANDS, October 23)- Republican Candidate Anna Little AND
Congressman Scott Garrett (R-NJ), Ranking Member of the Subcommittee
on Capital Markets, Insurance, and Government-Sponsored Enterprises
for the House Financial Services Committee will hold a meet and greet
on MONDAY, OCTOBER 25, 2010 10:00 AM – 12:00 PM at the Peterpank Diner
967 Rout 9 Sayreville, NJ
WHO: Congressional Candidate Anna Little and Congressman Scott Garrett
WHEN: Monday, October 25, 2010 10:00 AM – 12:00 PM
DONATION: $25.00
Anna Little for Congress Jane Frotton Treasuer
Posted: October 24th, 2010 | Author:Art Gallagher | Filed under:Anna Little | Tags:Anna Little, Scott Garrett | Comments Off on CONGRESSMAN SCOTT GARRETT AND ANNA LITTLE MEET AND GREET AT PETERPANK IN SAYREVILLE, NJ
If there was any doubt left that the Asbury Park Press’s candidate endorsements are irrelevant to the electorate, the Nudniks made the point themselves today when they published an editorial declining to endorse a candidate in the New Jersey’s 3rd congressional district. The 3rd district includes Toms River and 22 other Ocean County towns that the APP purports to serve.
The Neptune Nudniks don’t like GOP candidate Jon Runyan because he is a former NFL star who, they say was once rated the second dirtiest player in the league. They don’t say who rated him that way or why it is relevant to his being elected to Congress. They say Runyan “seems to have stolen the playbook from the conservative elements of the Republican National Committee and adopted it as his own,” as if that was a bad thing. For voters in the 3rd district, who prior to sweeping John Adler into office on Barack Obama’s coattails in 2008 had not sent a Democrat to Washington in decades, Runyan’s conservatism will probably be enough to elect him.
Joe Schilp at More Middlesex Musings reports that he received an automatic polling call from Monmouth University yesterday afternoon:
I just received an automated phone poll call from the Monmouth University Polling Institute seeking the youngest male voter in the household. The following are the questions posed as I best remember them:
1) Are you a voter in District 6? Yes? No? Don’t know?
2) Have you voted? Certain to vote? Likely to vote? Not likely to vote? Uncertain?
3) Are you voting for Frank Pallone? Anna Little? Another candidate?
4) What is your opinion of Frank Pallone? Favorable? Unfavorable? No opinion?
5) What is your opinion of the job that Congress is doing? Favorable? Unfavorable? No opinion?
6) What is your opinion of Barak Obama? Favorable? Unfavorable? No opinion?
7) Do you think America is headed in the right direction? Yes? No? No opinion?
8) Who do you prefer to run Congress? Democrats? Republicans? No preference?
It is sad to watch a highly esteemed member of our community be so easily manipulated by a heartless politician shamelessly fighting to save his career.
Make now mistake about it. Rush Holt is, and has been, manipulating Greg and Linda Bean, the former editor of the Greater Media Newspapers and his wife, for his own desperate political purposes.
Back in September, Greg accused this blog of conspiring with the Sipprelle campaign to play “dirty tricks” on the Holt campaign. Bean said he was convinced that the Sipprelle camp had put me up to posting “Abram Spangel’s” Rush Holt Champions Infanticide post and that Spangel is a pseudonym of mine. The truth is that the Sipprelle campaign wanted to distance themselves from Spangel’s posts before Greg reacted to that one. I am not Spangel. Bean milked the controversy he created for a couple of weeks in his column in the Greater Media newspapers and on their website. I maintain that Bean was looking to attack Sipprelle and used this blog as his excuse to get started.
In case your unaware, Greg and his wife Linda lost their son Coleman to suicide in September of 2008. Coleman had served two tours in Iraq and was seeking treatment from the VA for post-traumatic stress syndrome. Holt and Bean blame Coleman’s suicide on a “gap in the system” that doesn’t serve members of the Individual Ready Reserve (IRR), reservists who are not assigned to a unit. Greg wrote:
“He fell through the cracks. He had no advocate, no Army machinery to help him find his way through the system. He felt he was literally on his own. He made appointments with the VA to have an ulcer treated and to obtain treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder. Those appointments were postponed. He was still waiting when he took his own life.”
Holt reached out to console the Beans after their loss. Whether his initial gesture was genuine or political only he and God know. Since then, Holt has obviously been exploiting his relationship with the Beans for political purposes. During the spring of this year Holt promoted the legislation he introduced “to close the gap” in mental health care available to members of the IRR with great emotion and fanfare. He had the Beans testify in Washington and “earned” a lot of free media in the central jersey papers.
In his closing remarks at the Rider University debate with Sipprelle, Holt brought up the Bean legislation–“out of nowhere”–it had not been a topic during the debate–as a reason to reelect him.
Now the Holt campaign has an ad featuring the Beans tugging on the heart strings of 12th district voters, as if Holt’s efforts on their behalf are a reason to give the congressman another term:
In the ad, Greg Bean says Rush Holt has “worked on this (legislation) tirelessly.” Holt hasn’t work on it tirelessly.
Linda Bean says, “what we are talking about is legislation that will save someone’s life.” The legislation will not save anyone’s life.
Greg says, “Congressman Holt has actually been better than his word.” He hasn’t.
Holt approved the message and he has orchestrated the manipulation of the Beans.
Holt’s Congressional website, the one we taxpayers pay for, says the legislation he introduced in memory of Sgt. Coleman Bean has passed the House and awaits action in the Senate. It has not passed the House. It is buried in the Military Personnel sub-committee of the House Armed Forces Committee. Holt lied to the Beans and he is lying to his constituents on the website they are paying for.
Holt’s Congressional site, the one we pay for, goes on to say that on July 28 the House unanimously passed his amendment to allocate $20 million into the Fiscal Year 2011 Department of Veterans Affairs budget for direct advertising and the use of online social media for suicide prevention outreach. The House passed the funding bill for the Department of Veterans Affairs, and it awaits Senate passage.
Amendment to what bill Holt doesn’t say. But that it awaits passage in the Senate means it hasn’t happened.
If Rush Holt actually has worked tirelessly on his Bean legislation, he is incompetent. The legislation is not law. It is a campaign piece. It will not save any lives. If Rush Holt has been “better than his word” that is because his word has never been any good.
There is a strong argument to be made that Holt is incompetent. In the current Congress he has introduced 38 pieces of legislation. None became law. In the 110th Congress he introduced 52 bills. None became law. In the 109th Congress Holt introduced 50 bills. One, a resolution (not a law) passed the House and the Senate. That resolution recognised the 40th Anniversary of the Second Vatican Council’s promulgation of Noestra Aetate. None of them became law. And so it goes.
Holt knows that the legislation he introduced for the Beans will never become law. He’s just using them for his campaign.
Hopefully the Beans will not be too bitter, or embarrassed, when they smell the coffee.
And hopefully Greg’s involvement in Holt’s campaign hasn’t cost him his column at Greater Media. His byline has been removed from their websites. Maybe that is just temporary until the election is over. If not, my offer to Greg to be published here stands.
