Guadagno not such a dark horse vs. Murphy | Opinion

By Alan J. Steinberg This has been the week of the entry of Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno into New Jersey’s 2017 gubernatorial race. The conventional wisdom of the state’s political class is that Guadagno will win the Republican nomination and lose by a substantial margin in the general election to the likely Democratic nominee, former Goldman… Read the rest of this entry »

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Road to the White House, 2016: Florida, Pennsylvania and Ohio

By Alan J. Steinberg

I have had a rather poor prediction record in this year’s presidential primaries, as I vastly underrated Donald Trump’s appeal.  I remain intrepid, however, so the following is my initial Electoral College 2016 projection.

In order to be elected president, a candidate must win states giving him or her a total of at least 270 electoral votes.  I believe that Donald Trump will carry all the states won by Mitt Romney in 2012, giving him a base of 206 electoral votes.

I classify seven of the states won by Barack Obama in 2012 as swing states in 2016.  These states are the three double digit electoral vote states of Florida (29 electoral votes), Ohio (18), and Pennsylvania (20), and the four single digit electoral vote states of New Hampshire (4), Iowa (6), Colorado (9), and Nevada (6), for a total of 92 electoral votes.  Hillary Clinton is likely to carry all the other states won by Obama in 2012, giving her a base of 240 electoral votes.

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The Wisconsin landslide propels Cruz in California – and New Jersey

By Alan Steinberg

Ted Cruz did not just prevail in Wisconsin Tuesday night – he won a landslide.  And that has major positive ramifications for him in the primary finale of the campaign in both New Jersey and California on Tuesday, June 7.

A bit of context is in order.  The California GOP primary is presidential winner take all three delegates in each of the 53 Congressional districts, plus 10 at-large delegates to the statewide winner plus three Republican National Committee delegates (state GOP chair plus national committee man and woman), a total of 172 delegates.  In New Jersey, all 51 delegates are bound to vote for the presidential primary winner on the first ballot.

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Phil Murphy — A Bloomberg, Not a Corzine

By Alan J. Steinberg

Alan J. Steinberg

Initially, I thought Phil Murphy, as a candidate for the New Jersey Democratic gubernatorial nomination in 2017 would be the second coming of John Corzine – a well-meaning yet out-of-touch gubernatorial candidate who would be unable to communicate effectively with middle class and working class New Jerseyans.

Murphy had been appointed by former Acting Governor Dick Codey in 2005 to chair an advisory commission regarding the state pension shortfall.  The commission’s implicit recommendation was a $12.1 billion tax hike – political suicide in New Jersey.  To me, this was the forerunner of the Jon Corzine asset monetization/toll hike proposal which doomed him in his reelection campaign against Chris Christie in 2009.

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My fellow Republicans: Abortion takes an innocent life – same sex marriage does not

By Alan Steinberg

I am a pro-life person and opposed to abortion, except in order to save the life of the mother. Many times, my beliefs on social and moral issues are based on Orthodox Judaism, my religion, Orthodox Judaism is somewhat complex on the abortion issue, although far more pro-life than pro-choice. My pro-life views, however, are based upon my own study of the science of the issue. I believe that a fetus is life, and since I venerate life, I oppose abortion, except to save the life of the mother.

By the way, there have been over the years a multitude of statements, including from that great Torah sage, Gloria Allred, claiming that on the abortion issue, Judaism is pro-choice. While my political and moral beliefs on abortion are not based upon the Torah and the tenets of Orthodox Judaism, they are not inconsistent with them either. If somebody wants to read a short, concise summary of Orthodox Judaism and the abortion issue, I recommend the following page from the Aish HaTorah website:

http://www.aish.com/ci/sam/48954946.html

My views on the same sex marriage issue are another matter.

Orthodox Judaism is vehemently anti-homosexuality. Yet I read something recently on the Chabad Lubavitch website which really hit home with me: “Torah law expressly forbids the specific act of male homosexuality. And we do know this: Torah law forbids bigotry; homophobia is prohibited.”

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