By Art Gallagher
Assembly Republican Budget Officer Declan O’Scanlon returns to the LaRossa and Gallagher Radio Show this afternoon at 5 PM. O’Scanlon will continue the conversation we started last week on the impact of the new pension and health care system for government employees and fill us in on the moving and shaking happening this week in Trenton with budget negotiations. The State must have a new budget by Thursday night at midnight.
During the second 1/2 hour of the show we will be joined by Fair Haven Mayor Mike Halfacre. Halfacre will be discussing the impact of the pension and health care reforms on municipalities.
The LaRossa and Gallagher Radio Show, sponsored by Repatriot Radio, features former State Senator Richard LaRossa and your favorite blogger. It is broadcast every Tuesday afternoon from 5PM to 6PM on WIFI AM 1460 and on the world wide web here.
Listeners are encouraged to call into the show with questions and comments. The call in number is 609-447-0236.
Posted: June 28th, 2011 | Author: Art Gallagher | Filed under: Declan O'Scanlon | Tags: Declan O'Scanlon, LaRossa and Gallagher Radio Show, Mike Halfacre | Comments Off on LaRossa and Gallagher Radio ShowBy Art Gallagher
Leaders of the Middletown Democratic Party met last night to select a new running mate for Jim Grenafege on the ticket for Township Committee, according to a report in the Asbury Park Press.
Even though the Dems have 92 members of their party committee, including Grenafege, there was no announcement of who will replace Alex Desevo on the ballot. The APP article indicates that it could take the Dems until September to select a candidate.
Municipal party chairman Joe Caliendo said, “We believe we have a good chance of winning this November, so we want to find a candidate who can really represent Middletown well,” according to the APP.
Posted: June 28th, 2011 | Author: Art Gallagher | Filed under: Middletown | Tags: Middletown Democrats | 2 Comments »By Art Gallagher
New Jersey Governor Chris Christie and New York Governor Andrew Cuomo are both being hailed in the media for the “landmark” legislation they were able to get passed by their respective legislatures last week. Christie got his pension and benefits compromise passed and Cuomo led New York into becoming the sixth state in the nation to give homosexuals the right to marry.
In what could be considered a level of dissatisfaction with the current field of 2012 presidential candidates, including President Obama, there is now a media buzz about both Christie and Cuomo competing for their respective party nominations for President in 2016.
While Christie and Cuomo have put together similar records of bringing fiscal discipline to their state’s budgets and pension systems, the two governors part ways over gay marriage. Christie says he believes that marriage should remain between one man and one woman and points to the Democrats inability to pass a marriage equality law during the lame duck session in 2009-2010 when they controlled both the legislature and Governor’s office.
Besides gay marriage, the other big difference between Christie and Cuomo is how use the media.
Christie is all over the national media…Piers Morgan on CNN two weeks ago, the Today Show last week, Meet The Press yesterday, MSNBC, Fox and Friends and Imus today, followed by Steve Malzberg on 710 AM radio and his monthly NJ 101.5 Ask The Governor gig tomorrow.
Cuomo has taken the exact opposite approach. He told his staff not to discuss or speculate about his presidential ambitions and has turned down most requests for interviews from both the national and New York media during his first six months in office, according to Fredric U. Dicker writing in the New York Post:
Cuomo ordered his staff not to discuss or even speculate on the possibility that he harbors presidential ambitions.
He also directed his aides to turn down invitations to appear on several high-profile national news shows to discuss gay marriage, believing the media would turn them into discussions of a possible presidential campaign, administration insiders said.
“He’s seen this dance before, with his father,” said a source close to Cuomo, referring to former Gov. Mario Cuomo’s flirtation with a presidential run in 1992.
“It’s distracting and possibly destructive to a governor, and you have to shut it down immediately, immediately, because it will begin to fuel itself if you don’t.”
Cuomo has repeatedly turned down most requests for interviews by national and New York news outlets during his first six months in office, but interest exploded following Friday night’s gay-marriage vote.
“The governor also views the speculation as disrespectful to the position of governor, and it would make the governor look like just another politician looking to take the next step on the ladder, which is not the case,” the source said.
We’ve seen the Christie for President in 2012 or 2016 buzz fuel itself and be encouraged by the Governor.
When was the last time you saw a national TV interview with Mitch Daniels? Daniels withdrew from consideration for the GOP 2012 nomination and hasn’t been heard from on a national level since. Christie has repeatedly denied any interest in the 2012 race, saying he’s not ready. Yet Christie and the national media can’t get enough of each other.
Christie doesn’t see the national attention as being a distraction from his job. He’s made it part of his job. Christie’s probably the most televised governor in New Jersey history. And he hasn’t done a “Perfect Together” tourism commercial.
One thing I’ve come to believe about Christie since I started observing him in early 2009 is that he always has a purpose and a plan. Even when he speaks off the cuff, he’s on purpose and forwarding his plan.
Christie and his team are too smart to believe that all the attention he is getting now will have an impact in 2016. If he’s not running for President now, as he insists, what could his purpose be in fueling all the national media attention?
Posted: June 27th, 2011 | Author: Art Gallagher | Filed under: 2012 Presidential Politics | Tags: Andrew Cuomo, Chris Christie | 2 Comments »By Tommy DeSeno, cross posted on Ricochet
My life is like a stroll upon the beach,
As near the ocean’s edge as I can go.
– Henry David Thoreau
I’m a son of a beach. Sand between my toes and white stuff on my nose. People have many different places they feel closest to God. Church comes to mind. Others enjoy the serenity of a garden, forest or mountain. I’m betting the ubiiquitous Dave Carter feels something for an open road. For me, sitting on a jetty with the waves lapping around me fills me with the Holy Spirit.
My absolute favorite time to go down the beach is just after sun up when it is truly hot and sunny – still over 80 degrees at sunrise. The ocean looks like it’s covered in diamonds and there is a sizzling sound when the wave breaks and crawls upon the sand. No tourists yet. Just me and my safe place until they get here.
By the way – “down the beach” – that’s a colloquialism used by beach boys. We never go “to the beach,” it’s always “down the beach.” There is at least a decade-long moratorium against newcomer assimilation should we hear you say “down the shore.” Never say “shore” if you want to fit in with the locals.
Despite the spiritual love we in New Jersey have for the sand and surf, our state is one of the few places in the world to charge people to walk on the sand to get to the ocean. Jersey strange. First we charge you $2 per hour to park next to the beach, then $8 per person to walk onto it.
The law is truly odd. The public has a right to the high water mark left by the ocean. Government can’t charge you for being there. The problem is, not even Carl Lewis on his best Olympic day could long jump the 75 or so yards of sand to get from the boardwalk to the high water mark. Land in the sand and you get arrested.
For sure there are places in New Jersey where you can get on the sand free of charge. But that’s a vestige of the “separate but equal” mindset of yesteryear, because as every local knows, you can’t go to just “any old beach.” Beaches are as personal to people as their undergarments, and held just as closely.
Don’t marry a beach girl or boy until you first work out which beach you’ll frequent. Some love waves. Some love little coves. Some want shade. My wife digs Avon-By-The-Sea since it’s a big family beach. I body surf in Asbury Park because there are at least a dozen venues where I can swill adult beverages right on the boardwalk. So we split our time between beaches. My wife and I treat our beaches like divorced parents treat their children – we get visitation every other weekend.
The point is, don’t tell me I can go miles away to a free beach I don’t like and all is the same. It’s like telling me to wear shoes that don’t fit. I can’t get comfortable.
The political debate that rages in New Jersey, as it now rages again, is not whether government should decide if you can swim. It is “which government” gets to decide if you can swim. Some lobby for state rule (big government monolithic solution) and the more conservative (so they claim) want “home rule” where each town gets to decide the rules.
I don’t know why there needs to be any rules. New Jersey towns will tell you they have to pay for life guards and beach cleanup, so they should get to charge for beach access.
I counter with Aruba. Bermuda. Cancun. Jamaica. Bahamas. Every state on America’s east coast. These are all places I’ve been where I didn’t have to pay a dime to park near the beach, walk on the sand or swim in the Ocean. All of them have governments that work, with taxes and costs of living far less than the Garden State. So, Mr. New Jersey Mayors – your excuse is sooooo bogus (said in my best Jeff Spicoli voice)!
How about MMM? What do you think? Let me pose a polling question that is fair, unloaded and in no way leads you to an answer I personally hope you give:
Should New Jersey towns honor the freedom and liberty that our Americanism promises since the time of our founding by making beaches free, or should they continue their neo-fascist, big government corruption by charging money for the God given right to shred a waive?
Captial Quickies has an interesting piece this morning about the 2011-2012 budget.
In addition to listing programs and the money to be spent on those programs, CQ says that the budget sets parameters for the programs that defines the administration’s leeway in spending.
One of the restrictions that CQ lists strikes me as odd:
What happens if we get another historic blizzard late next winter and the $10 million limit has been met? Would DOT have to spend the last $100K getting the legislators to Trenton to approve spending over the $10 million cap to clear the roads. What if there are people in life threatening situations like there were during the December blizzard last winter?
I don’t think it is wise to have the legislature micromanaging the DOT’s snow removal spending. Legislative approval for cost overruns of road projects might make sense. Not snow removal.
Posted: June 27th, 2011 | Author: Art Gallagher | Filed under: NJ State Legislature | Tags: Budget, Snow Removal | 2 Comments »Governor Chris Christie appeared on NBC’s Meet The Press this morning.
Tomorrow morning he will be on MSNBC at 7:30, on FoxNews at 8:00 and on the Fox Business Network with Imus at 8:30.
By Art Gallagher
I was in Maryland on business this afternoon when I received the news of Alex Desevo’s arrest. Someone was calling me with a scoop. Word of the arrest had made it to the holmdel-patch police blotter and the sordid details were leaking out.
My first reaction was sadness. A member of my community, someone I know by name and who knows me by name, was in the middle of a personal, family and career crisis that was about to become very public and very humiliating.
That Desevo is “on the other side” didn’t even occur to me until my friend who called with the scoop said, “do you know what they would be doing it if was one of us? They made stuff up about our guys and called their employers trying to get them fired.”
“True, but we’re not like that,” I said. The truth is some of us are like that.
Within an hour I was receiving more calls. The APP had the story. Desevo’s professional head shot was on the front page of the paper’s website. The APP beat me to the sordid details and salacious implications that I wasn’t relishing reporting.
Desevo was not the only Middletown resident charged with possession of a controlled dangerous substance by the Holmdel police on June 18. He was the only one who became front page news. That is part of the price one pays when you’re a proverbial big fish in a small pond.
Sometimes, especially on a local level, I think it is appropriate to relate to each other and to both good news and bad news not as us and they but as we.
There is no point piling onto Desevo. He won’t be a candidate much longer. His arrest should not be a campaign issue, assuming he resigns his candidacy. He needs to get help and do some serious work on himself. His career is likely in shambles. His family must be under a lot of stress.
Desevo’s problems are not Democratic problems or Republican problems. They are human problems.
Desevo does not deserve our sympathy, as he brought this upon himself. Nor is his plight a cause for celebration or scorn. Concern is appropriate. Holding to account is appropriate. Support of his recovery is appropriate.
Posted: June 24th, 2011 | Author: Art Gallagher | Filed under: Middletown | Tags: Alex DeSevo, Middletown | 23 Comments »Developing:
Democratic candidate for Middletown Township Committee Alex Desevo has been charged with drug possession in Holmdel.
Posted: June 24th, 2011 | Author: Art Gallagher | Filed under: Uncategorized | 14 Comments »© Copyright 2026 | MoreMonmouthMusings | All Rights Reserved