Hornik will seek fourth term as Marlboro mayor

Marlboro Mayor Jon Hornik

Jonathan Hornik will run for a fourth consecutive term as Mayor of  Marlboro Township.

The mayor announced his candidacy on the Tommy G Show Tuesday afternoon during MMM publisher Art Gallagher’s guest appearance on popular drive time radio show.

First elected in 2007 when he defeated incumbent Republican Dr. Robert Kleinberg in a race that got statewide attention when Kleinberg incurred the pubic wrath radio personality Jim Gearhart and Asbury Park Press columnist Bob Ingle by falsely claiming Gearhart’s endorsement.  Kleinberg then went on the air with Gearhart the day before the election to argue with the host and defend his campaign mail.

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Thanks Gannett, for the kick in the teeth #STTS

Photo credit: www.SignsByTheSea.com

Ugh!

As if the weather wasn’t a damper enough to the Jersey Shore kickoff that Superstorm Sandy ravished businesses, their employees and  shore area municipalities desperately need, the shore’s biggest newspaper, and its most popular columnist/blogger are working against us too.

The Asbury Park Press Editorial Board (formerly known here as the Neptune Nudniks, a title we retired the day before Sandy hit, but are tempted to bring back after today’s doozy), opines today that Governor Christie should issue an Executive Order doing away with beach badge sales.

What is really insulting, is that the APP blatantly show how ignorant they are about the New Jersey economy, our tax structure and the cost allocation of our various governments.

There is another logical reason for making the beaches free: revitalizing the Shore economy. What better extra inducement to get people to come to the Jersey Shore? Free beaches could mean millions of dollars in additional revenues for towns. More money spent in restaurants and bars, on summer rentals and motel stays, on souvenirs, on gasoline. For some families, beach fees are prohibitive. For a family of four, they can run $40 or more. That kind of expense can make the difference between going to the beach or staying home. Or between going once or twice a summer instead of several times during the season.

Doing away with beach badges would be a logical thing to do if it would bring revenues to shore towns. Duh!  Why didn’t the mayors think of that!?

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Sweeney Uses Gay Slang To Denouce New Democratic State Chairman

NJ Media trips over itself to give the Senate President cover

Photo credit: nomblog.com

Senate President Steve Sweeney referred to Assemblyman Jason O’Donnell, Barbara Buono’s choice to be the new Democratic State Chairman, as “Cryan’s beard” yesterday while condemning the choice as divisive.  Buono is the presumptive Democratic gubernatorial nominee.  By tradition the gubernatorial nominee of both parties chooses the state chairman of the party. Cryan is former Democratic State Chairman, Assemblyman Joe Cryan.

“Beard” is a slang term for a person, most often a woman, who is used, knowingly or unknowingly, as a date or spouse to conceal their ‘partner’s’ homosexuality.

Can you imagine the media outcry if Governor Chris Christie or another prominent Republican denounced an advisory as a beard?

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Menendez not denying allegations of pay to play with Dominican children

News of the allegations that U.S. Senator Bob Menendez sexually exploited Dominican teen aged girls during his trips to the DR on a campaign contibutor’s private jet slipped into New Jersey main stream media coverage last weekend when Bob Ingle blogged about the sentor’s spokesperson telling FoxNews that the allegations were “unsubstantiated garbage.”

Yesterday, Brietbart caught up with Menendez who said he would not dignify the story.  Click here to listen to Mendendez refusing to dignify.

“Unsubstantiated garbage” and “I’m not going to dignify that” are not denials.   I can not imagine a dignified substantiation.

New Jersey State Senator Sam Thompson, in his capacity as Chairman on the Middlesex GOP, wrote to the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Ethics last November asking that they investigate Menendez’s accepting illegal travel for his DR sexcapades.  Thompson tells MMM that he has not heard from the committee.

It would seem that Mendenez, who officially becomes Chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee upon John Kerry’s confirmation as Secretary of State, is getting a pass from the Select Committee on Ethics.  The FBI won’t confirm or deny that they are investigating him.

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GQ: Dear Mitt: Please Pick Chris Christie

GQ columnist Reid Cherlin says Mitt Romney should pick Governor Chris Christie as his running mate over the “milkiest of milquetoast options,” Ohio Senator Rob Portman or former Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty.  Hat tip to Bob Ingle.

Yes, I know the criticisms. Chris Christie is a hot-head and a showboat. He’s overweight. He doesn’t represent a key swing state.  He’d be uncontrollable, in the way that Sarah Palin was uncontrollable. He’d  suck up all the oxygen and leave Romney fiddling in the wings, or worse,  cleaning up his messes. All that is true, to a degree.

But let’s remember the other key truism here: people vote for the top of the  ticket, not the would-be VP. As you’ve read countless times, the real virtue of  the running mate pick is that he can be nastier on the attack, he doubles your  capacity for in-person campaigning, and your selection of him says something  essential about your judgment. I think Christie would be a win for Romney on all  three fronts. He is an excellent attack dog. He lives for town-hall campaigning.  And his pick would make loud and clear—to Romney’s still-unenthused Republican  critics, and to swing voters who love moderate East Coast Republicans—that he’s  serious about kicking ass. Most of all, though, Christie is damn entertaining.  He is disarmingly blunt. He’s a ham,  he takes tough questions head-on,  and he loves the parry-and-thrust that is weaker pols’ undoing. There’s a reason  he remains so popular.

The campaign so far has been an utter grind, and Romney’s VP announcement is  our last, best chance for an infusion of something fresh, interesting, and new.  Please, Governor Romney: I know you’re a businessman above all else. But can’t  we all just have some fun for once?

I have to agree. Portman or Pawlenty will put voters to sleep.

I would love Romney to make an “out of the box” VP choice like Condie Rice, Allen West or Marco Rubio.   But Rice doesn’t want to do it and probably would not perform well on the campaign trail.  West is a patriotic hero but comes across as angry.  Angry scares voters.  I don’t think Rubio is ready, for the office or for the glare of negative media attention that would come down on him.

No one articulates the case against Obama better than Christie.  Christie has a Reaganesque optimism and ability to communicate it in a way that inspires like no one else on the national scene.

Christie will bring an excitement, and fun, to the race that no one else can bring.

If the presidential race keeps going the way its going, voters will tire of the campaign before Halloween.  Christie will engage voters more than any VP candidate since Thomas Jefferson and the media won’t get the better of him like they did of Sarah Palin.  ( I can’t believe I just put Thomas Jefferson and Sarah Palin in the same sentence.)

Most importantly, with Chris Christie as his running mate, Mitt Romney can win.

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Patrick Murray: “New Jersey voters are probably a little more savvy than reporters”

Monmouth University Polling Institute Director Patrick Murray is a “go to guy” for journalists looking for expert opinions and analysis on New Jersey politics.

Philadelphia Inquirer reporter Matt Katz called Murray to ask him why Christie’s approval numbers are so high when many voters used the pejoratives “bully” and “arrogant” when asked to use one word to describe the Governor and when Jersey mainstream media pundits so frequently criticise Christie’s manners.  Katz mentioned The Star Ledger’s Tom Moran, Inquirer opinion writers, and the Courier-Post editorial board.  He could have included most of the Statehouse press corp, save Gannett’s Bob Ingle and the Capitol Quckies crew.

Murray’s answer was Christieesque in its refreshing honesty: “Part of the issue is, voters of New Jersey are probably a little more savvy than reporters.”

Who talks to more reporters and voters in New Jersey than Murray?  His is an expert opinion.

“Ouch,” wrote Katz, who often writes critically of Christie.

Credit Katz for including Murray’s quote in his article.  If you start seeing Ben Dworkin’s name in The Star Ledger more than Murray’s, you’ll know Chrisite was right when he called famously called Moran, the editorial page editor, “the thinnest skinned guy and America.”

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Republicans could be in for a long summer

In Chris Christie:The Inside Story of His Rise to Power, authors Bob Ingle and Michael Symons describe U.S. Attorney Christie’s reluctance to use Solomon Dwek as informant during the Operation Bid Rig investigation in 2006.  “Do I really want to get in bed with this guy?” Christie is described as asking his deputies who were pushing for approval to make Dwek an informant. 

Ironically given how Democrats and defendants have argued that the July 2009 arrests based on Dwek’s sting were politically motivated to help Christie, the Deputy U.S. Attorneys advocating the sting argued to Christie that he would have been acting politically if he did not approve Dwek’s cooperation.

If this Star Ledger article by Matt Friedman is an indication of charades to come this summer, the Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee will make Joe Oxley’s confirmation hearing for his Superior Court Judgeship nomination a payback for the unceremonious end to former House Speaker, Senator and Commissioner of Community Affairs Joe Doria’s career when he his home was raided during the July 2009 federal operation. 

Doria has been cleared of any wrongdoing.  He has a letter from the U.S. Attorney, just like John Bennett does, but his career in public service is over.   Maybe Doria can become Chairman of the Hudson County Democrats some day.

U.S. Senate nominee Joe Kryillos is in the Democrats sites as well.  Dwek is the ammunition.

Democratic State Chairman John Wisniewski Tuesday issued a list of questions for Kyrillos, including how often he met with Dwek, what was discussed, who else was in attendance and whether he was ever contacted by law enforcement about it. “If you deny this and suggest Dwek is lying, does that raise the possibility with you that Dwek’s testimony that convicted others should be questioned?” Wisniewski wrote.

Kyrillos campaign spokesman Chapin Fay did not directly respond to Wisniewski, instead repeating that Kyrillos did nothing to help Dwek.

During the trial of Ridgefield Mayor Anthony Suarez it was revealed that among the diobalical schemes Dwek deployed in the 14 years leading to his 2006 arrest was a life insurance scam.  Dwek paid the life insurance premiums of people close to death who could not afford to keep their policies.  Upon the death of the insured, Dwek would give the deceased’s family 10% of the policy proceeds and pocket the rest.

Dwek’s father tried to get Soloman a pardon from President George W. Bush.  Maybe President Obama will pardon Dwek if he helps knock Chris Christie down a notch and helps keep Bob Menendez in the Senate.

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Bennett responds to the Soprano State anonymous mailer

An anonymous mailing which included a copy of the book jacket of The Soprano State and the two pages of the New York Times Best Seller by Bob Ingle and Sandy McClure that featured former Acting Governor John Bennett was sent, from Trenton, to members of the Monmouth County Republican Committee this week, presumably to hurt Bennett’s candidacy for Monmouth County GOP Chair.

Bennett’s opponent, State Committeewoman Christine Hanlon, has denied any involvement in or prior knowledge of the mailing.

Bennett responded by mailing the County Committee members a photocopy of a March 24, 2007 Asbury Park Press article, Feds: Bennett is cleared in billing probe, which included a handwritten note from the former Acting Governor in which he refers to The Soprano State as a “politically charged and intentionally biased novel.”

A copy of Bennett’s mailing can be downloaded here.

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Bennett’s Baggage: The Monmouth GOP Chair’s Race, Part 2

Ultimately the job of a county chairman is to win elections.

Unfortunately, one of the candidates for Monmouth County GOP Chair is blinded to the fact that that his record will become a major issue in the next two general elections, should his revisionist history campaign successfully result in his chairmanship.

If John Bennett and his supporters think The Asbury Park Press and the new Monmouth County Democratic Chairman, whoever that ends up being, are not rooting for Bennett to be the next Monmouth GOP Chair, they truly have their heads in the sand.

Bennett has been promoting his early legislative career and electoral successes as a reason to elect him chairman as if the unceremonious and embarrassing end to his legislative career didn’t happen.  He even implored MMM not to write about the damage he has done, not just to Monmouth County, the Monmouth GOP, but to the entire State of New Jersey and the New Jersey GOP.  “Don’t write bad things about me!” Bennett exclaimed when we met for almost three hours early last month.  We hoped he would realize the obvious himself and that we wouldn’t have to write the truth about him.   Unfortunately that has turned out not to be the case. 

Just as he did in 2003 when he ignored then County Chairman Bill Dowd’s call to abandon his unwinnable reelection bid, Bennett has his head in the sand now.  Just as he didn’t see that his continued candidacy in 2003 would not only cost Republicans the 12^th legislative district but control of the State Senate where he was Co-President, Bennett doesn’t see now that his being Chairman could very well cost the Monmouth GOP control of the county government which we have worked so hard to win back over the last four years.

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Escort procedures are secret

Bob Ingle writes this morning that the government is protecting its butt by keeping documentation of escorts classified.

Bob is writing of the New Jersey State Police luxury sport car escorts that have been in the news recently.  Not the Secret Service’s recreational activities.

Ingle is the co-author with Sandy McClure of The Soprano State, the New York Times bestseller about New Jersey’s culture or corruption.  His new book, written with fellow Gannett reporter Michael Symons, Chris Chrisite: The Inside Story Of His Rise To Power, arrives in book stores on May 22.  Pre-orders are available on Amazon, Barnes and Noble and Books-A-Million.

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