Not Even Close. The Mainstream Media damages its credibility and demeans the victims of Katrina with the comparison.
By Art Gallagher
This photo was taken in New Orleans on September 5, 2005, seven days after Hurricane Katrina hit the city:
Source: popmatters.com
This photo was taken this afternoon in Monmouth County, NJ, seven days after the Blizzard of 2010 hit:
FEMA will be in New Jersey tomorrow to start to access the damage caused by the blizzard. The damage will be a great deal less than the $81 billion that Katrina caused. The loss of live and human suffering caused by the blizzard was negligible. Not so Katrina.
Last week Capitol Quickies and InTheLobby got caught up in the hysteria of the storm and Governor Christie’s absence from the state during the storm. By now they should be over it.
Today, the Star Ledger used the Katrina reference in critiquing the public relations of Christie not being here during the storm.
The Sledger even quoted the PR hack who advised former Louisiana Goveror Kathleen Blanco during Katrina. Talk about epic failure. The hack, Bob Mann did a heck of a job for Blanco in 2005. Now he teaches political communications at Lousiana State Univeristy. Yikes! That’s like Jim McGreevey teaching ethics at a New Jersey state college.
Here’s a video of Chrisite answering the Sledger reporter’s PR questions during his press conference on Friday at the Monmouth County Hall of Records:
I guess the reporter didn’t like the Governor’s answer.
Governor Chris Christie will be at the Monmouth County Hall of Records this morning for the purpose of signing a letter to the Federal Emergency Management Agency requesting disaster aid for storm releated expenses resulting from the blizzard this week.
He will be available to the press at 11:30am in the Freeholders Meeting Room.
If turnout at pre-election rallies are an indicator of voter turnout, Anna Little will be the Congresswoman from the 6th district of New Jersey during the 112th Congress.
Last night at the Shore Casino in Atlantic Highlands some 300 Republicans, Tea Partiers and Independents rallied with Little, the Monmouth County ticket of Sheriff Shaun Golden, Freeholder candidates Rob Clifton and Tom Arnone and the Atlantic Highlands Council ticket of Lou Fligorand Jake Hoffman. Across the hall, 30 people (a generous estimate) mingled with Frank Palloneand the Monmouth County and Atlantic Highlands Democratric candidates.
300 are expected again tonight for the GOP team at Bachstadt’s in Middletown with Governor Christie. If the Monmouth Democrats are rallying tonight they won’t have a headliner. Presidents Obama and Clinton are elsewhere. Corzine wasn’t invited.
Turnout will be the key to victory. All signs point to a broken glass turnout for Republicans, i.e. Republican voters will crawl through broken glass to vote. There are no signs of Democratic voters being so motivated.
I’ve been worried about Plainfield where Democrats outnumber Republicans 12-1. Plainfield has been part of the district since the last census in 2000. Pallone has ignored it until very recently. There is no passion for Pallone in Plainfield.
Reading the popular blog Plainfield Today, I learned that the Democrats are divided there after a contentious primary where the “New Democrats” defeated the establishment lead by Assemblyman Jerry Green for the local offices. There is no competitive local race to boost turnout in Plainfield. That race was won in June and the anti-establishment sentiment prevailed. While there is reason to be cautiously optimistic about Plainfield, I still praying for a snow storm there and only there.
In Middlesex County, the Republicans are running their best campaign in memory. They have a legitimate shot of cracking the Democratic stronghold in that county which will boost both Little and NJ-12 candidate Scott Sipprelle.
Murray Sabrin says that if Little wins the GOP will pick up 100 seats in the House. I hope that happens. However, and I could be wrong, but from where I sit Little shocks everybody and defeats Frank Pallone by a larger margin than Scott Sipprelle defeats Rush Holt and by a larger margin than Jon Runyan defeats John Adler. There is no passion for Pallone. There is plenty of passion against Pallone. There is even more passion for Little.
Little’s MONEY BOMB that we started on Friday night has raised over $9000 as of this morning. Let’s double, or better, today. Donate here.
More importantly, turn out the vote. Talk to your friends, families and co-workers. Make it happen.
In the editorial page of October 12 Paul Mulshine, correctly, continued to question the ARC rail tunnel. Inadvertently, the Star Ledger business section supported Mr. Mulshine’s position.The business section (page 7) stated that there is almost 40M square feet of office space available in NJ. 40M square feet of space will support 200,000 employees, at an average of 200 square feet per employee. The ARC supporters refuse to consider that NJ residents would actually prefer to work near their homes in NJ, rather than commute to NYC. Even if they had to take a pay cut to work near home, it would be worth it. As a former commuter I can make this statement.
Governor Christie was correct to cancel the tunnel. It will be New Jersey’s version of Boston’s “Big Dig”. One major difference between the two projects is that Massachusetts was forced to pay the lion’s share of the cost as the cost spiked from $8B to $24B. But, in this case the benefit accrued to Massachusetts and the Mass. construction unions. In the case of the ARC tunnel all of the benefits accrue to NYC, with NJ getting the cost overrun tab. If you do not think that there will be cost overruns, then you know nothing about construction-related activities in NYC.
New Jersey needs to get out of this 1960s mindset that states that anything that the public sector proposes has merit and must be done. A great first step in this direction would be to stand by the decision to cancel the tunnel and to implement tax and economic policies designed to fill up these 4M square feet of empty space.
Harold V. Kane is the GOP candidate for Middlesex County Clerk
