Christie’s Interaction With William Brown

Full exchange audio, courtesy of Save Jersey:

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The video we’ve been anticipating…

Not released by the Governor’s office

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Higher Education Restructuring

Last month Governor Chris Christie announce a complex restructuring of New Jersey’s medical schools.

Under the proposal,  Newark’s UMDNJ would be replaced by New Jersey Health Sciences University, University Hospital would be placed under non-profit management and Rutgers-Camden and its law school would become part of Rowan University.  Cooper Medical School in Camden would become part of Rowan.

Mark Magyar has an excellent piece on the proposed restructuring at NJSpotlight.

Alarmed by the prospect of losing the prestige that comes with the Rutgers name, many at Rutgers Camden, including our friend Brian McGovern of Save Jersey are fighting the move to Rowan.  Save Jersey has become Save Rutgers Camden today with a lengthy post about how to legally block the merger.

Magyar in his NJSpotlight piece noted that the name of the South Jersey institution is important to advocates of the merger as well:

The absorption of Rutgers-Camden, with its 6,000-plus students, into Rowan, with more than 11,000 students, was not so much a matter of numbers as of name. Sources said that the family of Henry Rowan, who donated $100 million to expand his alma mater, Glassboro State College, into Rowan University, balked at the idea of the Rutgers name displacing Rowan.

Furthermore, Norcross, as head of Cooper University Medical Center, had been heavily involved in the creation of the new Cooper Medical School at Rowan University, and both he and Sweeney have talked about the importance of a South Jersey university that would not be a stepchild to the much larger Rutgers University in New Brunswick, as the Camden campus was sometimes perceived to be.

The South Jersey merger with Rowan has also gotten some push back from Rutgers-Camden faculty,  Rutgers retiring president Richard McCormick.  Colleen O’Dea outlines reports both sides of the controversy in a  NJSpotlight piece today.

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MMM Year in Review – May

Seal Team 6 killed Osama Bin Laden.

Having lost the legislative map battle, Governor Christie made a deal with Senate President Stephen Sweeney over Supreme Court Justice nominees’ confirmation hearing.  In making the deal, six months before the general election, Christie implicitly conceded that the Democrats would retain control of the State Senate and the Sweeney would remain Senate President.

Howard Birdsall resigned as chairman of the Brookdale College board of trustees.

The world did not end.  The Rapture was rescheduled for October.

The State Supreme Court reaffirmed the Abbott decision, assuring that New Jersey’s educational system would remain racially segregated  and funded by the highest property taxes in the nation.

The Neptune Board of Education made a deal with the ACLU that prevented litigation and kept the high school graduation at the Ocean Grove Great Auditorium.

Governor Christie pulled New Jersey out of the RGGI cap and trade scheme.

86 veterans of the Battle of the Bulge and their families attended a Survivors Reunion and Monument Rededication Ceremony at Thorne Middle School in Middletown.

Rutgers paid Snooki $32,000 to bestow her wisdom upon the student body. They paid retiring University president Richard McCormick $550,000 to take a year off and will pay him $335,000 per year to teach history when he returns.

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The Map

You’ve probably heard about the map that Rutgers grad Joe Steinfeld created on Monday night and posted to his reddit page.  By Tuesday night over 750,000 people viewed it on facebook and reddit.  The newspapers have all written about it. 

Steinfeld was enjoying all the attention until his bosses at the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection took a dim view of it and released a statement saying it had nothing to do with the department.

Steinfeld reduced Monmouth County to “WHERE THEY FILMED CLERKS,” BANKERS AND BUSINESSMEN,” WORKING CLASS PEOPLE AND BEACH HOUSES: SPRINGTEEN COUNTRY, ” and “McMANSIONS.”

Obviously, Steinfeld doesn’t know Monmouth all that well.  The Bayshore is much more than where Kevin Smith filmed clerks.  Coastal Monmouth is extremely diverse, as are the central , western and southern parts of the county.

Just for fun, how would you correct Steinfeld’s map?

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Snooki is cheap

By Art Gallagher

I’m not talking about her lascivious lifestyle—that’s no longer newsworthy and I still don’t get the entertainment allure of the train wreck while there are so many real disasters on TV.

I’m talking about her $32K speaking engagement at Rutgers.

Compared to the largess that Rutgers is bestowing on outgoing president Richard McCormick, Snooki’s $32K is cheap. McCormick with receive a one year paid sabbatical at his salary of $550,000.  After his full year paid vacation he will return to the faculty as a history professor with a $335,000 salary.

I don’t have a major gripe with McCormick personally.  His is just one more example of a golden parachute for a government employee .  I was surprised to read that he is making only $550,000 to lead the 57,000 student university.  That sounds cheap compared to former Brookdale College President Peter Burnham’s salary and perks before Freeholder John Curley tore down that ivory tower.  McCormick’s compensation sounds cheap, given the job, compared to the numerous $200K plus superintendent of school salaries we’ve read about throughout New Jersey before Governor Christie reformed that absurdity.   McCormick’s golden parachute is a bargin compared the almost $800K the former superintendent of the Keansburg schools tried make off with.

McCormick hasn’t been as blantently greedy as some in government. He refused to take raises to his salary from 2002 through 2008 and he hasn’t taken another raise since the 4.75% bump he got in 2008.  Also, in 2008 he donated the $100K performance bonus that the Board of Trustees awarded him back to the university to fund financial aid to students based on need and performance.  It’s tough to make a case that McCormick’s a bad guy.

But the system that the government class designed for themselves and continues to exploit is increasingly tough to take and increasingly difficult to pay for.  It’s tough to write the tax check knowing that too much of it is going to pay high five figure pensions and lifetime health benifits for men and women in their forties and fifties.    McCormick’s case is just the latest reminder of all that is broken in New Jersey.

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Open Letter To Governor Christie, The Senate and Assembly: Why Pay A Racist Speaker To Come To Rutgers?

By Thomas DeSeno

Imagine if Rutgers announced they paid $32,000 to have a singer show up in Black Face, slur some drawl, shuffle through a few soft shoe steps and sing “Mammy” to the uproarious delight of white students. I’m betting the lot of you would have your magic sound-bite generating machines set on “I abhor racism” and cranked into overdrive. Someone, somewhere, would fire Don Imus.

Well, Rutgers did just that when they booked Chilean actress “Snooki” to speak last night, to deliver the uplifting and not dangerous message that the student body at Rutgers isn’t partying hard enough. Yes – pass me a Bud and a hypodermic needle.

MTV’s “Jersey Shore” Show is not a reality show with cameras turned on people living their lives. It is a scripted show with paid actors pretending to be someone else, and it involves racism.

Jersey Shore wanted the public to think this show was about Italian kids. That’s why they painted the Italian flag on their house. That’s why they scripted them to talk about “Italian family values” (in between all the casual sex and punching people). That’s why they are filming in Italy.

Know what else the producers did the first season? Never once mentioned any of the actors’ last names. Ever. Why? Because half the actors aren’t Italian. Snooki is Chilean. Others have last names like Ortiz, Farley and Pivarnik. What part of Italy are they from? MTV hid that these kids weren’t Italian. Black Face.

And that’s why it’s racist. MTV took a racist stereotype of a knuckleheaded, sexually uncontrolled, violent criminal, called him a quintessentially Italian name (Guido) and said “let’s make a show!” Being unable to find Italian kids who act that way, they hired actors who aren’t Italian to fill the rolls. Making a show out of a racist stereotype and hiring actors of a different persuasion to play the stereotype means you can only call it one thing: Black Face. It matters not that this time it is Italian Face. Black folks didn’t act that why when Jolsen sang, and Italians don’t act like Snooki. It’s a stereotype.

Don’t let MTV argue the popularity of the show. Stepin Fetchit was popular. Will MTV bring that back?

And don’t argue that the money only came from the mandatory student fee account (as if that’s not bad enough) and wasn’t taxpayer funds. That’s the same foolish point Planned Parenthood makes when they say, “We don’t pay for abortions with tax dollars – we pay for other stuff.” Money is fungible. Support for one end of a business supports another.

So Governor Christie, paesano, do you have anything to say about this?

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Israel Supporters Turned Away From BAKA Event At Rutgers

By Noah Glyn

Groucho Marx once quipped that he would never join a club that would have him as a member. I suppose my standards are not as high as Groucho’s because on Saturday night, even as thousands of Rutgers students poured into the RAC to watch the Scarlet Knights lose to the Pitt Panthers, I went to Trayes Hall on Douglass Campus for an event titled Never Again for Anyone. The premise of the event was that Palestinians are the victims of ethnic cleansing at the hands of Israelis, and that this is analogous to the Jews who were victims of genocide by the hands of Nazis. Of course, it is an idiotic premise that flies in the face of proper historical analysis, common sense and decency.

            As I found out last night, I had no reason to expect any level of decency from the organizers of the event. The event was sponsored by the Rutgers University student group, BAKA: Students for Middle Eastern Justice. As a side-note, an event that I organized last semester had been interrupted and disrupted by BAKA. The event I held was for Ishmael Khaldi-an Israeli Bedouin who served as a consul to San Francisco. The BAKA disrupters viewed Mr. Khaldi as an “Uncle Tom,” who sold out his people out to the genocidal Israeli government.

            At a little after 5 on Saturday, I walked with several of my friends to Trayes Hall where we entered peacefully, and signed in. The people behind the desk were polite, as they asked us to display our Rutgers ids, and to write our names and email addresses on a sheet of paper that was lying on the desk. On the same table, there was a sign that read, “$5-$20 Suggested Donation. No one will be turned away for lack of funds.” In addition, this event had been advertised on the Facebook event and on the official website as “Free and Open to the Public.” I declined to pay, as did all my friends. The people behind the desk continued to be polite, and said that our decision was fine.

            The organizers told us that the doors would not open until 6:30 and that we should form a “queue” to be prepared to enter the room. We did as we were instructed. A couple minutes passed and I exchanged pleasantries with other people in the line. By now, the group of Jews and Zionists grew to several hundred. One report estimates the number at four hundred pro-Israel supporters. After a few minutes, a non-student, adult organizer of the event entered the lobby where we were waiting and told us that the $5 fee was now mandatory for admittance. The money, we were told, would go to the International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network. At this point, the crowd got very upset that they had been lied to. One female organizer announced that anyone who did not want to pay could watch the event on Facebook. Up to this point, no such video of the event has been put onto Facebook.

            Several witnesses who entered the actual event reported an organizer saying that they decided to charge $5 once “150 Zionists showed up.” The organizers asked Rutgers Police to refuse us entry into the room, which they did. There were about ten officers in the building to stop us from going into the room. Rutgers students took out their Rutgers id cards, held them out, and began shouting, “Let the students in!” In the meantime, non-Jewish and anti-Zionist students were allowed into the event for free without paying a $5 charge, since they were members of BAKA. When one student attempted to join BAKA on the spot to be allowed entry, he was-again-refused. It became clear that the organizers wanted to shut out all dissenting voices, even if doing so violated Rutgers University guidelines, let alone human decency.

            One student who entered the event reported that the room-with a capacity of 320-was less than half filled. Those who entered had the chance to listen to several speakers, including Hajo Meyer, a Holocaust survivor. The speakers not only accused the State of Israel of ethnic cleansing, but they also marginalized the severity of the Holocaust. One speaker argued that while it is true that six million Jews died in the Holocaust, many survived, thus implying that the Holocaust really was not as terrible as those racist Zionists (alas, I repeat myself) want to make it seem.

            As I noted above, BAKA has a history of intimidating others who disagree with their warped views. In addition to disturbing my event, they also have intimidated several of my friends who attended past BAKA events.

Even worse, they are engaged in an effort to delegitimize and to destroy the State of Israel. Their accusations are outlandish and false, but they are nonetheless dangerous to our society and to Rutgers University. Israel is the greatest friend America has in the Middle East, and possibly in the entire world. As we watch the Egyptian people struggling for their freedom, it is worth remembering that there is only one stable democracy in the Middle East that grants equal rights to women, gays, ethnic and religious minorities, and all of its citizens. That is Israel. BAKA actively seeks to undermine those liberties: the same liberties that we celebrate and embrace in this country. If BAKA is interested in comparing people to Nazis, perhaps they ought to look themselves in the mirror.

Noah Glyn is a junior at Rutgers University and a Fellow with the Committee for Accuracy in Middle East Reporting in America (CAMERA). Noah majors in economics and history.

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