The Star-Ledger hit a new low of innuendo and guilt-by-association smear tactics in editorially trying to link racists to the Republican Party. You get an A+ in McCarthyism and dirty tricks, but an F in integrity and respect for any point of view other than your own.
The editorial’s subliminal message is that Republicans who disagree with the paper’s editorial board or President Obama on policy do so for racially-motivated reasons.
Why not consider that maybe, just maybe, those who disagree do so because the policies are horrible, not in the national interest and complete failures?
“I never thought I’d see so much of your anatomy” –The Camel Toe Movie
By Art Gallagher
Respected columnists on both the left and right have come to Governor Chris Christie’s defense against the viral social and new media reaction to the ridiculously embarrassing photos of Christie in a way too tight softball uniform last week.
Star Ledger sports columnist Steve Politi writes that we should give Christie credit for not being ashamed of his body and applaud him for putting on the skin tight uniform that revealed both girth and a lack thereof and getting on the field to raise money for a very good cause–the families of slain New York City police officers. Politi noted that he was fat in high school and that he’s covered high school sports. Therefore, he argued, we should not ridicule Christie because fat kids might stop participating in sports.
A Star Ledger editorial, presumably written by Editorial Page Editor Tom Moran who launched Christie’s YouTube career when he lectured to Governor on his manners, lectures his readers for acting like fifth graders, asks if we’d tolerate such nastiness if a female politician dressed like Christie did last week, and like Politi, asked if it would have been better if Christie had not taken the field in his tight white pants, as if Christie did not have another choice. Moran, if he wrote the editorial, did not mention if he has ever been fat.
Ken Kurson, publisher of The Observer and a friend to many MMM regular readers, writes that he used to be fat and probably will be again while dubbing the social and new media’s reaction to the Governor’s appearance as “Disgraceful and Stupid Fat Shaming.”
New Jersey voters are either greedy jerks or stupid and impressionable buffoons if you buy The Star Ledger Editorial Board’s (Tom Moran’s) reading of the QuinnipiacPoll released on Thursday. The poll reported that New Jerseyans favor wage freezes for state workers, by a 53-42 margin, and oppose an increase in the gasoline tax by a 65-33 percent margin.
Hundreds of middle-aged people looking for work at Brookdale Community College job fair. April 4, 2014
New Jersey voters are jerks. The new state motto: “Screw you, not me.”
That is how Moran starts off his rant. He finishes by cutting the poll respondents a break. Maybe we aren’t greedy jerks, maybe we’ve been led to think the way we do.
We’ll cut the folks responding to the Quinnipiac poll a break – they’ve been goaded in this direction. Despite widespread reforms to state workers’ pay and benefits during the past four years, not to mention budget cuts that led to historic layoffs of police, teachers and firefighters, Gov. Chris Christie used his annual budget address to continue to blame state worker compensation for our fiscal aches and pains.
Hmmm. Moran’s frustration is showing. As the editorial page editor of the state’s largest media outlet, Moran should be the most powerful opinion maker in New Jersey. How could his readers be so stupid?!
Insulting your customers (readers) is a interesting strategy to stop the bleeding of a company (media outlet) that is contracting rapidly and recently announced 167 layoffs which followed millions in concessions from the outlet’s unionized workers and a smaller round of layoffs.
Some members of New Jersey’s presscorps, along with Senator Loretta Weinberg, Assemblyman John Wisniewski and the Democratic National Committee seem think they finally have an issue to thwart Governor Chris Christie’s rising star. They’re hoping traffic jams in Fort Lee will prevent Christie from becoming President of the United States.
The Star Ledgerhas an article this morning quoting Democrats and academics saying “the scandal” could hurt Chrisite’s national ambitions.
But questions about the incident have fueled a scandal that even Christie’s masterful team of brand managers can’t make go away.
Stile and The Star Ledger’s reporters have it wrong. Christie deftly accepted “ultimate responsibility” for the mistakes made in Fort Lee last September, while deflecting blame, at his press conference on the matter on Friday. As NJTV’s Michael Aron said on Reporters Roundtable, the issue is ‘fundamentally over.” If the ‘Bridgegate’ story gets any ink at all in 2014 and beyond, it will be deep in the back pages.
It’s doubtful that the subpoenas that Wisniewski, as Chairman of the Assembly Transportation Committee, issued will result in any smoking gun that proves that Christie or anyone in his inner circle other than Port Authority’s Bill Baroni or David Wildstein knew about the George Washington Bridge lane closures that tied up traffic in Fort Lee for a few days is September. Even if a smoking gun is discovered, as Hillary Clinton would shout, “What difference does it make?”
Now that Christie is a legitimate presidential contender, the front runner in the early polls, it is perfectly appropriate that the press and his opponents attempt to make mountains out of traffic jams and other mole hills as part of the vetting process for a president. Barack Obama got a pass from the press and his opponents in 2008 and 2012. Look what that got us.
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie’s ascent to the status of would-be savior of the national Republican Party started with one viral video – a clip of him telling my colleague, Star-Ledger Editorial Page Editor and columnist Tom Moran, “you must be the…
NJ.com updated their headline to include the word “accused” this morning, but has not lifted a finger to verify the accusation, nor have they referenced MMM’s story that disproved the allegation that a warrant for DiSomma’s arrest is outstanding or had ever been issued. MMM has previously been cited by NJ.com and The Star Ledger on several stories. They can’t honestly claim that they don’t consider this little blog a reliable news outlet.
The Asbury Park Press doubled down on their defamation of DiSomma in a story updated this morning: (Screenshot from the app.com story)
APP reporter Larry Higgs has not responded to numerous messages via twitter, public and private, asking if he personally confirmed a warrant with the Dallas municipal court.
Such a confirmation would be impossible, because there was never a warrant.
There were three shootings in Asbury Park this afternoon, according to a report at NJ.com.
The shooting happened around noon on Mattison Avenue, near Langford Street, Detective Lt. David DeSane said. As of around 2 p.m., DeSane said he did not know the extent of the injuries.
Two people in the area, who asked not to be identified, said they heard four or five shots, but did not know what happened.
AsburyParkSun photo
In the triCityNews last week, publisher Dan Jacobson said there have been four fatal shootings in the city, population 16,132, so far this year.
In their award winning series, Gripped by violence, published last October, four days before Superstorm Sandy, the Asbury Park Press said there had been an average of one shooting per week in Asbury Park through October 25, 2012 and that the city was second only to Camden in terms of violent crimes in New Jersey. That’s right, Asbury Park is more dangerous than Newark, Trenton and Jersey City, where there were also three shootings today.
She hasn’t officially secured the Democratic nomination yet and the wheels are falling off State Senator Barbara Buono’s gubernatorial campaign.
Buono will be the nominee. Her only competition on the ballot is Troy Webster, an aide to East Orange Mayor Robert Bowser. Webster isn’t really running for governor. He agreed to through his hat in the ring on the same slate as Bowser for ballot positioning purposes in the primary.
But the wheels are falling off the Buono wagon. She can’t raise money. She defiantly divided the party and broke with the legislative leadership with her choice of State Democratic Chairman. MSNBC’s Chris Matthews dubbed her Dawn Quixote.
Buono is on track to be the first major party candidate not to qualify for state matching funds for her campaign. She named Assemblyman Jason O’Donnell her choice as State Chairman, against the advice of Senate President Steve Sweeney and over the objections of Assembly Speaker Shelia Oliver. A prominent Monmouth County Democrat told MMM “Buono should never go on TV again,” after her appearance on Matthew’s Hardball.
Just when things couldn’t get any worse for Buono they did. Over the weekend former Democratic Governor Brendan Byrne, on a teleconference with former Republican Governor Tom Kean, told The Star Ledger that Buono should consider dropping out of the gubernatorial race.
One of the Dominican escorts who said she was stiffed by Senator Bob Menendez now says she was paid to read a fabricated script and that in truth she has never met Menendez, according to a Washington Post report. (hat tip Star Ledger)
The woman identified a lawyer who approached her and a friend to make the videotape, according to affidavits obtained by the Post. That man has in turn identified another lawyer who gave him a script for the tape and paid him to find women to fabricate the claims, the affidavits say.
The escort was one of two women who taped videos that seems to support a tipster’s allegations that Menendez had patronized prostitutes while vacationing in the Dominican Republic.
FBI agents conducting interviews in the Dominican Republic have found no evidence to back up the tipster’s allegations, according to two people briefed on their work.
Daily Caller, the site that first broke the Menendez prostitution story has yet to report on this latest development. Breitbart, the site that now employs the reporter who broke the story, posted a wire service piece on the escort’s latest claims.
Media bias evident when contrasting coverage of allegations against Oxley to allegations against Menendez
Former Monmouth County Sheriff Joe Oxley will finally get a hearing on his nomination to become a Superior Court Judge.
The Star Ledgeris reporting that Senate Democrats have reached a “blockbuster deal” to hold hearings on 20 judicial nominations, including Oxley’s, this week. The Senate Judiciary Committee has been sitting on these nominations with no action for months and New Jersey’s court system is backed up due to 55 judicial vacancies on the Superior Court level.
The Ledger is characterising Oxley’s nomination as “controversial” based upon their own report of a leaked deposition transcript wherein convicted fraudster Soloman Dwek said that Oxley gave him insider information regarding foreclosures in exchange for campaign contributions. The FBI investigated Dwek’s allegations and like many other of his tales, found that they were without merit.
The Ledger obviously thinks nothing of smearing a Republican’s good name based on allegations that have been investigated and dismissed, yet as we have seen since early November, they’ve been hiding from the public Democratic U.S. Senator Bob Menendez alleged ethics violations and patronage of underage victims of prostitution.
Is Soloman Dwek a more credible source than State Senator Sam Thompson? Thompson filed an ethics complaint against Menendez on November 3rd, 2012 yet there was no mention of it in the Ledger until last week after the FBI raided the office of Menendez’s friend and campaign contributor Dr. Salomom Malgen in Florida.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and much of the left stream media has justified their lack of coverage of the Menendez scandal because of “the source,” the conservative website The Daily Caller. MMM has learned that The Daily Caller’s source shopped the Menendez story to The Star Ledger before going to The Caller.
There would be no controversy over Oxley’s nomination had The Star Ledger declined to turn a politically motivated leaked of Dwek’s allegations into a salacious story.
Shame on The Star Ledger for smearing the good name and threatening the career of Joe Oxley based on the word of Soloman Dwek while ignoring the words of Sam Thompson and giving Bob Menendez political cover.
The Star-Ledger hit a new low of innuendo and guilt-by-association smear tactics in editorially trying to link racists to the Republican Party. You get an A+ in McCarthyism and dirty tricks, but an F in integrity and respect for any point of view other than your own.
