And So It Goes: Lobbyists Feed Politicans at DNC

A Bloody Mary in the morning, champagne flutes in the afternoon and paté at night. Funded by special interests, enjoyed by politicians and hidden from public view. At hotel lobbies and dive bars and shiny museums far from the floor of the Democratic National Convention in South Philadelphia, democracy is getting fat – and wasted -… Read the rest of this entry »

• Tweet

Gopal: When Dems Take Over Monmouth County, Republicans Will Never Win Statewide In New Jersey

There’s little hope for Republicans anyway if they don’t win a legislative chamber this year.

Vin Gopal’s ambitions are bigger than winning Democratic control of Monmouth’s county and municipal governments.  He wants to make sure New Jersey never again has another Republican governor or U.S. senator.

“Once we turn Monmouth County blue, a Republican will never win statewide,”  Gopal said last night at the annual Monmouth County Democrats Annual Chairman’s Ball, according to a report on PolitickerNJ.

State Senate President Steve Sweeney was on hand to boost Gopal’s plan of taking over Monmouth County from the bottom up.

“Build the party, bring as many people as you can to strengthen this  organization, … and then once you create it you can win, there’s no reason why not,” said Senate President Steve Sweeney, who was invited to speak at the  Monmouth County Democrats Annual Chairman Ball.

“It’s the effort that you put in and you’ve got to build from the foundation  up,” he said, explaining first it’s the councils and then the freeholder  boards.

“No Republican can win statewide if we can win this county,” Sweeney said.  “It’s just a matter of attitude, energy and focus, and that’s what I’m seeing  out of this county.”

Unless New Jersey Republicans win at least one chamber of the legislature on November 5, it is unlikely that a post Chris Christie Republican will be elected statewide for the foreseeable future anyway or that Republicans will ever control the legislature again.

If Republicans can’t pick up seats this year when they have a hugely popular governor cruising to a 30 point win on the top of the ticket, when will they?  Not until there is another Jim Florio or Jon Corzine in Drumthwacket, or a Democratic version of Richard Nixon or George W. Bush in the White House, if even then.

Christie is going to be reelected by huge margins.

Read the rest of this entry »

• Tweet

Double Dose of Bad News For Buono

Yet, good news for Trenton Democrats—the NJ Republicans are trying to lose

By Art Gallagher

State Senator Barbara Buono, the presumptive Democratic nominee for governor, received two doses of bad news today (so far) for her fledgling campaign to unseat Governor Chris Christie in November.

1) A Quinnipiac poll released today indicates that Buono has made no progress over the last month in increasing her dismal name recognition.  78% of those polled don’t know enough about Buono to form an opinion. That compares to 79% last month.  Of the few who recognize her name, 43% have an unfavorable opinion.

Christie’s numbers remain amazingly strong. 67% approve of the job he is doing as governor.  66% says he deserves to be reelected. In a head to head match up with Buono, Christie wins 58%-26%, with 13% out to lunch.

2) Even worse for Buono, PolitickerNJ reports that she is likely to be the only major party gubernatorial candidate in the history of New Jersey’s matching funds campaign program not to qualify for the maximum amount. PolitickerNJ said that Buono has raised only $29,000 per week since she declared her candidacy in December.  In order to earn the maximum $2 million in state matching funds for the primary, she would have to raise $216,000 per week over the next six weeks of the primary campaign.

Christie has opted out of the state matching funds program and has raised upwards of $5 million to date for the primary.

Trenton Republicans Trying to Lose

With Chrisite’s polling and financial numbers so strong, one would think that the Trenton Democrats that control the legislature would be concerned about Christie coattails.  Trenton Republicans seem enthused about the prospect of taking control of the legislature, but so far their campaign is deploying the stupidest strategy imaginable.

I’m not a professional political strategist, I just play one of the Internet.  In my not so humble opinion the NJ GOP‘s campaign against Corzine Democrats is the dumbest political strategy since Christine O’Donnell declared she is not a witch.

Read the rest of this entry »

• Tweet

AshBritt CEO Deflates Buono’s Hopes Of Making Clean Up A Campaign Issue

Trenton Democrats’ continuing quest to turn Governor Christie’s strongest issue against him suffered a set back yesterday when AshBritt CEO Randall Perkins won over Democratic members of a Joint Legislative Oversight Committee and flummoxed presumed gubernatorial nominee Barbara Buono by calling her on the political motivation of her questioning.

Facing four hours of questioning by the bi-partisan committee chaired by Senator Bob Gordon (D-Bergen), Perkins frequently praised the legislators for exercising their oversight duties, while combatively swatting back Democratic allegations of impropriety disguised as questions.

Read the rest of this entry »

• Tweet

Governor Christie: You need a Trenton to English dictionary to understand Democrats

• Tweet

Unions To Dems: Shut Up About Port Authority Toll Hikes

By Art Gallagher

Politickernj is reporting that New Jersey’s construction unions are leaning on Democratic lawmakers not to criticise Governor Christie over the proposed 50% toll and fare hikes by the Port Authority of NY/NJ. Yet.

The labor unions want New Jersey commuters to fund the $33 billion in NY and NJ infrastructure projects, including the rebuilding of the World Trade Center, that the toll hikes will support.

Trenton Democrats and U.S. Senators Robert Menendez and Frank Lautenberg had initially come out strongly against the toll hikes.   Governors Christie and Cuomo claimed they were caught off guard by the toll hike proposal and would review it.  Most observers expect Christie and Cuomo to approve lower toll increases than the Port Authority has proposed.

Trenton Democrats are now holding their powder on criticising the proposed hikes, figuring that Christie will look good politically if he responds to the criticism by scaling back the increases.  Instead they will attack Republicans after the final hikes are approved.

Christie has blamed the need for toll hikes on years of mismanagement  in the Port Authority and has claimed that the people he has appointed are improving the operations and finances of the mega agency.  Cuomo said that the proposed toll hikes don’t work for him.

• Tweet

Kyrillos: “Is it Ever Enough for Trenton Democrats?”

Majority’s Rhetoric Ignores Increased Funding for Vulnerable New Jerseyans

Trenton– At the close of Day Two of the Senate Majority’s attempt to hoodwink New Jersey taxpayers ahead of the November elections, Senator Joe Kyrillos (R- Monmouth/Middlesex) said that only to a Trenton Democrat could funding increases in key programs for vulnerable and needy New Jerseyans constitute “cruel” funding reductions:

Democrats still have not given us a source of funding for all of the added spending they’ve voted on in the last two days that doesn’t require taxpayers to close their eyes and make believe.

After all, it’s far more effective on the campaign trail for the Democrats to make outlandish promises the taxpayers cannot possibly keep, pass a budget that is nearly $1 billion in the red, and then all anyone who dare be responsible and support balancing that budget cruel and mean-spirited.

Despite having to clean up the Democrats’ mess, Governor Christie increased funding over Governor Corzine’s last budget for schools by $804 million, Medicaid by $982 million, Temporary Assistance to Needy Families by $47 million, hospitals by $31 million, senior property tax relief by $58 million, adoption subsidies by $16 million, and the list goes on and on.

The only people who put funding for those in need in jeopardy were the members of the Majority by supporting a budget that spent hundreds of millions of dollars more than the state takes in. A fantasy budget that promises the world but cannot deliver is the cruelest act of all.

• Tweet

Kyrillos: “Democrats Resort to Scare Tactics on Budget”

Middletown- Trenton Democrats’ empty budgetary promises and political rhetoric just more of the same.Senator Joe Kyrillos released the following statement demanding that Trenton Democrats take a moment to understand that their election year games have real consequences.

“Trenton Democrats are using an election year to play on the emotions and real issues of our neediest citizens. By passing a budget filled with empty promises – but no funding – Trenton Democrats have crossed the line into the dangerous and disingenuous. Not only are they playing election year politics, they are doing so in a manner that misleads the public about specific programs, as well as the state’s finances. Democrats overstate the surplus while ignoring that education funding has gone up $850 million over last year, funding for the AIDS Drug Distribution Program has been protected at the same level as last year, and hospital funding has gone up by $20 million.

“If these Democrats have any sense of decency they will be honest with the people they claim they want to help, instead of continuing to put forward myths, lies and distortions about what we can really afford.”

• Tweet

Trenton Democrats Keep Underestimating Christie

By Art Gallagher

Governor Chris Christie dropped his bombshell budget on the Trenton Democrats last week and then took off on a two week vacation with his family, leaving a media vacuum for Senate President Steve Sweeney and the Democrats in the legislature to try to fill.

Sweeney got some national attention by calling Christie a “rotten prick” and a “bastard” who hurts people and now the Senate is scheduled to hold votes to over ride Christie’s budget next week.  The Assembly is scheduling hearings on the impact of Christie’s cuts but hasn’t scheduled any override votes.    It is all political theater.   The budget that the Democrats submitted to Christie was political theater.    They planned on giving Christie a budget he would cut  so that they could spend the summer and fall using his cuts against the Republicans in the legislative election campaigns.

Christie is a “bastard” because he outwitted the Democrats, again.   By trying to box Christie in, forcing him to make cuts to popular programs they could use against him in the coming election, the Democrats unwittingly gave Christie the leverage he needs to accelerate his reform agenda.

Christie cut $139 million of $149 million from the urban “transitional aid” program.  New Jersey’s cities, Asbury Park, Camden, Trenton, Newark, et al, can not operate without that money.  The cities can’t legally lay employees off fast enough due to civil service rules, which takes spending cuts off the table.  Asbury Park would have to raise their property taxes by 101% to make up the the funds that Christie cut.  That would be fun to watch, but I don’t think they could collect those taxes.  If they did, they’d prove that the transitional aid wasn’t necessary.

While Christie was gutting the urban budgets and other programs dear to the Democrats, he also added $300 million to the surplus.

The Democrats will keep making noise that nobody hears until Christie gets back from vacation.  Then they will start negotiating.   But now Christie has the leverage because the Democrats gave it to him while thinking they had in a political poor position.  Christie wants education reform, especially tenure reform.  He wants the rest of his tool kit passed, especially civil service reform.   He couldn’t get that from the legislature over the last year.  Now he has what they need, what they must have.

The cities will get the transitional aid money.  Christie will get his reforms passed before Labor Day.

Given the new legislative map, it is unlikely that the GOP will make significant gains in the legislature this coming election.  However, it looks to me like Christie has positioned himself to extract reforms from the Democrats that are more landmark than the pension and benefit reforms recently passed.  Christie and the GOP legislative team are positioned to enter September with major triumphs.

• Tweet

Higher Prices At The Pump? Trenton Democrats Have A Plan For That

• Tweet