I took a vacation day to spend some time cleaning up my basement. I’ve got a few damp boxes to go through, but none of the stuff I lost is heartbreaking. A quiet day with the kids at school, to get rid of stuff and to reorganize my basement. It’s not a disaster, it’s an opportunity!!

Anyway, while driving to the recycling center, I saw parked in front of our post office, a protester . . an anti-0bama protester!!!

I thought, wow, what a great thing, a patriotic American exercising his right to protest our government. Speaking truth to power. Dissent is the highest form of patriotism. Etc, etc.

I thought about pulling over to talk to the guy. But then I got a close look.

Uh, oh. LaRouchies. In a country of nut jobs, LaRouchies are near the top of the list. I didn’t even realize that they were still around.

Off I drove.

Haiti??

NO.

0bama is going to Massachusetts this weekend to try to save the sinking campaign of democrat senate candidate Martha Coakley (Obama to Campaign for Martha Coakley in Massachusetts). Her campaign has been a total fiasco, a disaster of historic proportions that couldn’t come at a worse time for democrats or 0bama.

If you remember, 0bama traveled several times to New Jersey to campaign for democrat incumbent governor Jon Corzine, including two rallies just 48 hours before election day. How did that election turn out ????

Columnist Mark Steyn sticks it to the TSA, Newark Airport security and NJ senator Frank Lautenberg in Crack TSA Manhunt Corners National Security Threat.

If you haven’t heard, they arrested the guy who last week snuck through airport security at Newark Airport and caused a massive flight upset and airport lockdown. The perp was 28 year old Rutgers grad student Haisong Jiang who was arrested at his Piscataway townhouse and charged with tresspassing, something that isn’t even technically a crime. It’s considered a disorderly persons-type violation that will probably result in a small fine and maybe some community service. And Lautenberg is not happy with that, he wants the guy indicted and sent to Rahway to break rocks.

As Steyn points out in his piece, the guy was just going to give his girlfriend a last minute hug before her trip to LA. The real criminals are the security personnel at Newark Airport who did their best Keystone Cops/Marx Brothers/Three Stooges impersonation in response to the inadvertent security breech.

Oh, and the guard who was in charge of the security at the gate is suspended, but his union is sticking up for him. Another reason to oppose mass unionization of TSA employees.

In the race for Ted Kennedy’s old senate seat in the people’s republic of Massachusetts, you have this latest poll:

Buoyed by a huge advantage with independents and relative disinterest from Democratic voters in the state, Republican Scott Brown leads Martha Coakley 48-47.

Corzine gets trounced in his re-election bid for NJ governor, and two months later a democrat woman is in trouble for a senate race in Massachusetts??

And what is the democrat response?? Send in Bill Clinton.
Bill Clinton to visit Mass. to stump for Coakley.

If I remember correctly, Bill and Hillary came to New Jersey to campaign for Jon Corzine. As did Joe Biden and Barrack 0bama. Didn’t help Corzine too much, did it??

Aerosmith is still popular in Massachusetts, maybe they can campaign for Coakley like Jon Bon Jovi did for Corzine. But I read somewhere that Aerosmith guitarist Joe Perry is a gun toting right winger, so maybe they can count on J. Geils.

From Friday’s headlines:

Other bloggers have noticed the same thing. It appears to me that the economic plan for 2010 is for 0bama to tell everyone the economy is doing fine and then dismiss any bad economic news as “unexpected”. Sort of like Alfred E. Neuman and “What, Me Worry??”

• Suspect Charged in Airline Bombing Attempt. Let me get this straight. This is a single guy flying alone. He pays cash for his ticket. His visa says he’s going on vacation but he doesn’t check any bags. His name is on a terrorist watch list. And his dad notified the authorities that he was concerned about his son’s jihadist tendencies. I thought this was the kind of guy who is supposed to be taken aside and given a detailed interrogation (and a cavity search?). Instead he waltzed through security and nearly takes down an airplane with nearly 300 passengers. This is what several hundred billion dollars in security buys??
• Boom decade for raises in Atlantic City. Yeah, the casinos have been taking in less money for the past two years compared to the boom years. And Atlantic City schools are amongst the worst. And most of the city west of the Boardwalk is crime ridden. But city employees have done great!! The city has an incredible headcount of 1500 government employees, and the salaries from 2000 to 2009 increased 60-70%. Any city employee who is given a city issued pager or cellphone gets $50 a week for being on call. There are raises on top of increases in pay scales. And the city is facing a $35 million dollar deficit next year. Must be Christie Whitman’s fault.

  How bad are the casinos doing? Atlantic City’s casinos revenue for November 2009 was down 13.4 percent compared with the same month a year ago. And November 2008 was an awful month, the first full month of economic meltdown. The city is doomed, and unfortunately a lot more money will be wasted as it goes down.

• New Jersey Lawmakers Object to ‘Jersey Shore’ . They mean the MTV show, not the region of the state. Hey, I used to go down the shore when I was a teenager and do stupid stuff. But that’s the thing, I was a teenager. Two of the guys on this MTV show are 27-28 years old. Time to grow up guys, and get a real job and move out of your mommy’s house.

Am I the only person to see a common theme in all these recent stories about the economy??

Consumer Sentiment Index For December Unexpectedly Revised Downward

New Home Sales Unexpectedly Show Steep Drop In November

New U.S. Jobless Claims Jump Unexpectedly

US home builder sentiment unexpectedly ebbs in Dec

Economy Watch: New jobless claims unexpectedly rise

Service sector shrinks unexpectedly in Nov.

It seems to me the ruling class feels that if they just keep on saying the economy is doing fine and dismiss all the bad news as “unexpected” then all the common folk will think that happy days are here again.

When does the unexpected become the expected??

With 37% of the vote counted, the republican candidate for Virginia governor is kicking some serious butt!! How about republican Bob McDonnel with 62% and democrat Creigh Deeds with a measly 38%. Sounds like all those 0bama voters who gave Virginia to the democrats last year stayed home this year.

The 0bama administration has claimed over 600,000 jobs have been saved or created thanks to the breathtakingly amazing plan hatched by the brightest and the best that 0bama has amassed in his administration. The plan in a nutshell: save the ecomony by borrowing trillions of dollars and throwing the cash at state and local governments.

Nevermind that except for newspapers run by Pinch Sulzberger, most media outlets have called “BS” when looking at the 0bama figures. Even CBS news, home to Walter Cronkite, Dan Rather and Katie Couric says the White House is “fudging” stimulus jobs.

Now the Bergen Record has taken a detailed look at the record of jobs created or saved in New Jersey thanks to the stimulus bill. In 24,000 jobs saved in N.J., we find the following statistics:

1. Of the 24,000 jobs, almost 14,000 are in public schools.
2. Almost 2500 jobs in the Summer youth program jobs administered by the state Department of Labor
3. Another 1000 jobs at NJ Transit to do maintenance on buses, rail lines and Newark Penn Station.

What happened to all that Corzine talk about “shovel ready” construction projects?? I guess that was just for suckers.

The Record looked at NJ Transit’s records and found only 152 jobs added after getting the free money. But who are you going to believe, 0bama or your own eyes??

• Frustrated developers are hissing back at a snake. Thirty five years ago, Tennesse had the snail darter, a fish that derailed billions of dollars of contruction projects because it was considered an endangered species. In 2009, New Jersey has the equivalent of the snail darter, the Northern Pine snake.
• Viewers react with sympathy, disgust for Letterman. Put me in the disgust column. This was a guy who was essentially the top boss at a company using his power to bed younger women who were basically his subordinates. This makes him no better than Bill Clinton, and the fact that feminists fell all over themselves to defend Clinton’s behavior makes it difficult for them to unload on Letterman. Hint to Letterman: Make a statement tomorrow saying how you 100% support abortion rights. That will silence the feminists.
• Don’t Believe the Corzine Surge Just Yet. Stu Rothenberg pours cold water on the excitement in the Corzine camp because their guy is trailing by only 4% in the latest polls. Corzine’s support is still stuck at no more than 42%, and his negatives are at 56%. The reason the race has tightened is because the third party candidate, Chris Daggett, has picked up support at the expense of the leader, Chris Christie. That’s right, don’t start planning the election night victory party just yet.

Found this in an AP story about how democrats are running scared heading into the 2010 mid-term elections.

The story is Election trouble brewing for House Dems in 2010 and there’s this line:

“. . . a highly motivated GOP base confused by the president’s proposed health care plan “

Oh, that’s it, I guess I’m just confused.

Who has said the following in the past few weeks:

About the 0bama multi-billion dolllar stimulus scheme:

“We know some of this money is going to be wasted,” and “Some people are being scammed already.”

and while introducing NJ governor Jon Corzine at his re-election campaign kick-off:

“Ladies and gentlemen, the next president of the United States . . . ”

And at the Air Force Academy graduation, when a teleprompter was knocked over by a strong gust of wind:

“What am I gonna tell the president when I tell him his teleprompter is broken? What will he do then?”

If you answered Vice President Joe Biden, you win a free hair transplant for you (or a loved one).

And let’s not forget his statement not to fly for awhile during the swine flu epidemic.

Someone once said “BS” isn’t short for that stuff that bulls leave in a pasture after grazing. “BS” means “Biden Says”.

Headlines from last night and this morning:

Obama Set to Revive Military Commissions

White House aide resigns over N.Y. flyover

This appears to be a common White House tactic, release uncomfortable news on Friday night. The weekend is typically a slow news period, and by Monday there will be new stories to bump the Friday night releases to the bottom of the pile. 0bama has done it a few times during his first four months in office.

Oh, and see the post below concerning NJ Governor Jon Corzine’s plan to borrow $2 billion to get the state through the fiscal year. Also a Friday night news dump. Not exactly “Profiles in Courage” are these liberals??

update: Andy McCarthy at National Review has also noticed. See ” . . . this week’s Obama administration Embarrassing Friday Night News Dump . . . . “

I give democrats credit for one thing, and that’s the ability to corrupt the english language to further their political agenda. A few days back I mentioned the “millionaire’s tax” which can actually increase taxes on residents making as little as $300,000.

“Shovel Ready” is only the latest. The American public was sold a bill of goods with the multi billion (or is it trillion) dollar stimulus package that would fund thousands of shovel ready projects, and put millions of Americans to work. These projects would be job creating engines that were ready to start as soon as the stimulus spigot was opened.

NJ governor Jon Corzine was one of the biggest champions of “shovel ready” projects. Well, now that it’s time to start the projects, we start to see that there not quite as far reaching and stimulating as we were told.

This article at NJBIZ, $27 million road project announced, says this project will create 130 jobs. That works out to a bit over $207,000 per job for “..repaving the roads, improving the drainage system, and installing sidewalks and a traffic signal” in Cumberland County.

Then there’s these shovel ready jobs described in DOT launches bidding process for stimulus-funded projects. Two of the three projects are painting jobs, about $30 million to paint bridges on I-280 and route 1&9.

And these painting jobs will have to pay prevailing wages, which for a painter is something like $66 an hour in salary and benefits. Not exactly the best use of $30 million if you ask me.

I voted on the way into work this morning. No lines at my polling station. I walked right up to the desk, signed my name and went into the booth.

My voting place divides the sign-in books between A-K names and L-Z names, and I was number 56 on the “A-K” list. My town is generally republican leaning. There is a race for two spots on the town council that is getting plenty of attention (based on lawn signs anyway).

There were two poll watchers. Why is the democrat poll watcher always a younger lady and the republican poll watcher a grandfatherly type older man??

My first thought during the Palin-Biden VP debate was (seriously), did Joe Biden have plastic surgery? He had those slanted-upwards eyes that you see on someone who had a facelift, like Joan Rivers for example. Plus Biden is a Washington DC legend for his hair transplants, so it wouldn’t be a stretch to think he’d go the plastic surgery route.

Now the New York Post has an article up IS JOE HIDIN’ FACIAL WORK?. The have pictures of Biden from 2005 and compare them to facial shots from Thursday’s debate. It’s pretty damn obvious that Biden had some work done. The article quotes a Manhattan plastic surgeon who says Biden got surgery around the eyes (a ‘Lateral Brow/Eyelid Lift’ says the doctor) and Botox injections for the forehead.

Hi, kiddies!! Time for the DynamoBuzz word of the day.

Today’s word is schadenfreude.

Wikipedia defines schadenfreude as:

I bring this up today because of the news that New York governor Eliot “The Punk” Spitzer has been caught up in a federal investigation of a high priced call girl ring. Spitzer was apparently a client, and based on the transcipts of a federal wiretap Mr. Spitzer was a steady customer for the call girl ring, an outfit that was charging Mr. Spitzer about $4500 an hour for its services.

The call in question happened on this past February 13th, the day before Valentine’s Day. Mrs. Spitzer must be glad to hear about that.

The classy thing for Spitzer to do would be to spare his family the continuous embarassment and resign. However, the next classy thing Spitzer does will be his first, so expect him to try to tough it out.

While some will compare this to Bill Clinton’s experience, Byron York at National Review notes one big difference. Clinton had many defenders, even feminists, who were willing to go out and stick their necks out to defend the louse. Spitzer on the other hand, has almost no friends. He is nasty and unlikeable, and his fan club can meet in the back seat of a Ford Pinto and still leave enough room for the groceries.

Spitzer made his career as an attorney general using any hint of a violation of the law as a hammer to club alleged criminals into submission. The “blackmail” form of prosecution. Now the hammer has become the nail. Couldn’t happen to a more deserving fellow.

My turnout prediction was right. I expected 43% +/- 2% of NJ registered voters to vote, and the final tally was a bit below 45%. This was a bit higher than average for a mid-term election, but it still means over half of NJ voters did not vote, even with expanded voting hours and no questions asked absentee ballots. Some of my other predictions were close.

But I missed bad on the big one, “Republicans will do better than the MSM is predicting.” You get the government you ask for, so this is what we’ve got for the next two years.

The Virginia senate race, with 85% of the vote counted, will be this year’s version of Florida 2000. Incumbent senator George Allen is leading democrat Jim Webb by less than 0.5%, 49.62% to 49.18%, an 8000 vote plurality with 1.9 million votes counted. The lawyers are packing their bags, and this won’t be a long commute.

My thoughts on the upcoming elections, just two weeks from today:

• The NJ senate race between democrat senator Bob Menendez and challenger Tom Kean Jr. has been up-and-down. Kean was leading in the polls all summer, and then Menendez went ahead but now the race has tightened up a bit. Three of the four most recent polls show Menendez with only a 3-4% lead. Voter turnout will be the key.
• I had stated months ago that for Kean to win, he needed to make the election a referendum about the lousy performance of the NJ state democrat party and also to bring up the Menendez = corrupt Hudson county party boss angle. Kean needs to continue to hit on these to have a chance of winning on November 7th.
• The NJ media is lining up behind Menendez, but Kean needs to ignore them. The media has declared that any mention of Menendez and his buddy Don Scarinci is “mudslinging”. And pointing out the federal investigation into Menendez’ shady real estate deal with the Union City non-profit is “sleazy campaiging”. Hey, it’s not Kean’s fault that Menendez has immersed himself in a culture of corruption.
• Of course there’s NJ’s favorite election tradition, fraud. Kean needs to have a lead in the polls to compensate for fraud and the votes from the cemetary.
• The national democrats have borrowed a page from the Corzine campaign book. In 2005, Jon Corzine ran a campaign ad using a handicapped teenager to make a point about stem cell research. The national democrat party has done Corzine one better, they have a handicapped celebrity starring in campaign ads, Michael J. Fox.
• “The most important election of your lifetime” so says the left wingers about this election. Hey, I seem to remember hearing that about the 2004 election. Oh well, I guess the 2006 elections are the most important election ever. That is, until the 2008 elections.
• Kean got two recent endorsements. One from his dad, Tom Kean Sr. and also from the NY Post, Kean for New Jersey. The Post reminds the voters of all the skeletons in the Menendez closet. Don Scaricni. Charles Kushner. Kay LiCausi. They forgot Menedez’ mentor, the Torch, Bob Torricelli.