Cruise on over to Smadanek and check out the 11th edition of the Carnival of New Jersey bloggers [link]. Ken sorted the fifty-nine (!!!) links into easy to browse categories, like politics, terrorism and food. Hmm… I wonder if I could write a post that combines all three, politics, terrorism and food? Anyway, that’s a topic for another day.
Enlighten-NewJersey has a post up about one of Jon Corzine’s affordability plans, the plan to make college more affordable through grants, tax credits and loans that you don’t have to pay back. I think Corzine will give you a better deal if you attend a New Jersey college.
As is well known, New Jersey may have the biggest college student “deficit” of any state in the country, meaning more Jersey high schoolers go to out of state colleges than students from out of state coming here. Back when I was applying to colleges, Rutgers was the place you attended when you couldn’t get into your first choice. Rutgers is a bit weird in that Rutgers reputation increases the further away from New Jersey you get. I lived in California for two and a half years, and people out there think Rutgers is an Ivy League school.
The reasons NJ students go out of state are varied, but I doubt cost or affordability is a major reason.
The college cost issue is complicated. The annual cost of tuition at a private college is often compared to the MSRP of a new car. Nobody pays the sticker price. And tuition cost is directly related to the availability of grants. If you gave every college student in the country a $2000 grant towards college tuition, college would not all of a sudden become more affordable. Colleges would just raise their tuition by $2000 or reduce other financial aid to eat up the extra money.
If Jon Corzine really wanted to help me pay for my children’s college costs, he should cut my property and income taxes so that I could save more money. And maybe eliminate or reduce the capital gains tax so that I could keep more of my stock earnings.
And as far as the cost of New Jersey colleges, has Mr. Corzine been paying attention to the mess at the University of Medicine and Dentistry, New Jersey?? UMDNJ has turned into a patronage mill, a source of easy jobs and no bid contracts for politically connected consultants. If they get rid of a few of those multi-million dollar constulting fees and perhaps fire some of the dead weight on the payroll the cost of college tuition at New Jersey colleges and universities would drop immediately.
Last night, I took the kids to Commerce Park in Bridgewater to see a minor league baseball game, the Somerset Patriots versus the Atlantic City Surf. The game was a pitcher’s duel, 2-0 Patriots win, and there was a fireworks show afterwards. Very well done show. Daniel, Allison and Liliana ate about $40 worth of popcorn, cotton candy, peanuts, fries, Dippin Dots ice cream and drinks.
Then I stop on over at Coffeegrounds and find out that the proprietor was also at the game too!! He had the same observation as I did concerning the night’s entertainment, superfan “Crazy George” who had a voice like someone who had been smoking too many cigarettes.
There were about 7800 in attendance last night, a season high crowd. I know not every minor league team has been a success, but I would bet that the Somerset Patriots are one of the big success stories of recent years. They have great attendance, the ballpark is very nice and surprinsingly not too bad as far as traffic. They have a very good geographic fan base, a suburban crowd from a generally affluent area and they provide a nice night of family entertainment. The quality of players in the Atlantic League has been up and down in recent years, but the games are always entertaining.
Tom Moran in Friday’s Star-Ledger has a piece about the disgraced ex-senator from New Jersey Bob Torricelli, “For a charger like Torricelli, there’s nothing like a good race“. Seems as if the ethically challenged Torch is getting bored sitting around his 13 acre Hunterdon county estate and is thinking about a return to politics.
To “..a charger like Torricelli” I say “Whoa!!”
Mr. Torricelli hasn’t suffered enough for his misdeeds and violations of the public trust. Nixon had to lay low for 10 years or so before he started to regain political respect. And I have already sentenced disgraced ex-New Jersey governor Jim McGreevey to 10 years out of the political spotlight before he can even think about becoming a political player. Torricelli has been out of office for less than three years, not long enough to remove the stench he obtained from his shenanigans on the New Jersey political scene.
The Moran article barely touches on Torricelli’s misdeeds, mentioning David Chang, cash, a Rolex and expensive suits. This 2002 National Review article by Allison Hayward, “Passing the Torch: What Bob Torricelli did wrong” is a good starting place if you need to refresh your memory about Torricelli, Chang and illegal campaign financing. Don’t forget that Torricelli showed up at a Fort Lee 7-11 to meet David Chang accompanied by a large person who proceeded to try to intimidate Mr. Chang. Unfortunately for Mr. Torricelli, the video surveilance cameras in the store captured the scene of Chang retreating to a phone booth to hide from Mr. Torricelli and his associate.
If National Review is too conservative for you as a source of information about Torricelli, try the Rutgers Eagleton Institute of Politics. I could fill an entire page about Torricelli, Korean money, leaking CIA information, straw donors and campaign finance violations.
Torricelli was a fundraiser for John Kerry’s 2004 presidential run and he’s helping out Hillary Clinton. And as documented in Craig Horowitz’s classic New York Metro piece, “The Deal He Made: Senator Jon Corzine’s Quest for Redemption” Mr. Corzine learned about politics at the feet of Mr. Torricelli, and the Torch is probably a behind the scenes player in Mr. Corzine’s campaign, another reason all this talk about Corzine being the “Mr. Outsider” in NJ politics is so much hot air.
So Torricelli is not totally out of the spotlight, but it’s still a bit too early to be talking political comeback.
Bloomberg.com has a good summary of the political battle between Doug Forrester and Jon Corzine over the development of Petty’s Island [link].
Petty’s Island is a 400 acre island in the Delaware River near Pennsauken NJ that is currently owned by Citgo. Citgo wants to donate the island to the State of New Jersey for use as a nature preserve. The island is home to a few bald eagles and is otherwise undeveloped, though some of the island is contaminated from oil spills. The article notes that the state rejected the offer, and currently the city of Pennsauken is studying using eminent domain to seize the island and turn it over to politically connected developers who want to build a golf course, hotel and hunreds of luxury condos.
The article notes that Citgo has agreed to set aside money for the cleanup of the island. The article leaves out the tidbit that the state was about to accept the donation of the island until NJ democrat party boss George Norcross faxed a report to a member of the state board reviewing the donation from Citgo. Surprise!! The report was a sales pitch for the golf course and real estate development project [link]. The DEP then rejected the offer, laying the groundwork for the developers to start their study in order to use eminent domain to seize the island.
This is a perfect campaign issue for Doug Forrester. He’s already made it an issue, showing how Jon Corzine puts the interests of the party bosses ahead of the environment. Environmental groups like the Sierra Club want the island to be undeveloped. Norcross and his contractor and developer friends want every bit of open space in South Jersey to be covered by luxury condos, shops, etc. And you’ve got the eminent domain angle, a hot topic after the recent Supreme Court decision. Corzine is in the middle, and so far he’s decided that since bald eagles don’t vote he’ll be on the side of the developers.
My guess is you’ll hear lots about this in the fall. Forrester may even ask Citgo if they’ll lease him space on the island for a campaign office.
DynamoBuzz regular visitor Bob from eCache reminded me that the voters never approved the $8.6 billion in borrowing to fund the New Jersey School Construction Corporation. The New Jersey constitution states that any borrowing exceeding a certain amount must be approved by the voters via referendum. The state legislature bypassed that by approving the borrowing without voter input. Bogota mayor Steve Lonegan filed suit, but in August 2002 the NJ Supremes decided that the constitutional requirement to fund a “thorough and efficient education” superceeded the constitutional requirement for voter approval of state borrowing [see New Jersey Supreme Court Rejects Challenge to School Facilities Financing], so the taxpayers are on the hook for $8.6 billion plus interest even though it was never approved by the voters. I think this is called taxation without representation.
So what happens if the state tries to borrow another $8 billion to fund all the school projects the first $8 billion was supposed to pay for?? The NJ Conference of Mayors seems to think the legislature will have to go to the voters for approval via referendum. My guess is they don’t, and when it gets challenged as being unconstitutional, the NJ Supremes will give them cover by agreeing to the additional borrowing without voter approval.
This will be one of the big issues facing the next governor in 2006. And property taxes. And pension funding. And expanding medical care. And the gas tax and funding for the transportation trust fund. My, oh, my.
This Saturday is the National Hockey League player draft. The first player expected to be taken by the Pittsburgh Penguins is Canadian phenom Sidney Crosby, supposedly the hottest prospect since Eric Lindros came out in the early 90’s.
Expected to go in the top 10 of draftees and possibly as high as #4 is 18 year old Bobby Ryan. Ryan is from New Jersey, born in Collingswood and played hockey as a youth in Cherry Hill. Ryan moved to California and then Michigan before playing hockey as a teenager in Ontario. Ryan had a very troubled family life as a pre-teen (see story here) but he seems to have overcome his problems and is poised to become an NHL star. Good luck, Bobby Ryan.
I only remember two other NJ players being drafted by the NHL. Of course, Jim Dowd from Brick who played for the NJ Devils and lots of other teams. There also was a defenseman, Max Middendorf who played high school hockey at St. Joe’s in Montvale who played for Quebec.
The History Channel has a new show starting August 1st “Weird U.S.” hosted by Mark Moran and Mark Sceurman, founders and editors of the classic New Jersey magazine (and website) “Weird NJ“.
Looks like Moran and Sceurman are doing a good job expanding the Weird state theme, with Weird books now being published for Wisconsin, Illinois, Florida, Pennsylvania and Texas in addition to the Weird US book.
The History Channel has a good bio of the two Jersey guys who made good. Moran lives in West Orange and Sceurman lives in Bloomfield. These guys deserve plaques in the New Jersey Hall of Fame that is supposed to be part of the new Xanadu entertainment complex in the Meadowlands.
The New Jersey Schools Construction Corporation (NJSCC), charged with managing the expenditure of $8.6 billion in taxpayer money to build and refurbish schools in the state has now allocated all the available money in the fund [link].
That’s the bad news.
The really bad news is that there are still about 350 projects that they were unable to fund with that $8.6 billion. The money was borrowed to renovate or replace schools to comply with a NJ Supreme Court ruling that said the state was responsible for school construction in poor and neglected school districts in NJ. The money paid for only a fraction of the necessary projects, and many of the poor districts are still looking for money. One of the districts that got some money is Hoboken, a town with one bedroom condos selling for $500,000, but that’s another story.
The NJSCC may turn out to be one of the biggest financial scandals any state government has ever undertaken. Bernie Ebbers and Dennis Kozlowski are going to jail for stuff like this. And now the state will have to go back to the taxpayers and ask for another 8 or 9 billion dollars to finish the job.
Waste, fraud and abuse are a big reason the fund is tapped out. Contractors have been charging the NJSCC for state of the art offices and equipment. Project costs are at least 50% higher then comparable projects done outside the NJSCC.
Governor Codey is quoted in the article saying, “..There has been too much money wasted by the agency”. Funny, Mr. Codey was at the groundbreaking for the new $136 million Union City high school and he didn’t have anything to say about wasted money then.
The interesting thing will be if the state has to borrow another $8 billion or so and they go to the voters to approve the bonds and voters decide to reject it. Does the Supreme Court then force the state to borrow the money without voter approval?? Or maybe mandate a tax increase to pay for the schools?? I think that has been done in other states.
The Boston Globe has a hilarious on-line photo gallery highlighting bad album covers from the 1970’s and 1980’s. What were these guys thinking when they put out covers like these.
I have had to explain to my kids exactly what an album is. They only know cassette tapes and CD’s. I would never try to explain 8-track tapes to them.
Super conservative blogger Michelle Malkin gives Jersey blogger Fausta at the Bad Hair blog a mention concerning her post about the London bombings and the shooting of the Brazilian contractor by the London police. Fausta notes that the Brazilian victim may not be totally as innocent as the anti-Western media is portraying him. Sounds like the MSM should take a reporter off the Rove-Plame story and perhaps investigate this case.
Fausta also got a link from Charles Johnson at Little Green Footballs. We’re talking serious blog royalty here.
Howard Dean actualy said this about the Supreme Court:
First off, President Bush hasn’t appointed any of the nine justices on this Supreme Court. John Roberts is the first appointee in over a decade. Second, if Dean is talking about the Kelo vs. New London case that allowed cities to use eminent domain to seize people’s homes and turn it over to developers, then he is truly an idiot. The five justices who voted in favor of taking homes were the liberals on the Supreme Court, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, John Stevens, Stephen Breyer, David Souter and Anthony Kennedy. It was the conservative block of Clarence Thomas, William Rehnquist, Antonin Scalia and Sandra O’Connor who voted against expanding the scope of the Takings Clause of the constitution.
Liberals forget one of other cases that caused an uproar this past session was the Raich vs. Ashcroft case involving the state of California and the legalization of medicinal marijuana [link]. Once again, it was the liberals who decided that the commerce clause of the constitution cancelled out the wishes of the state of California. The dissenters in Raich were the conservatives, Thomas, Rehnquist and O’Connor.
So while the left is getting all charged up over abortion, they seem to have no concern over the ever-expanding power of the federal government. And Howard Dean continues to make a horse’s ass of himself.
I was able to relocate all the files for DynamoBuzz!! My host was shutting down my server, and I had to move all my files and my database to a new server. I also had to go to my domain registrar, GoDaddy, and change the nameservers for my domain. But it worked, I’m on a new server. Plus I think I get more storage space and more bandwidth on the new server.
It’s Fauta’s turn this week to host the NJ Carnival of Bloggers. I count links to almost 50 bloggers and other stories of interest to New Jerseyans. Great job. Magnifico!!!
The infamous George Norcross tapes were part of a state corruption investigation involving Palymra NJ township and an engineering firm, JCA Associates. The investigation started in 2000 but was dropped by the state and Attorney General Peter Harvey early on in the McGreevey administration.
One bit of news recently was that part of the evidence in the investigation was a videotape of George Norcross meeting with a NJ Dept of Justice official, pleading with him to end the investigation. The tape has since been “lost”, triggering cries of outrage from republicans who called for an investigation and for Mr. Harvey to find another job. Even democrat Jon Corzine piled on, showing “concern”. All the parties involved were then shocked to hear that there was already an investigation going on, lead by US Attorney Chris Christie. Seems as if the feds took over the investigation after the state took a pass. This sent shudders throughout the state, since Christie has shown no hesitation going after corruption while Peter Harvey has been a Garden State version of Inspector Clouseau.
The Philly Inquirer is reporting that a big part of the federal investigation involves campaign donations from JCA to the failed 2000 NJ senate campaign of Susan Bass Levin [link]. Ms. Levin is now chief of operations for the Corzine for governor campaign. While running for senate in 2000, Ms. Levin was also mayor of Cherry Hill. The situation is a textbook example of what everyone is against but does nothing to change it, and that’s pay to play. And you’ve got possible campaign finance violations.
What raised the interest of the investigators was about $16,000 in donations from JCA employees to Levin’s campaign. Some of the donations were from spouses of the firm’s employees, raising the question of whether JCA illegally reimbursed them for their donations. “Straw donors” are a no-no, ask Bob Toricelli about that. A JCA employee has a cancelled check to the Levin campaign for $1000 and also a copy of a voucher showing that he was reimbursed days later for $1004 for a trip that he didn’t take.
JCA donated over $750,000 to democrat causes over the years, and in a totally unrelated coincidence, the firm was awarded millions of dollars of contracts for government work. Some $300,000 of the contracts were from the township of Cherry Hill while Ms. Levin was getting the donations and while running for senate. Ms. Levin denies any improprieties were committed. But that’s why we have investigations.
Of course Ms. Levin hasn’t been indicted yet, and as long as your name isn’t Karl Rove, you’re innocent until proven guilty. But Jon Corzine is trying to run for office as an outsider, someone untarnished by New Jersey’s corrupt government and political machines. Well you’ve already got Corzine’s extensive links to the Norcross political machine, plus his millions in donations to county chairman. Now his campaign chief is a poster girl for pay to play. Let’s not mention her role in ramming through New Jersey fast track development laws during the waning days of the McGreevey administration. Levin’s support for a law that could be labeled “Leave No Contractor and Developer Behind” already has drawn sharp rebukes from environmental groups that reflexively support democrat candidates.
And let’s not forget Attorney General Peter Harvey, labeled Peter “See No Evil” Harvey by Bob Ingle of the Gannett papers. He had all the evidence that the feds have, and instead of actually investigating the case and trying to flip witnesses, decided to let everyone settle for minor charges and then he closed the case. I guess he needed more time to go after Blockbuster Video. Fortunately for the democrats, this is a complicated case that the public will have trouble grasping.
Vice President Dick Cheney will be in West Windsor tonight for a GOP fundraiser. Unfortunately for commuters, the VP will be making his way to the hotel in the 4PM to 7PM time slot, meaning a rush hour traffic nightmare for commuters [link]. Note that on Friday evenings during the summer, rush hour is almost five hours, from 3PM to just about 8PM.
This brings back memories of an Al Gore visit to the shore home of Jon Bon Jovi during the 2000 campaign. During Gore’s visit to the Bon Jovi compound in Middletown, the Secret Service basically shutdown the NJ Turnpike and the Garden State Parkway during rush hour.
Disgraced former Essex County Executive James Treffinger had his pension reduced from $35,000 a year to less than $6,000 after a unanimous vote of state Employees Retirement System board [link]. Treffinger did over a year of time after a 2003 conviction of a slew of corruption and obstruction of justice convictions. Treffinger is the highest profile republican to be snagged in a New Jersey corruption case.
The board voted 9-0 not to count his 8 years of service as county executive towards his pension based on a regulation that “..retirement credit can only be granted for years in which public service is deemed honorable.” I’d rather there be a law with clear cut definitions of the crimes that would disqualify a government employee from a pension rather than a subjective “honorable” standard. Was Jim McGreevey’s service to the state “honorable” even though he wasn’t charged (yet) with a crime??
And another poll, this time from Fairleigh Dickinson University-PublicMind, has it Jon Corzine 47% and Doug Forrester at 34%.
Luckily for Forrester it’s only July, and Corzine is below 50%, but Forrester has his work cut out for him.
A Strategic Vision poll of 800 likely New Jersey voters had democrat Jon Corzine leading republican Doug Forrester 48% to 40% with 7% undecided and 5% selecting other candidates.
Many democrats do not like Strategic Vision, calling it a republican polling firm, but they did a very good job predicting the 2000 and 2004 presidential races, better than many mainline polling firms. The results are in line with other NJ polls from Rasmussen and Eagleton. While Corzine seems to be holding his base Forrester is still trying to nail down his.