Raising Roaches For Fun and Profit

Cockroach Farming For Dummies:  The best way to raise a large colony of healthy roaches is to keep a cluttered home.  The roach colony enables this Trenton resident to clean her dishes without washing them

While browsing the web, I came across an article in Better Trenton Ghetto Homes and Gardens about roach farming.  The article stated that farming roaches in your kitchen was a shore fire way of getting rid of pesky houseguests that keep coming over to your place for dinner.  One look at your kitchen, and your unwanted company will be gone for good!.

Another benefit of having roaches is added protein in the diet.  Since they get in your food, you are guaranteed a dose of insect protein with every bite.  If you think that's gross, did you know that lobsters, crabs and shrimps, which are classified as crustaceans, are close relatives of spiders and insects.  So when you go to a fancy restaurant and order lobster, basically what you are getting a large insect that lives in the sea.  So save money on food and eat more roaches.

Additionally, having roaches in the home helps improve the health of you and your family.  When you run around with the can of disinfectant and reach for the hand sanitizer, what you are doing is creating a semi-sterile environment for you and your family.  That means when you come in contact with something that's dirty and germy, your body has no resistance to it and you get sick.  The best way to avoid this problem is to live in filth.  Our ancient forebearers in the stone age, whether they lived in caves or in trees, had minimal sanitation.  Studies of modern stone age tribes in the jungles of Brazil and in the South Pacific indicate that individuals live quite healthy lives until they enter their late 60s.  It is at that time that most tribe members die of infectious disease.

So live like a savage.  Don't clean your house and avoid death by cancer and heart disease.  Die of germs instead!

I hope you figured out that this is an attempt at satire.  I got the idea when I was spraying the home of a person who I know who happens to have a clutter problem.  That's a good way of getting a roach problem.

The stuff I used works pretty good.  It was made by BASF, the company that manufactured the gas the Nazis used in the death camps.  That gas was nothing more than an earlier version of the BASF roach bomb.  Them krauts shore know how to make a good bug killer.  Kills roaches real good.

I used to work for American Cyanamid as a temp for a while back in the 1980s.  I learned that the Princeton research center was the place where they developed Combat roach products.  They actually had a room there where they raised roaches under optimal conditions.

Today, the American Cyanamid property which sits on Rt. 1 just north of the Quakerbridge Mall on the same side of the road is largely abandoned.  The farm buildings and fields are rented by farmers, but the labs and offices are empty.  The loss of another great source of jobs for Trenton.  I believe the last occupant of the property was BASF which also used it an an agricultural research facility.

Ask a Man Who Owns One.....He'll Tell You to Buy A Big American Car

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Ask the man who owns one is the slogan that appeared in Packard ads from 1901 all the way until the brand went out of production in 1958.  This particular Packard is a 1956 Caribbean.  June 25, 1956 was the date that the Packard factory on East Grand Boulevard at Concord in Detroit ended production. and was the last year "real" Packards were made.  This top of the line model sported an array of features including a 300+ horsepower V-8, power windows and door locks and factory air.  It sold for about $5,500, a small fortune at the time.  However, that sounds like a bargain compared to what a vehicle like this in pristine condition goes for today...Around $100,000!

 Part of the fun of having a blog is you can write about anything you want.  Although this has basically turned out to be an anti-Christie blog, I often write about other things as well in between my attacks on the governor.  It gets a little tiring just writing about the governor and I'm sure the people who follow me get sick of reading about nothing else but him.

Today I am writing about my tastes in automobiles.  As you can probably guess from the picture of the Packard at the beginning of this entry, I like them big, powerful and well equipped.  A Smart or a Toyota Prius is not my idea of a daily driver.  Neither is a Lexus or even a Nissan Sentra.  To me, if they are not rear wheel drive, American made and V-8 powered, they're not worth considering.  Yes, a  1956 Packard would turn me on, but so do Lincoln Town Cars and real wheel drive Cadillacs.

They do not have to be old.  The car I currently drive is a 2008 Mercury Grand Marquis LS.  I bought it new in July 2008 back when gas was $4.50 per gallon.  So when I say I don't care about gas mileage, I really mean it.   The LS is the top of the line model and mine came with all the bells and whistles like leather seats, a decent stereo, heated seats and pedals which can be adjusted to fit the driver.  Needless to say it has the most important features of all - a V-8 motor and a real wheel drive power train.

See,  I don't drive like a grandpa.  Mounted on my windshield is a Valentine 1 Radar Detector.  Top of the line, lust like the car, the Valentine 1 sells for $500 and is unique in that it tells you where the radar source is located.  That's important if you got a lead foot.

The car's trip computer indicates that I am getting 15.5 mpg, pretty damn good if you consider that my way of getting on Route 1 from the Mercer Mall and the other stores in Lawrenceville and West Windsor is to drop the hammer.  In other words, I look for a the first gap of about 30 feet or so and just floor the thing.  You'll be up to 50 in about 5 seconds, so it just doesn't matter what's coming up behind you.

If you think my job comes with a state-issued car, just forggetaboutit.  State cars exist in Hollywood and in the imaginations of the writers of the Trentonian, not in the real world of working stiffs.  On my job I get to go on the road about three or four times a month so I can meet with the people at the one stops and get to see what is going on across South Jersey.  When I'm out, I drive about 5 or 6 hours each day and log between 120 and 150 miles.  The big Merc allows me to travel in comfort even though it costs a bit more to operate than the 32 cents per mile that the state reimburses me.

To understand why I like big gas hogs, you need to know a little about me as well at the vehicles I've driven throughout the years.  The big car fetish is the easy part.  A lot of that has to do with being 6 feet one inch tall and having a weight of 270 pounds.  When you're that big, you want a car to match especially if you spend a lot of time in it.  The American made and rear wheel drive part has a lot to do with being middle aged, that's what I grew up with.

I know all about the modern writing style.  The experts say that people today have short attention spans especially when online, so keep it brief and to the point.  Don't worry however, I like to break rules, so I will stay to form and write a book as usual.  Like I said in the begining, I am going to keep going and discuss some of the cars I had years ago.

I was born and raised in and around Trenton.  My father worked at the American Standard pottery and my mom was an industrial nurse.  In other words, she worked in various factories throughout her career and took care of employees injured on the job.  We were working class.  Forget about Packards or even V-8s.  My parents usually bought used stripped down 6 cylinder vehicles.

The low-end cars of the 1950s and 1960s were of a type no longer sold today.  In that era, most cars were "standard size" meaning big - but not enormous affairs capable of comfortably carrying 6 adults.  For anybody under 50, sedans that can carry 6 adults in comfort are an unknown commodity.  Hell, my Grand Marquis even can't do that.  But a 1960 Chevrolet Bel Air could.  More about the Bel Air later.  Then, what do I mean by not being enormous.  Well that class of vehicle - the truly enormous, was made up of behemoths like the Packard pictured at the start of this story or the Cadillac Fleetwood - hardly the kind of thing my family (or most families for that matter) could afford.  The "rest of us" had to made due with Chevys, Fords, Dodges, Plymouths and the like.  And my family drove stripped down versions of this babies.

Just like "smaller car" had quite another meaning in the 1950s than now, so did the term "stripped down".  Today that means the absence of a navigation system or a heated steering wheel, but certainly includes factory air conditioning, power steering, power brakes and an AM-FM stereo.  Well stripped in the 1950s meant the cars were lacking things like heaters, oil filters or AM radios.  You got a rubber floor.(carpet was an option), a 3 on the tree manual transmission and an in-line six cylinder engine barely big enough to get the car up to 60 miles per hour on level ground and that was pretty much it.  The brakes were manual (remember to stomp hard), the steering was manual and turning the wheel was like steering a ship, something like 2 complete turns from lock to lock.  Some cars even had a manual choke.  You had to pull the thing out to start the car and push it in once it started.  Not that a manual choke was not a bad thing, the automatic chokes of the day absolutely positively sucked.  My parents normally kept a screwdriver in the glove box.  You used it to start the car.  To start the car, you take the air filter cover off and shove a screwdriver down the butterflies.  Once the car warmed up, you'd remove the screwdriver and replace the air cleaner.

Nope, driving these things was not something out of American Graffiti. It was more like the Opie and Andy Show.

Here are some of the cars I remember that my parents had when I was a kid.  We had a 1954 Dodge.  I don't remember anything special about it except that when I was 4, I put it in neutral and had it rolling down from the Hilltop Shops in Bordentown and almost took it into Rt. 206.  My mom chased it and managed to stop it in time.  I guess if she wasn't successful, you wouldn't be reading this.  We had my grandmother's old 1952 Chevy.  It came with a 2-speed Hydromatic transmission which meant it jerked unbelievably hard when going from low to high gear.  That model was equipped with after-market turn signals. (in 52 turn signals were optional).  Then there was the 1952 Chevy pickup with a hole in the cab floor.  That had a manual choke and a throttle.  Throttle was the cruise control of the day.  Strictly manual like everything else.  You pulled a button out that fed the truck more gas.  Since that was all there was to it, it wasn't much good if you were on a hill because the truck would slow down going up and speed up going down hill.  One more honorable mention was the 1958 Olds 98 my dad bought in a bar in the late 1960s.  That was the exception to the rule because it was equipped with everything including a real automatic transmission and a powerful V-8.  It didn't stay at the house long.  When my mom saw it, she said "it's an 8.  It will use too much gas.  Get that bomb out of here."  That was the first and last time I saw it.

There was one car we had in childhood that deserves more than a fleeting mention.  That was the "king of the lemons", a 1961 Rambler Classic station wagon.  No doubt, if you know anything at all about 1960's classic cars, you heard of the "lay down Rambler".  That meant that all the seats folded down flat to form a bed.  This was a vestige of a long-standing feature of Nash Ambassador automobiles.  Some Ambassador wagons were even equipped at one time with a real mattress so you could use it as a camper.  That was in the late 1940s.  Then, you could get screens as an option so you could leave the windows open at night and keep out the bugs.

We got the Rambler in 1962 as a used car.  I remember going to Reedman's with my parents and sat in the room when they were talking with the salesman.  I remember they were looking at a new Chevy at first, but my mom thought it was too much money.  The salesman said he had a real sharp machine that was only a year old that was a lot cheaper than the Chevy.  It was the Rambler.

My mom loved it at first sight.  It was white.  "easier to keep clean and cooler in the summer".  Of course, it had no air conditioning, so the white paint job was seen as a plus on hot summer days.  It was a 9-passenger model, which meant it came with a fold-down third seat in the far rear.  My sister and I loved it, because it faced rearward and we loved riding back there.  It was like we had the car to ourselves because we didn't have to look at our parents.  Another feature was that the tailgate swung out to the side, rather than opening down flat.  "Makes it easier for the kids to get in and out."  Lastly it had modern "Captive Air" run-flat tires.  These had an inner core which stayed pressurized if the tire went flat.  That way you could keep driving and reach the gas station and have the thing fixed without changing it.  See, back in the day, tires were much less reliable than now and flats were a common occurrence.

Other neat things about the wagon was that it had a push button automatic transmission.  Rather than a shifter on the steering column it had buttons on the dash.  The dash had lots of push buttons and chrome. 
My parents got slip covers for it at Rayco on Broad Street in Hamilton.  They were meant to protect the upholstery, which was much less durable than modern seat coverings..  Yes, the Classic even came with things like carpet, a radio and a heater with defrosters.  (A real redneck Caddy, you think!)

The Classic was an intermediate-sized car, in between the full-sized Ambassador and the compact American.  By 1961, the micro-sized Nash Metropolitan was extinct.

Now comes the lemon part.  My first bad memory of the "car from hell" was from the time our family went to see my mother's sister at her farm in Illinois.  Her sister married a soldier from Ft. Dix in the 1950s.  He was a farmer, so she got to be a mid west farmer's wife after growing up in Bordentown as the daughter of an employee of Roebling Steel.  What did the 1,200 mile each way trip do to our lovely Rambler.  Well, the engine boiled over at regular intervals.  I remember my dad getting sprayed  with boiling hot water when he took off the radiator cap.

The overheating problem persisted the whole time we had the thing.  Going to Seaside was a real treat.  You had to take a few gallons of water with you for the car.  Sometime after you passed Allentown, you had to pull over and add water.  The same thing going home.

Another nasty habit this junk heap had was loosing the passenger-side front wheel.  Several times over the four years we had it, the wheel fell off.  Once we went to the school to pick up my sister and I said something about the wheel falling off.  Speak of the devil, the wheel came off when we stopped at the school.

One feature of the vehicle was that it was equipped with an aluminum head.  The car had my mother's favorite engine configuration, a straight six.  The aluminum head was nothing but problems and the car got several valve jobs.  It rocked and knocked like a sewing machine.

Finally, in 1966 my father sold the car at the bar for $50.00.  That's right, a lay down Rambler for a General Grant.  Good Riddance.

I was going to write more, but I think I did enough for today.  Perhaps another time, I'll tell you about my experiences with my first car, a 1960 Chevrolet Bel Air formerly owned by my stepfather.  It came with a 235 cubic inch straight six.  It had no radio, a rubber floor and no oil filter.  Unlike Ford, Chevrolet took mercy on their base-model purchasers and threw in a heater and defroster at no extra charge.  Of course it cam with manual "captain" steering, "stomp 'em" 4-wheel manual drum brakes, and a 3 on the tree manual transmission complete with a clutch with a throw as long as a Mack truck.

That was what I learned to drive on.  My experiences with the Chevy enabled me to get a chauffeur's license a couple years latter.  I kept this car for the beginning of my college career and made many a trip from Iowa State University in Ames to Trenton and back.  It was during those trips I proved it can carry six adults in perfect comfort.

That's enough for a taste of what may come in a future post.

From what I told you so far, you can now understand why I love big luxury model V-8 highway cruisers.  Of course, I had more of my fill of base-model "lead sleds" and have grown to appreciate the finer things in motoring life.

So leave saving gas and driving rice grinder Camrys to the schmucks.  For me, for now anyway, I'm proud to say that if you don't drive at least a Panther-Class Ford Motor Co. product, then your car has no class.

Photo:  The Detroit News

In its heyday, the mighty Packard Motor Cars. Co. factory in Detroit was advertised as the most modern auto manufacturing facility in the world.  Today, it is the nation's largest abandoned factory.  The 3.5 million square-foot. facility runs along Concord Street for a full half mile and contains over three times the total square footage of the Quakerbridge Mall..  When it was operational, no doubt it was one of Detroit's crown jewels.  Today, it still stands as a ruin of monumental proportions.  The vacant plant is a magnet for homeless people, drug users, scrap collectors, and of course, photographers and urban explorers interested in seeing industrial ruins.

Back to the Future, Out With Civil Service, In With Tammany Hall

Tammany Hall was a real building in New York City.  It was the headquarters of the city's Democratic Party.  It has come to symbolize the kind of corruption which results from filling government jobs based on political patronage.  As you will see below, Republicans are just as adept as Democrats at playing the patronage game.

I work for the New Jersey Department of Labor & Workforce Development in a unit that keeps track of the economy.  We're the guys who come up with things line the unemployment rate as well as something called "Covered Employment Statistics" employment estimates or CES employment estimates for short.  Our shop also produces a myriad of other products such as wage surveys (which provide an indication of what people are paid in various jobs) as well as labor force and population estimates.  Most of our work is funded by the federal government.  The group I work for does something a little different from the rest of the floor.  Rather than churning out statistics,  we get to go out and speak to the people who work in the "one stops", or what were known a few years ago as employment services or job service offices and train the counselors on our products so they can better serve unemployed people in choosing new careers and in selecting job training that will help them become gainfully employed again.  We also work with municipal,county and state officials who need help using and interpreting our statistical products.  Another part of my job involves reading newspapers, riding around in the field to observe business conditions and to keep track of business openings and closings and answering questions from the media and public about the local labor market and economy.

Basically, we're generalists.  In other words, we are the regular guys who get to explain to the rest of the world what products we have available, where to find them and what they are useful for.  We also keep track of the economy in out assigned area and put out newsletters and other publications which explain labor market and demographic trends.  While my official job title is not "economist", that's basically what I do.  I only needed a bachelor's degree to get my job, while while a "research economist" needs an advanced degree.

While the type of work I do basically involves common sense and little in the way of understanding of advanced statistics or detailed economic research, the job still requires a broad level of skills and knowledge as well as interpersonal skills, public speaking and writing ability.  While people who do my job can learn basic skills necessary on the job, such as computer skills, basic economics, statistics and technical writing from school course work, much of what we do can only be learned on the job.  It takes on the average six months for a new worker to develop minimal competence to work independently and about a year or two to get proficient at it.

You can probably guess this is probably not the easiest job in the world to get.  No, you won't see any ads that say "Labor Market Analysts Wanted, No Experience Necessary. Apply today and start tomorrow."   However, the entry requirements are not as steep as you might imagine, at least under Civil Service rules for filling the position.

In the past, if we hired someone off the street, we would go looking for a Labor Market Analyst Trainee or a Labor Market Analyst IV.  Both jobs require at least 20 college credits of economics and three credits each of math and statistics.  The job also requires a bachelor's degree, however work experience in economic research can be substituted for the degree, but not the credits in economics, math and statistics.

No work experience is required for the trainee position.  The Labor Market Analyst IV requires one year of work experience in economic research with writing experience.  The trainee job is a range 17 and starts at about $40,000.  The Labor Market Analyst IV job is a range 19 and starts at about $45,000.

Usually we hired people in the past by posting the position as a promotional opportunity open to employees throughout the labor department.  People who take the job usually come from jobs in disability or unemployment, which hire people off the street.  Oftentimes, people take entry-level jobs working on unemployment or disability claims to get their foot in the door, and the promotion gives them the opportunity to get a more interesting job with the prospect of eventual promotion to higher level positions within our division.

Since the McGrevey years, our shop has been loosing workers.  During the first Whitman administration, there was a hiring freeze and it was difficult to get promoted.  Once she was reelected, the money began to flow like wine.  We were able to fill about three or four slots and had more analysts than we had any time since I started in 1994.  Promotions became common.  Everybody got new computers.  So much for Republican austerity.  Once McGreevey came in, the usual cycle where an incoming governor cries poverty repeated itself and the hiring freeze was re instituted and it was never really taken off.  As people retired, we were able to get replacements for some of the people by raiding other shops on the floor.  We also got a man for the Commerce Commission, which Corzine abolished.  (He abolished the Commission, but not most of the actual jobs or the work that the commission did.   That was transferred to other agencies like ours.)

Well, we recently had a worker retire and needed a new body.  With a good nine years of hiring freezes, the rest of the floor has also been getting a little thin.   My supervisor suggested to the assistant commissioner to hire a trainee because we wouldn't have to worry about finding someone with research and writing experience willing to start at the princely sum of $45,000 per year.

Like I said earlier, my job involves reading newspapers and I get to see the gripes from the public on the letters to the editor page.  Many of those letters go like this.  I am a senior citizen.  I worked hard all my life and all I have to live off of now is Social Security and my investments, which got chewed up by the recession.  I really don't understand why we put up with this expensive civil service system, where you have to lay off workers by seniority (keeping the most expensive older workers on the payroll and letting go the less expensive, but more energetic new people.) and where people get annual pay raises just for warming up the seats of their desks and get pensions when they retire which they keep getting no matter how bad the stock market gets.  I don't know why the governor doesn't run the thing like a private company.  He should be able to hire who he wants without following silly civil service rules with tests and all that nonsense. He should be able to start them at what he wants and give raises on what they are worth rather than just because they stay on the job for a certain amount of time.  And if they want retirement income, they should have to save for it like I did and not get a taxpayer subsidized pension.  I can't afford more property taxes to pay for these deadbeats and goldbrickers."

Well, these grandpas probably think that by bypassing civil service rules the public will be able to hire workers at lower wages, give them less frequent and less generous wages and save the state money.  Of course, this system will insure that raises would be given solely on merit and not seniority.  It would give the government the flexibility to fire incompetent workers at will and trim the fat out of the workforce without too much fuss.

The only problem is it really doesn't work that way in the real world.

Perhaps finding a way around civil service would enable the Motor Vehicle Commission or unemployment office to hire clerks off the street at lower pay.  But on higher level and more desirable positions like in my shop it would probably cost the public more and result in a less fair system of hiring workers.

How do I know this?  Because it has already been done.  We got our new analyst this week.  Except the new person was neither a trainee or labor market analyst 4.  Instead, his title was Government Service Representative.  He was not a civil service employee, but instead is a unclassified employee.  He was hired outside of the civil service system and serves at the pleasure of the governor.  In other words, he can be dismissed on a moment's notice.

We already had an unclassified employee, a graduate student finishing up his schooling who was brought in by the old assistant director under Corzine.  He worked basically as a research economist helping out the director as well as doing some more routine work that our unit now gets.  He was dismissed just before July 1, by someone over at the Economic Development Authority who paid part of his salary.  The dismissal was part of a mass layoff of unclassified workers by Governor Christie as a cost saving measure.

The new guy will also be doing work for the folks on our executive row.  We never filled the director job.  It is now being done by our assistant commissioner who has a PhD in economics.  The new guy will assist him on his research as well as help us out by covering the labor area handled by the person who recently retired.

You may wonder what kind of background the new guy has.  Remember that when we hired career service workers through the civil service system, we normally got people with little experience who would start at less than $50,000 per year.  The new guy worked for several years for Wall Street investment houses, first as a commodities broker then as an analyst.  You've heard of the slogan Trenton Makes, The World Takes."  Well I guess the flip side is "What Wall Street Refuses, Trenton Uses."

To be fair, I haven't worked with the man long enough to know how good he will be on the job.  He's only been there a day.  I know that no matter where we get people, whether they come in from unemployment or disability or we get them from other sections on the floor, it takes a long time to get them trained.  Some people can do the job well, others never get the hang of it.  The new guy has as good a shot of catching on as anybody.

I have several problems though with the way he was hired.  First, since he came in as an unclassified person, his salary his not set by the union contract.  Basically, it can be whatever the people who got him on want it to be.  It is probably north of $70,000 and might even be $90,000.  Since he is new, he is not on the Courier-Post's Data Universe which lists the salaries and titles of all state employees.  No doubt, an analyst from Wall Street will be more expensive than a new hire from the street.  However, at least in his role as an analyst covering a labor area, I doubt he would be able to do the job any better than a new hire or someone we could get from elsewhere on the floor. 

This begs the question, Why hire him?  Here is where the element of unfairness comes in.  At this level, it is highly unlikely he walked into the lobby of the Labor Building and randomly asked for a job application.  More likely, he had connections with someone high up in the state who got him hired.  I believe he was out of work from his Wall Street job for a while before before getting hired.  Lots of names on Christie's donor list have Wall Street connections.  Perhaps the new guy is some out-of-work Republican who needed a job and knew the right people to get him hired.  Kind of like New York in the good old days of Tammany Hall.

Another good question is why not bring back the last unclassified guy that got laid off.  You know, the one that was let go just before July 1.  The new guy is doing some of what he did.  Perhaps the difference is that the old guy was hired by people from Corzine's administration and the new guy was hired by Christie's people.  The decision to fire the old unclassified guy and bring on a new one may have had more to due with political loyalty and personal connections than it with the ability to do the job.  Precisely, just like old Tammany Hall. 

Don't let anyone fool you.  Perhaps Christie's plans to ditch Civil Service in favor of an employment at will policy has more to do with politics than you think.  Perhaps it will bring us back to the good old days when all government employees will have plenty to fear when power changes hands in the governor's mansion.  Because, back in the good old days, people in ordinary non-policy making jobs were regularly replaced with loyalists to the new leader when a new governor or mayor took over.

The civil service system is essential for maintaining a professional non-political workforce.  Dedicated professionals willing and able to work their whole careers for a governmental agency are good for the public.  A professional workforce has the skills and the continuity necessary to provide a consistent level of service to the public.  This is something you will not have if hiring decisions become based on cronyism and political loyalty.

Trenton - At Least its not Camden

At least some of the houses in Trenton are still occupied.  This is a shot of "The Land of the Damned" in South Camden.

This is is a picture I ripped from Google Images.  Yeah, I sometimes cheat, but at least I tell you when I do.   I don't know for certain, but I believe it is from South Camden off of Broadway near the South Jersey Port Authority Broadway Terminal, which at one time was the home of the New York Shipbuilding Co. where the aircraft carrier USS Kitty Hawk and many another proud American warship were built over a period of more than half a century.  These homes no doubt were occupied by workers from New York Ship or by other nearby manufacturing concerns.

New York Ship, Campbell's Soup and RCA were the big three manufacturing powerhouses in the city.  The were to that city what Roebling Steel, American Steel and Trenton Pottery were to our city.  Well all good things must eventually come to an end and after the Kitty Hawk was completed in 1961, no more large ships were built there.  Finally, in 1967, New York Ship folded.  And so the rest of the neighborhood began to go after that.  And it of course did not help matters when it was discovered that a nearby abandoned dress factory on the corner of Jefferson and Broadway was found to be heavily contaminated with radioactive thorium.  Seems that prior to becoming a garment mill the building in question was the General Gas Mantle plant which manufactured lamp mantles or the cloth bags that used to go over the outlet pipes on gas lamps.  When the gas was turned on and the mantle lit, it would produce a glow and emit light like a modern light bulb.  The "secret ingredient" in the mantle that made it an effective light emitter was thorium, which came from sand brought to the plant for processing..

For more about New York Shipbuilding Co., see http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/facility/camden.htm.
For more information on General Gas Mantle see http://www.epa.gov/superfund/eparecovery/welsbach.html
and  http://www.state.nj.us/health/eoh/hhazweb/hhw_no_3.pdf and http://www.dvrbs.com/camden-streets/camdennj-streets-arlingtonstreet.htm

Over the years, the workers took the sand home with them and used it in children's sandboxes and to mix concrete.  Some put it in the soil of their gardens to make it lighter.  In the process, the whole neighborhood was contaminated with radioactive radiation and the housing was abandoned.  Most has since been torn down.

I decided to write about Camden today because my job brought me there last Thursday and I got to ride down Broadway all the way from the Roman Catholic Cathedral downtown to Fairview Avenue which lies just past New York Ship.  This drive takes you through the city's Combat Zone, a netherworld of hookers, junkies, drunks and busted up buildings.

If you want a movie set to shoot a gang picture in the hood, or better yet a movie about down-and-out drunks or junkies, this would be the perfect location.  Life Magazine did a photo shoot down there this past winter.  Their camera crew rode on the needle bus which passes out clean needles to the junkies.  Recently, Parkway Recovery, a methadone treatment center, was closed on Broadway to make way for construction of a medical school.  Parkway Recovery used to treat over 700 junkies a day.  I don't know where they go now.  It seems Camden is the Aids and Heroin capital of the state.

An image of an obviously Aids infected hooker I saw last Thursday still sticks in my mind.  She was real skinny, kind of like the people in Ethiopia.  She was wearing a halter top and her breast were so flat, her chest looked like that of a six year old girl.  Her legs were like bones.  I wonder what kind of tricks are desperate enough to pick her up.

By the way, I'm not the only one in blogland to refer to Camden as a damned city or compare that town to Trenton.  To see a blog with some interesting pictures of Camden and Trenton, click here.  http://www.northbankfred.com/abdul48.html 

Call for Candidates in June 2011 Democratic Primary for Senate District 3

If you are a laid off teacher or police officer, or are just disgusted with the way Steven Sweeney has been giving public employees and the general public the shaft, here is your chance!  Start looking into running for state senator from District 3 in the Democratic primary coming up next June.

The problems with Mr. Sweeney are numerous.  He has managed to use his connections in government to get the state to squander taxpayer money by building a multi-million park for the horsey set in Gloucester County and. by getting the state to tear down a perfectly good modern prison in Camden to make way for some waterfront redevelopment project that just may or may not happen.  Right now, through his position in the Delaware River Port Authority, he is working on throwing away millions more on some silly rail line to link the Rand Terminal in the City of Camden with Glassboro.  (Presumably so Camden Residents can get advanced degrees in Pharmaceutical Technology and build better drug labs.).  All at the same time that he bends over backwards to help our Republican Governor spread the myth that the state is going broke because of overpaid public employees.

The 2% cap does not restrict capital spending projects.  These are normally paid for from the proceeds of bonds.  Bonding falls outside of the cap, because the money is coming from borrowing, not taxes.  Also repayment of the bonds falls outside of the cap, conveniently excluded as "debt service".

About a week ago Sweeney sponsored another one of Governor Christie's "gift wrapped" bills in the Senate to allow the state, county, municipalities, school districts and other public entities to furlough workers at any time without negotiating with the union.  Sweeney and the governor both say it is necessary to stay within the 2% cap.  Maybe so, because there should have been some kind of exemption for inflation and municipal necessity.

Suppose we get a period of high inflation like we had in the late 1970s under Jimmy Carter.  You may laugh, but they were laughing then at the prospects of a stock market crash happening again too.  Well then everybody will be locked into the 2% increase thing. Wages will begin to fall behind what workers can get on the outside.  Then at the best, nobody will want to be teachers and cops.  At the worst, you will have a general strike among public employees from one end of the state to the other.  The cities will then burn without any police on the streets to stop anarchy.

So, if you always thought you wanted to be a politician, here's your chance.  I'm sure the NJEA, PBA and the CWA would only be willing to back your campaign.  Ans so would be a lot of ordinary citizens dissatisfied with a hypocrite like Sweeney who is fattening his pockets and looting the state treasury while at the same time portraying himself as a guardian of public funds.

DUMP  SWEENEY

Here Comes The Bride, Governor Christie's New Wife, Stephen Sweeney

Last week I saw on the front page of the Trenton Times an article which said the governor just signed the 2 percent cap on property taxes into law.  A picture which appeared with the article showed Governor Christie sitting at a table, presumably to sign the bill.  Standing next to him was Stephen Sweeney, the senate president.  I wonder what is going through Sweeney's head especially since he is the Democratic leader in the senate.  The signing ceremony at the Nottingham Ballroom in Hamilton Square was also a rally for Thomas Goodwin the Republican senator from Hamilton Twp. that recently took over Bill Barone's seat.  It could just as well have been a gay wedding for these two politicians.

It seems that lately Sweeney has decided to become Christie's wife.  Since Christie does not control the legislature, he heeds help from sympathetic Democrats to get legislation introduced to advance his agenda.  Sweeney seems only too eager to oblige.

Now you may wonder why Sweeney is willing to kiss up to the governor to the extent of going to a Republican campaign rally.  Well, he would tell us uninitiated souls that if we think the job of a Democratic senate president is to help elect Democrats, then we are sadly mistaken.  See Sweeney's job is first and foremost to make Sweeney look good and screw everybody else including his fellow Democrats and his constituents who happen to work for state, county or local government.

Part of the deal with Mr. Sweeney is that he is the master of collecting multiple paychecks for holding many different offices.  Remember all that sanctimonious talk a few years ago about limiting elected officials in the state to one elected job.  That is now the law, but when it was passed, the politicians that held multiple jobs were allowed to keep them.  And nothing in the law prohibits politicians from being officers in organizations outside of government.

Here are a few of Mr. Sweeney's jobs.  As you already know he is the state senator from District 3, which covers parts of Gloucester, Salem and Cumberland counties.  He is also the Freeholder Director of Gloucester County, which is a position something like Mercer's County Executive, except he was chosen for the chief executive position by his fellow freeholders.  He is also a member of the Delaware River Port Authority board and is president of the ironworkers union.

Like any good politician, he got to where he is at by bringing the bacon home to his backers.  About four years ago, when Corzine was governor, the state shut down for about a week in July.  Senators Sweeney and Roberts were leading a faction in the legislature that opposed Corizine's plan to increase the sales tax by a penny and use the extra money to fully fund government worker pensions.  Every governor since Florio either underfunded the pension system, or like Christie, refused to fund it at all.  A deal was reached in the end.  Half the proceeds of the extra penny of sales tax were to be used for pensions, the other half cent was to be used for "property tax relief".  Somehow, the pension is not being funded now, nor is property tax relief, although that was the deal.

I believe there was also another quid pro quo under the table, for after the sales tax went up, several large projects were funded in southern New Jersey - projects that helped keep union construction workers employed and fattened the pockets of local businesses.  Examples included construction of the DREAM horse park in Logan Township, Gloucester County.  This is a place where you can board your horse and also has exposition rings and riding trails.  A nice perk for us working stiffs up here in Trenton who need a taxpayer-subsidized place to keep our string of polo ponies.  Also, Corzine fulfilled George Norcross's Jr.'s dream by chartering a four-year medical school at Cooper Hospital in Camden.  It will be a part of Rowan University with a campus to be built on Broadway in Downtown Camden.  (I guess the new physicians will be well versed in treating drug overdoses and fixing gunshot wounds after training there).  Also in Camden last summer, the Governor closed the second-newest prison in the state and had it demolished before he left office.  The idea was to make way for redevelopment of the North Camden waterfront as housing.  More jobs for the ironworkers members who will no doubt be constructing the steel framework of these high-rises.  Additionally, the governor secured funds for Rowan University and the City of Glassboro to demolish a residential neighborhood next to the Rowan campus to construct a new downtown area.  This is being built by SORA Associates.  Sweeney, through his connections on the Delaware River Port Authority is pushing to extend the PATCO high speed line from Lindenwold to Glassboro at the cost of millions of dollars (and of course more union construction jobs.).  A real fiscal conservative (ha-ha.).

I believe Sweeney believes if he helps sell public employees down the river with his 2-percent hard cap and by shepherding Christie's "tool kit" through the legislature, he will be able to have the governor throw a few construction projects his way.  He already has been rewarded when the "Governor from Harrah's" proposed establishing a state-controlled district around the casinos and loosening of regulations to enable the casinos to do their thing with less state oversight and keep more money for themselves.  He is probably hoping for funding for the medical school, the highrises on the Camden waterfront and the new rail line.

See, it's not about helping your fellow Democrats or taking care of the thousands of his constituents who work as police, teachers and government office workers.  It's about promoting Sweeney and fattening the pockets of union construction workers.  And he will probably go as far as sticking his tongue up the governor's butt to get what he wants.

How Popular is Chris Christie?

Chris Christie is more popular than I ever imagined, according to a Quinnipiac University telephone poll conducted from June 10 to June 15.  According to the poll 44 percent of New Jersey voters approve of his job performance, while 43 percent disapprove.

Forty-five percent of voters consider him a leader, while 43 percent describe him as a bully.

The public's opinion of Christie's policies is mixed.

Voters disapproved of his $820 million cut in aid to public schools by a 61-35 percent margin.

Sixty-seven percent approve of his proposed constitutional amendment to limit property tax increases to 2.5 per cent per year.  Only 25 percent oppose it.

Voters indicated Christie should have signed the bill to increase income taxes on millionaires by a margin of 61 to 33 percent..

Nearly two thirds of voters with children in the public schools say they like teachers, but 53 percent have a negative opinion of the teacher's union.

Whatever Happened to Pamper Petterway?

It was September 25,2002 and I just came home from work.  I had difficulty getting down my street to go into the driveway of my house because of all the police cars on the street.  When I finally parked my car and got to my house I sat on the porch to watch the action.  My wife said the cops are at Stella's house and that she thinks something happened to her.  The front of the property was marked off with yellow crime scene tape.   Next thing I know, a stretcher comes out the front door of Stella's house.  Someone was on it covered up with sheets.  Stella Garczynski was murdered.

The police hung around all night.  They searched around the front of my property and asked me if I happened to notice a broken knife or scissors laying around.  The cops stuck around the property for several days. 

Sometime after I showed up at my house, the news truck came.  They were from all the TV networks, NBC, CBS, ABC, Fox.  I was interviewed by Fox News and asked whether I was scared or considering leaving the neighborhood.  I said no, what is there to fear.  The reporter then said that most people she spoke to plan to move out of the neighborhood.  I said I already have an alarm system, a high fence, a good deadbolt and a Rottweiler.  What is there to fear anyway?

The murder made a big splash in the local news.  An elderly white middle class woman stabbed to death in her own home.  She just had work done on her property.  The big question on everybody's mind was, "Who done it?".  Well, two days after the crime we got our answer on the front page of the Trentonian.  It wasn't a gang of burglars, a crazed maniac or the handyman.  It was none other than Pamper Petterway, a married woman with children who held Jehovah's Witness meetings in her home.  Oh yeah, I forgot to mention she was also black and a crackhead.

Stella was targeted the morning of her murder.  She walked to the bank on the corner of Liberty and Broad.  At the time I believe it was Core States or First Union.  Today it is Wachovia.  While walking there she met a black lady who said she had no place to live and was looking for a home.  Stella offered to take her home with her, give her a meal and help her find a place to rent.  (At least this is Pamper's story.  Doesn't sound like the Stella I knew, who seemed to be too streetwise to befriend strangers hanging out by the ATM and then let them in her home.)  The two walked back to Stella's house and she let Pamper inside and began fixing a sandwich when Pamper said she needed to use the bathroom, which was upstairs.  Pamper went upstairs and began ransacking the bedrooms.  Stella thought she was taking too long and went upstairs to get smacked over the head with a lamp and a statue of the Blessed Mother then stabbed her 38 times with a knife and a pair of scissors.  She was stabbed so hard, the handle of the scissors broke off, leaving the blade in Stella's body.  Needless to say, there was blood all over the place.

From what I heard from the neighbors (this never made the papers), Pamper stuck around for a while.  She had lunch, took a shower and washed and dried her clothes at Stella's house before leaving.  Yes, she even ate the sandwich that was waiting on the table.  How's that for a cold blooded killer.

Pamper got caught when she went to the big Wachovia bank branch on State and Warren with a forged power of attorney and one of Stella's checks, which was filled out.  It seems Pamper was bold enough to clean out Stella's bank account.  The bank clerks heard about the murder and recognized the name and probably also wondered why some Polish woman would sign over access to her bank accounts to a black woman.  They stalled for time and called the police who made the arrest.

Eventually, the hoopla died down.  Many of our old neighbors moved out.  I guess they got scared that this could happen to them.  Me, I'm used to this thing.  I remember when the state trooper who lived next store to Stella was out front hosing blood off his sidewalk.  That time someone was stabbed there, probably over a bad drug deal.  We've had other incidents too, like the time several people charged out of their houses and tackled a car thief and held him down until the police came.  I tore my Achilles tendon in that one and was laid up for several months after that.  Just some more excitement in River City.

Of course, after the old people moved out, new ones moved in.  A Trenton cop now lives in Stella's house.  Paul moved out next door and Lawrence moved in.  The state trooper moved out of the big rancher, and now his house is occupied by a landscaper who parks his big pickup in the driveway.  Things have quieted down quite a bit down here since 2002.  No murders, no stabbings since then.  The new people are mostly black and Hispanic, a little change from the Slavic people that used to live around here when I first moved in back in 1992.  However, for the most part it is still the same sort of place.  Most people own their homes, take care of their properties and look out for each other.

As you probably guessed, Pamper got convicted of murder and never got out of prison again.  You would think that would be the end of the story for her.  No, She was arrested in May 2009 for the June 1982 murder of  68-year old salesman,, William Stelle

Also, Pamper Petterway has become a poster child for Neo-Nazi and skinhead blogs who want to show how wonderful black people are.  Her career as a murderer was mentioned on both Stormfront, "Stella Tries to Help Black Drug Addict = Dead Stella" and on Chimpout, "Huge Nigger Sow Serving Time For Murder Charged Again".  From the headlines, you can catch the editorial slant of these websites.  If you want to read them, just Google Pamper Petterway.  I'm not going to bother posting links to them here.  For a link to a straight news story about Pamper Petterway, click here:http://www.mycentraljersey.com/article/20090504/NEWS/90504056/UPDATE-Woman-49-indicted-in-Plainfield-stabbing-death-cold-case-from-1982.

Did Pamper think of all the damage she caused when she killed Stella?  Most likely not.  She was just looking for a few bucks to pay off her drug dealer and buy some more rocks to smoke.  What she did was put fear in people, caused several families to move, and no doubt made some people think twice about moving here.  I addition she helped make inner city blacks look like fools and gave the racist community a shining example of why people should avoid urban areas.

Who Will It Be This Tuesday, Tony or Manny?

As I hope everyone reading this already knows, there is a city election this Tuesday June 15.  I hope a lot of people come out and vote, but based on past experience with runoff elections in the city, turnout is usually a lot lower than in the first round of voting.  I sadly believe that will probably also be the case again this time because there has been relatively little publicity compared to May.  The one exception to this is the water works vote which seems to be drawing more interest than either the mayor or city council races.

According to the the Trenton No website, both Tony Mack and Manny Segura oppose selling the water works.  This is good.  The only real problem is the Trenton Yes campaign financed by American Water is much better financed, and it seems to have convinced the people that I know that are not politically active that the sale is a good idea.  Of course Palmer did this by deliberately holding off on scheduling the referendum so the whole year's tax increase could be charged to a single quarter to make it look like the sale is necessary to avoid a disasterous increase in property taxes.  If they were worried about taxes these same people should have been out last November backing Corzine with the same enthusiasm they backed Obama with in 2008.

Past the water works, what seems to be the big diference between the old Spanish guy and the short black man?..Tony mack has the support of Frank Weeden as well as city council candidate Juan Martinez and South Ward Councilman Frank Muschel.  Of course, all three of these people are rough-hewen law-and-order types who say they want to go after landlords and the criminal element with a sledgehammer.

Mr. Mack also indicated he opposes the use of eminent domain to displace homeowners to make way for economic development projects.  I couldn't agree more, because I supported Jim Costen and Carlos Avilla's efforts to stop the Leewood Village project.  It is a shame however that Costen and Avilla backed the city's efforts to allow Hovnanian to tie up the Champale site for years without building anything.  As a result, some homeowners were coerced into selling their properties for less than they would have otherwise would have taken and other people were forced to give up their back yards.  The neighborhood deteriorated severely while the project was stalled.  Fortunately, Hovanian did come in and build, but the city should have never tied up the property nor pressured people into giving up their homes until it secured a substantial performance bond from the developer.  It was for that reason that I could not back Mr. Avilla in the last election.  He wouldn't address my question about the performance bond in a meeting, he only would say that he was behind the effort to bring in Hovanian. 

I own several hundred shares of Hovanian stock, and for that reason have every reason to wish the company well.  However no mean s no and the threat of eminent domain should not be used against owner-occupants to take their homes, yards or anything else.  Also, in all cases, the city should demand a permormance bond before giving a company the exclusive right to develop a tract.  Why inconvenience the little guy, when the big corporation is under no pressure to move forward.

I like some of what Mr. Avilla has to say about selling city properties one at a time to homesteaders or small contractors or landlords.  Back when Art Holland was mayor, the city had an urban homesteading program where the city would reserve certain homes for owner-occupants and would lend them money to bring them up to code.  Also landlords and contractors could bid on the other properties at auction and develop them so they could get back on the tax rolls.

The Palmer administration got rid of the auctions and urban homesteading and instead relied on big developers who promised to come in and build grandiose projects like Leawood Village or the Broad Street Entertainment District.  As we know, many city-owner properties rotted during the last 20 years, because the big boys never came in and to do anything.  Rather than relying on the Great Father in Washington or on Wall Street, we should rely on ourselves and allow people with the drive and determination to take over individual homes or business properties.  I think we can't do any worse than we have done for the last generation.

Well, then who do I want?  It changes from day to day.  I worked with Tony Mack in the past, but agree with Frank Weeden that he can't handle money.  After all he couldn't pay the poll workers in a timely manner when he was chairman of the city Democratic Party and his payroll checks bounced when he ran for mayor four years ago.  Also, the folks in Bellmawr found out the hard way that he did not have the talent to be a school board business manager.  Let's see, did he loose $1.25 million like he said or $1.75 million like the Courier-Post said.  It doesn't really matter because in the end he screwed up and the school board fired him.

For that reason, I'll go with Manny Segura!

Vote No on Water Works Sale

My doorbell rang Sunday afternoon, and when I answered it I found Christine Donahue on my front porch.  She was passing out flyers for a group called Trenton No which was set up to fight the proposed sale of the suburban portion of the Trenton Water Works.  I will reproduce the text of this flyer below because it does a better job than I can of explaining why you should vote no on June 15.

Keep our water!

Vote NO June 15

Do you trust THEM or US

They are New Jersey American Water, a big corporation with a history of buying up water utilities and raising water rates.  They are spending big $$$ to talk you into a bad deal through a fake grassroots organization called "Trenton Yes".

We are your friends and neighbors.  We are community leaders and activists.  We stand by 2,000 signatures that were collected to stop the sale of TWW's suburban infrastructure.

We are committed to ensuring that Trenton Water Works generates positive revenues for years to come and continues to supply affordable water to Trenton residents.  On June 15th, we urge you to vote NO! to stop the sale.

STOP THE SALE COMMITTEE

UNITED AGAINST THE WATER SALE

VOTE NO TO STOP HIGHER TAXES AND WATER RATES

Suburban sales of Trenton's water keep our rates low, and revenue surpluses help pay for city services.  American Water wants to buy the Trenton Water Works suburbazn infrastructure.  If we fall for it, costs will go up.  The  proposed sale already caused a 40 percent rate hike costing $5 million per year, and we will loose $3 million in annual surpluses forever.

VOTE NO TO STOP PRIVATIZATION AND JOB CUTS

Trenton Water Works has already reduced staff in anticipation of the sale.  If we don't stop the sale, more jobs will be eliminated in billing, meter reading and installation & maintenance & repair.  Trenton Water Works provides good paying jobs to our residents.  Vote no to stop privatization and job cuts.

VOTE NO TO STOP A BAD DEAL THAT DOESN"T ADD UP!

American Water says we will get $80 million from the sale.  What they don't tell you is that most of the $80 million must be used to retire TWW deby, with little left over for us.  They claim we will get $320 million from bulk water sales over 20 years.  The truth is there is no guarantee.  If we keep the Trenton Water Works, we are guaranteed over $800 million, more than twice as much.

KEEPING TRENTON WATER IS MONEY IN THE BANK!

Trenton benefits from low water rates and revenue surpluses thanks to TWW's suburban operations.  TWW will bring in even more revenues as outside demand increases.  Selling the suburban territory would permanantly cut Trenton from future outside customers.

VOTE NO TO KEEP OUR REVENUES UP AND OUR OPTIONS OPEN!

http://www.stopthesale.org/. 

Designer Dogs Trenton Style

By now nearly everyone has heard of laberdoodles, cocapoos and other designer dogs.  The problem with most designer dogs is that they are wimpy.  They're fine for sitting on your lap and playing with kids, but not what you want if you want to project the Trenton macho image.

Never fear, ye  hood dwellers!  There's something new out, which combines the jaw of a pit bull with the speed and agility of a Doberman.  It's called a Doberbull and may be coming to a street near you.

And they can be cute too.  Check out the attached video.  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OhStK8B438g

To Know Christie the Governor, You Have to Know Christie the Freeholder

I'm willing to bet Chris Christie was a schoolyard bully in grade school.  While I can't confirm that fact, he does not seem to have evolved much past the bully stage.  Here he is, confrontational, demanding and does not play well with others.  But beyond this, most people don't know much about the man beyond that he is a lawyer and worked a stint as US Attorney General for New Jersey.  I was curious to find out where he came from and what else he did in life, so I looked him up on Wikipedia.  You can access his biography there at the following link: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_christie.

What you will find is that he held elected office only once before when he served a single term as a freeholder for Morris County from 1994 to 1998 During his short career in county politics he raised such a ruckus and antognized his contemporaries so much that his own Republican party sponsored another candidate to run against him in the primary in 1998, and he was defeated. 

Now you are probably wondering what Christie did as a freeholder that caused his own party to ditch him.  Well, when he ran in the primary in 1994, he lied that his opponents were under a criminal investigation for violating local laws.  After taking office he successfully pushed to have the architect charged with designing a new county jail dismissed, saying the architect was costing the county too much money.  After getting fired, the architect sued Christie for defamation for the remarks he made about the dismissal.

In 1995, one year after taking the freeholder job, Christie and Rick Merkt ran as an opposition slate against the regular organization candidates, incumbent assemblyman Anthony Bucco and Michael Patrick Carroll in the Republican primary.  Christie and Merkt were defeated by a wide margin.  The county Republican Party, unhappy with Christie's antics recruited John J. Murphy to to run against Christie for the Freeholder Board seat in the Republican primary in 1998.  Murphy, the endorsed candidate, won the primary and Christie's career in county politics was over, except for one last lawsuit.  In the campaign Murphy falsely accused Christie of having the county pay his legal bills in the architect lawsuit, so Christie sued and got an out of court settlement from Murphy.

So there you have it.   Christie bucks the party establishment and runs against the endorsed Republican incumbent in the 1994 primary.  He lies about his opponent's record so he can get elected, wins the election, but gets sued.  For one thing, you tend to upset the party establishment by challenging endorsed incumbents.  This can be forgiven somewhat if you manage to win, which he did, but he lied to do it.

Once in office, he challenges the other freeholders and has the architect that they hired removed, which is something that I'm sure ruffled a few feathers.  He then challenges an incumbent Republican in an Assembly race by running outside the column, thus committing an unpardonable sin twice.  This time he host and faced the full wrath of the party establishment.

My big question is why didn't we hear about this from Corzine's people during the governor's race.  Are the Dems a bunch of wimps or something not to challenge this part of his past.

Also, why did the Republicans invite him back to run for Governor in the first place.  I bet there are a lot of Republicans in high places in the state that are now biting their tongues and wishing they put somebody else in office.

Obviously, he is still the schoolyard bully that won't consult with others or take advice from his own people as evidenced recently by his rejection of the federal education grant application negotiated by Education secretary Bret Schundler and the NJEA.  Apparently it was more important for Christie to stick it to the teacher's union than to take the advice of the perfectly good conservative Republican he sent to negotiate for him.  I guess he doesn't need the federal money and would rather see more teachers get laid off.


Who knows, he may repeat himself and try to run for higher office before he finishes his first term as governor.  What will it be, Senator or President.  Probably wouldn't be a bad idea to have this pompous jerk run and loose, but what would happen if he makes it.

My guess is he will see his career as a governor end much the same was as his career as a freeholder ended.

His own Republicans will get rid of him and endorse someone else as the regular organization candidate in the primary.  

Left Turn,Reed

You might remember the old Clint Eastwood movie Any Which Way But Loose from the 1980s.  Well anyway, in the movie Clint Eastwood plays a trucker who keeps a pet chimp named Clyde in his cab.  A famous line from the movie is "Left Turn, Clyde".  When Clint Eastwood said this, the monkey would stick his arm out of the truck to signal a left turn.

Well, when you communicate with Trenton politicians, you might as well be dealing with monkeys, because they don't pay too much attention to what you tell them and they sure don't know which way the wind is blowing.

I sent an email to all three members of the 15th District legislative delegation.  The 15th district includes Trenton and the delegation is headed by Senator Shirley Turner.  The letter was requesting that the senator and assemblymen support reinstituion of the millionaire's tax and asked for their support in fighting Christie's proposed cuts in services such as school nutrition programs, after school programs, libraries and public health.  I also asked that they support maintaining wages, benefits, bargaining rights and civil service protections for the state's public employees.

The only representative to reply to my letter was Assemblyman Reed Gusciora.  For taking the time to respond, I wish to thank him.  I only wished that his response would have indicated support for the interests of ordinary New Jerseyians in our struggle against the Christie administration.

Here is his reply:

Thank you for contacting me in regards to Governor Christie's proposed budget for the upcoming fiscal year.  I appreciate you taking the time to share your views on this important matter.

As \you know, there is a projected $10.7 billion budget gap for Fiscal Year 2011.  In his recent budget address, Governor Christie proposed numerous cuts, reduction in state aid, and program elimination in order to close this deficit.  Some of the proposals he has set forth are necessary and overdue.  Others need to be evaluated to insure they will not lead to unnecessary property tax increases in the future or place extra burdens on our most vulnerable citizens.

While I do support some restorations in certain areas, any restorations most likely means cuts to other areas of the budget.  It is my hope that the Legislature considers the Governor's proposal and develops the budget further, we can reach a proper balance in order to fund programs which are critical to New Jersey residents and their families.   Notwithstanding, I will certainly keep your views in mind as we continue the dialogue on the State's fiscal course.  We all need to work together to address the pressing financial issues facing our state.

Once again, thank you for sharing your thoughts,


Very Truly Yours,

Reed Gusciora

When reading this, keep in mind the following.  The city of Trenton has a large low-income population, and low income people are being disproportionately hurt by Christie's proposed cuts.  They are the ones that qualify for free Abbott preschools, subsidized utility bills through the Universal Service Charge program, and free school breakfasts and lunches.  Single-parent headed households are the main beneficiaries of after-school programs, which allow the custodial parent to have someone watch her children while she goes to work.  Low income people are the ones who will be hurt the most by Christie's proposed change to unemployment benefits, which will make claimants ineligible to collect if they get fired from their jobs.  Mr. Gusciora does not say that he supports restoring any of this.


Trenton also hosts the state government's headquarters operations, and is expected to loose $42 million in aid previously given to the city to compensate it for lost tax revenue on these properties..  Mr. Gusciora dose not mention restoring any of this money.  He only says we must look at the proposed cuts to insure they will not unduly raise property taxes or hurt vulnerable citizens.

Over a third of workers employed in Mercer County work for state, federal and local government.  Public employees will be disproportionately hurt by Christie's proposed "reforms".  Many of those employed by the state, county, municipalities and school boards live right here in the city.  In fact the State of New Jersey is the largest employer of city residents.  Mr. Gusciora does not say what he plans to do to mitigate our plight.

Keep in mind that Mr. Gusciora has every reason to back us up.  Low income people and public employees are a large part of his constituency.  Yet he seem more concerned about raising taxes than protecting us.  And he is also one of the most liberal members of the Assembly.  He is openly gay and supports gay marriage.  He supports stricter environmental regulation and tough gun control and anti-discrimination laws.  If he is not convinced that he should stand with us, than what about representatives from wealthier areas of the state, where people are socially conservative, where fewer people work for the government, and where fewer people depend on government programs.

My advice to Mr. Gusciora is that he should pay attention to the numbers of people we put on the streets at our May rally and wise up.  If 35,000 people are willing to give up a Saturday to show up and protest in Trenton, then lots more will stand for us at the polls and vote for those candidates demanding restoration of services and protection of worker's rights.  Yes Reed, forget about what happened to Mr. Stockton and all of the other fiscally liberal Democrats who got kicked out of office during the midterm elections during Florio's time in office.  We now know what smaller government and support of the anti-tax crowd means.  It means tax breaks for the rich ands service cuts, pay cuts and higher taxes for everybody else.

Yes Reed, now is our time!  Now is the time that the fiscal liberals will get their revenge.  Come November 2011, we will sweep the legislature of all politicians that "Stood with the Governor" and supported the fat boy's Jack the Ripper tool kit of budget cuts, benefit cuts ans well as lost employee protections.

Get with it Reed.  Make a hard political left and stand behind us!  If you do, than we will stand behind you come next November.

Some Pictures From The Rally

I went to the big anti-Christie rally downtown yesterday (Saturday, May 23, 2010),  Christie has only been in office for about 5 months now, but has done such a good job of getting everyone ticked off at him that even the major news outlets agree that at least 30,000 people turned out. Lots of people were there, mostly state workers and teachers.  There were others as well, including a contingent from St. Lucy's Shelter protesting Christie's planned elimination of the $140 per month general assistance benefit to adults with no other income that are considered employable.  St. Lucy's said that it is deplorable that Christie would go back on his word and advocate stripping the homeless and others who are "the poorest of the poor" of even that little bit of income. 

Even Assemblywoman Linda Greenstein came over from the Mercer County Democratic Leadership meeting which was held earlier in the morning to address the rally.
Senate President Sweeney indicated in a Star Ledger article that he thought the protest was counterproductive and that the union members present there did not speak for the Democratic Party or for ordinary New Jerseyians.  The tone of the article was in general anti-public employee, as has been the tone of most material that has appeared in the mainstream state newspapers in the last couple years.  And of course, the right wing blog.savejersey.com compared the protesters to a bunch of Communists and wrote us off as irrelevant.

Well I don't think we are irrelevant.  And if we don't speak for at least part of the Democratic Party, why did Linda Greenstein show up to speak.  We certainly are not a bunch of Communist rabble rousers.  True, most of us were public employees, but the people there came from a broad spectrum of the state's population supporting the restoration of funding for a broad spectrum of programs from general assistance welfare to municipal moneys to go toward education and law enforcement to full funding of the state's Unemployment Insurance program so it can continue to pay benefits at the same rate as it does now under the same terms and conditions as now.

I don't think it will have any effect on Christie.  He clearly overplayed his hand and is too arrogant to admit it.  What he needs is to get his face rubbed in the mud real good by members of his own party when the budget comes up for a vote this summer.

The real effect will be on the state legislators, all of which come up for reelection in  November 2011.  They realize that if this many people are willing to spend a Saturday traveling to Trenton by bus, then spending several hours protesting, then many more will be willing to come out and express their anger at the polls.  They want to keep their jobs above all us and should pay attention to us.

Perhaps Mr. Sweeney and the newspapers should take their heads out of the sand and back us up.  Especially since the newspapers claim they got best interests of ordinary people at heart and since Sweeney is the president of the Iron workers union.  How can he represent a union as its leader while at the same time attacking the interests of union members.

In any event, expect a shutdown for a while this summer while the Republican Assembly and Senate members "stand with the governor" at least for a short time by supporting his expected veto of the Democratic alternative budget which includes the millionaire tax.  Then expect these same Republicans to turn on the governor and demand that he negotiate and save face or they will support an override so the state can reopen and get on with its business.

Whatever happens, we'll find out eventually.

Now, sit back and enjoy the pictures.

Rally Against Christie's Planned Budget

Fed up with Chistie's plans for the state.  So you don't want to see unemployment benefits cut and have the rules changed so you won't be eligible to collect after getting fired unless you work several weeks on another job.  You don't want to see teachers laid off and have school programs cut.  You don't want to see low income seniors have to pay more for prescriptions.  You don't want to see less police and fire personnel on the streets.  Certainly you don't want your property taxes raised.

All so that millionaires can get a tax cut this year.

then come join us for what is expected to be the largest demonstration in state history.

RALLY FOR PUBLIC SERVICES

12:00 NOON

SATURDAY MAY 22

THE STATEHOUSE

TRENTON, NJ

HOPE TO SEE YOU THERE.