Garden State Patriot

By now, I’m sure most of you are aware of the slaying of 4 police officers in a Washington state suburb. Well, it turns out that the killer was a former convicted felon in the state of Arkansas who was granted clemency by then governor Mike Huckabee.

Via Michelle Malkin’s blog.

Maurice Clemmons received a 35-year sentence in the early 1990s for armed robbery and theft. His sentence was commuted in May 2000, and he was let out three months later.

The following March, Clemmons committed two armed robberies and other crimes and was sentenced to 10 years. You’d think they’d keep him locked up after that, but no: He was paroled last March and is now wanted for aggravated robbery.

More recently, Clemmons was jailed on charges of child rape yet was still released.

Clemmons had been in jail in Pierce County for the past several months on a pending charge of second-degree rape of a child.

He was released from custody just six days ago, even though he was wanted on a fugitive warrant out of Arkansas and was staring at eight felony charges in all out of Washington state.

Clemmons posted $15,000 with a Chehalis company called Jail Sucks Bail Bonds. The bondsman, in turn, put up $150,000, securing Clemmons’ release on the pending child-rape charge.

Not good.

You can read more on this at Michelle Malkin’s blog.

Cross-posted at CMNJ.

We can’t live with them and we can’t live without them it seems - but polls are obviously an essential component of the political landscape. The problem, though, with so many polls isn’t the data they yield but the way questions are asked and how the results are interpreted.

Today, for example, Gallup released some polling results on healthcare showing that 49% against and 44% for which got my antennae up. Gallup’s results throughout the healthcare debate have been consistently closer than Rasmussen Reports which currently show a 53%-41% gap. So, this begs the question: why is there a fairly significant difference (5% vs. 12% spreads) between these two polls? The answer can be found, quite simply, in the framing of the question.

As the chart below shows, Gallup asks the question in the following manner:

Rasmussen Reports, on the other hand, poses the question this way:

“Generally speaking, do you strongly favor, somewhat favor, somewhat oppose or strongly oppose the health care reform plan proposed by President Obama and the congressional Democrats?”

Now, it doesn’t take a polling expert to see that Gallup is asking the question in a far more general manner. Heck, a Republican voter who has a Republican representative might advise him/her to vote for a healthcare bill this year – but just not THIS bill.

Meanwhile the Rasmussen questioning focuses more directly on the legislation being proposed in Congress.

Again, there are other factors that can skew polling results – such as the definition of the target sample, number of response options, timing and method of the polls - but in this case the framing of the question clearly is the reason for very different results.

The more precise question wording employed by Rasmussen Reports, in my view, generates a more accurate representation of people’s opinions on the Democrat’s healthcare legislation. 

Again, none of this should be too suprising, but it’s still important to point out considering how we all rely on polls when formulating our opinions about issues of the day. 

For more on this issue, check out the Rasmussen Reports article, Question Wording and Job Approval.

Cross-posted at CMNJ.

The following letter was issued by New Jersey’s six Catholic bishops on the issue of ‘gay marriage.’ Regardless of your own religious faith or views on the issue, I thought this was important and instructive enough to pass along. This letter makes clear the Catholic faith’s teachings on marriage as well as its view on civil unions. Please read – and let’s try to comment respectfully on this one. 

PDF | Q&A | Executive Summary

 Bishops’ Letter — “The Call to Marriage is Woven Deeply into the Human Spirit: A Message on Marriage from the Catholic Bishops of New Jersey”

God who created man and woman out of love also calls him to love – the fundamental and innate vocation of every human being. For man is created in the image and likeness of God who is Himself love. Since God created him man and woman, their mutual love becomes an image of the absolute and unfailing love with which God loves man. It is good, very good, in the Creator’s eyes. [Catechism of the Catholic Church, No. 1604]

A recent study issued by the National Marriage Project at Rutgers University identifies a broad cultural shift away from religion and social traditionalism and toward a belief in personal independence and tolerance for diverse life styles – otherwise known as “secular individualism.” The same report also indicates that “more children each year are not living in families that include their married, biological parents, which by all available empirical evidence is the gold standard for insuring optimal outcomes in a child’s development.”

One expression of this cultural shift toward “secular individualism” is the recent authorization of “marriage” between individuals of the same sex in a few states and the call for passage of a same sex “marriage” law in New Jersey.

As Catholics, we must not stand by in silence in the face of the many challenges that threaten marriage and, in turn, children and the public good. We must not shirk from our responsibility.

We must protect and promote marriage. We must not abandon the teaching of the Catholic Church on marriage and the complementarity of the sexes – a truth that is evident to right reason and recognized as such by the major cultures of the world. We must pledge our support to all family members, including those who choose to remain single. We must help those entering marriage to prepare for the challenges, sacrifices and joys to come. We must reach out with the special compassion of Christ to those married couples and families experiencing difficulties, anxiety, and illness.

In these troubled times, we, the Catholic Bishops of New Jersey, offer here some basic truths to assist people in understanding Catholic teaching about marriage and to enable them to promote and support marriage and families.

What is the Catholic Church’s Teaching on Marriage?

The Catholic Church teaches today and has always and everywhere taught for 2000 years that marriage is the union of one man and one woman as husband and wife.

“Marriage is not just any relationship between human beings. It was established by the Creator with its own nature, essential properties and purpose. No ideology can erase from the human spirit the certainty that marriage exists solely between a man and a woman, who by mutual personal gift, proper and exclusive to themselves,tend toward the communion of their persons. In this way, they mutually perfect each other, in order to cooperate with God in the procreation and upbringing of new human lives.” [Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith, June 3, 2003]

This great truth about marriage is not some obscure doctrinal fine point but a fact of human nature, recognized from time immemorial by people of virtually every faith and culture. God made us male and female; only men and women cooperating in marital love together can truly become one flesh, and only marital unions further God’s purpose of creating new life that is welcomed, loved, nurtured and educated by their mother and father.

The Church teaches that man and woman are equal. However, man and woman are different from each other but created for each other. This complementarity, including sexual difference, draws them together in a mutually loving union that always should be open to the procreation of children (see the Catechism of the Catholic Church, nos. 1602-1605).

These truths about marriage are present in the order of nature and can be perceived by the light of human reason and have been confirmed by divine Revelation in Sacred Scripture.

Why should the Church care about the state’s definition of marriage?

God Himself is the author of marriage. Marriage as a union of man and woman existed long before any nation, religion, or law was established. The marital union is the human and social institution upon which civilization has always been structured. It is a gift that our Creator bestowed on all of humanity through the first man and the first woman.

Governments, therefore, have a duty to reinforce and protect this permanent institution and to pass it on to future generations, rather than attempt to redefine it arbitrarily for transitory political or social reasons.

The Church asks Catholics to care about the government’s treatment of marriage because civil authorities are charged with protecting children and the common good, and marriage is indispensable to both purposes. As citizens, Catholics have the right and the responsibility to hold civil authorities accountable for their stewardship of the institution of marriage.

Catholics also have the right and responsibility to oppose laws and policies that unjustly target people as bigots or that subject them to charges of unlawful discrimination simply because they believe and teach that marriage is the union of man and a woman.

Why must marriages be treated differently than other voluntary relationships?

The marital union between a man and a woman is the foundation of the family and the family is the foundation of society. Marriage is singular in its importance as a public institution. No other voluntary relationship can be regarded as the equivalent of marriage, which is unique in its stability, the environment it provides for the development of families, and the protection it accords spouses and children. Marriage is not merely an article of the Catholic faith, but a foundational element of the common good.

Why should two individuals of the same sex be treated any differently than married couples who cannot conceive children?

Marriage benefits society by bringing men and women – the two complementary “halves” of the human race – together. Regardless of whether they can conceive children, a man and a woman united in marriage reinforce the importance of this ideal. By contrast, if the government insists that same-sex unions are “equal” to unions of husband and wife, the government will be teaching not only that mothers and fathers are no longer necessary for children, but also that uniting the sexes is no longer an important ideal.

Persons of same-sex orientation have the right to live as they choose but they do not have the right to redefine marriage for everyone by altering the civil law.

Don’t single parents make a valuable contribution to family life? If so, why should same-sex partners not be viewed the same way?

All children are gifts from God and deserve our care and protection. The stable, life long loving relationship of a mother and father, found only in marriage, provides the ideal conditions for raising and socializing children. Marriage represents the way we teach and reinforce this ideal.

Of course, some children are raised in situations other than the traditional two-parent family, and responsible loving single parents, and other family members make important and valuable contributions to the welfare of these children. But supporting single-parent families, as a just and compassionate society must do, is far different than deliberately creating motherless and fatherless families and holding them out to be the same as marriages.

But isn’t prohibiting same-sex “marriage” unjust discrimination?

No. We must always remember that every person has an inherent dignity because he or she is created in the image and likeness of God, and that God loves every person as a unique individual. Like all other human beings, our homosexual brothers and sisters are beloved children of God. As a result, the Catholic Church affirms that they “must be accepted with respect, compassion and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in this regard should be avoided” [Catechism of the Catholic Church no. 2358].

Thus the teachings of the Church make it clear that the fundamental human rights of homosexual persons must be defended, and that all of us must strive to eliminate any forms of injustice, oppression, or violence against homosexual persons.

But it is not “unjust discrimination” to treat different things differently. Same-sex unions are not, in fact, the same thing as the union of one man and one woman in marriage. One type of union may ever generate children, the other may never; one type of union respects and expresses the inherent complementarity of man and woman; the other does not.

Therefore, treating one type of union as “marriage,” and the other not, is not only permitted, but required. Indeed, it is treating this differentiation as bigotry that constitutes an injustice.

Is same sex “marriage” a civil right?

In the Church’s view same-sex “marriage” is not a civil right. A strong desire does not make a civil right. Every man and every woman has a right to enter into marriage, but marriage as an institution can only be between a man and a woman. Governments do not have the power to define marriage otherwise, because it is a permanent human institution that does not owe its existence to governments. Same-sex “marriage” is not a civil right because same-sex couples cannot fulfill the core public purpose of marriage: protecting children by bringing men and women into the only kind of union that can make new life and give children mothers and fathers.

This is not only the Church’s view. Throughout all of human history marriage has been held to be a union of man and woman. Marriage has its roots in natural law, which transcends all man- made law. Marriage as a union of a man and a woman is a natural, universal human institution that unites mothers and fathers in the work of childrearing and family life. Same sex unions may represent a new and a different type of institution – but it is not marriage and should not be treated as marriage.

Would maintaining the definition of marriage as a union solely of one man and one woman deny hospital visitation privileges to civil union partners? Would defining marriage as a union of one man and one woman take away any benefits currently provided to civil union partners by employers?

No. In New Jersey, the Civil Union Act already provides practical rights, benefits, and protections for persons who choose to establish non-marital unions. As clearly stated in the Act:

Civil union couples shall have all of the same benefits, protections and responsibilities under law, whether they derive from statute, administrative or court rule, public policy, common law or any other source of civil law, as are granted to spouses in a marriage. [N.J. Statutes 37:1-31(a)]

The Act also provides that civil union couples are entitled to the benefits and protections of “laws relating to insurance, health and pension benefits.” [N.J. Statutes 37:1-32(e)] In addition, the Act prohibits an array of unlawful employment practices by employers who do not fully implement the Act.

Civil Law, Church Law and Marriage

In their 2003 statement Between Man and Woman: Questions and Answers about Marriage and Same-Sex Union”, the Catholic Bishops of the United States addressed civil law, church law and marriage as follows:

Marriage is a basic human and social institution. Though it is regulated by civil laws and church laws, it did not originate from either the church or state, but from God. Therefore, neither church nor state can alter the basic meaning and structure of marriage.

Marriage, whose nature and purposes are established by God, can only be the union of a man and a woman and must remain such in law. In a manner unlike any other relationship, marriage makes a unique and irreplaceable contribution to the common good of society, especially through the procreation and education of children.

The union of husband and wife becomes, over a lifetime, a great good for themselves, their family, communities, and society. Marriage is a gift to be cherished and protected.

What Does All of This Mean?

In New Jersey, the debate about same sex marriage is not about benefits and rights. The Civil Union Act [N.J. Statutes 37:1-31(a)] settled that issue once and for all. In New Jersey, same sex couples have every benefit and right without exception that the State of New Jersey grants to heterosexual married couples. The same sex “marriage” initiative is an attempt to change the historic structure of marriage as a union only of a man and a woman. This initiative ignores human nature because throughout all of human history marriage has required the complementarity of man and woman.

Same sex civil unions may represent a new and a different type of institution, one in which government grants to same sex couples benefits and protections, but same sex unions are not marriage. Saint Paul in his letter to the Hebrews told us, “Jesus is the same yesterday, today, and forever. Do not be carried away by all kinds of strange teaching.” In this time of strange teaching and conflict over the meaning of marriage, let us prayerfully reflect on the words of Jesus:

Have you not read that from the beginning the Creator ‘made them male and female’ and said, ‘For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh?’ So they are no longer two, but one flesh. [Matthew 19:5]

For additional information on the teaching of the Catholic Church on marriage, please visit For Your Marriage, an initiative of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops at:

http://www.foryourmarriage.org/home.asp

Most Reverend John J. Myers Archbishop, Archdiocese of Newark

Most Reverend Paul G. Bootkoski Bishop, Diocese of Metuchen

Most Reverend John M. Smith Bishop, Diocese of Trenton

Most Reverend Joseph A. Galante Bishop, Diocese of Camden

Most Reverend Arthur J. Serratelli Bishop, Diocese of Paterson

Most Reverend William Skurla Bishop, Byzantine Catholic Eparchy of Passaic

(h/t Save Jersey)

Cross-posted at Red County and CMNJ.

Over at BigGovernment.com, Kyle Olson has an interesting post about the NJEA and their strategy during the recent election. Knowing that there was little enthusiasm for a second Corzine term, the NJEA embarked upon a strategy of solidifying its base and wooing women. The strategy, of course, dealt not with how the NJEA would actually help educate kids but focused on issues like ‘health care and family leave.’

An interesting document found its way to my inbox last weekend. It was a PowerPoint presentation of an analysis done by the New Jersey Education Association, regarding its efforts to re-elect Democratic Gov. Jon Corzine.

The document can be found at NEAexposed.com.

Citing “Electile Dysfunction,” meaning the polls were telling them that voters, including teachers, weren’t as enthusiastic about Corzine as they would like, the union’s Director of Government Relations, Ginger Gold Schnitzer, proposed a double-dose remedy: “A robust member-to-member campaign,” followed by “an independent communications campaign to inoculate the public.” 

The first dose of the union’s plan was to appeal to its members. The radical community organizer Saul Alinsky taught the NEA that the trick to “organizing people is to appeal to their self-interest.”  Thus, the union promoted Corzine’s pro-union “accomplishments,” like investing $3 billion into public pensions, increasing school funding, increasing school construction, expanding pre-kindergarten programs, opposing school vouchers, and providing free medical benefits for teacher for life.

Oddly, the union didn’t cite any accomplishment that actually helped students.

To “inoculate” the public, the union targeted women under 45.  It purchased advertising on cable channels typically watched by women, like the Food Network, HGTV, Lifetime, TLC, Bravo and a few others. Even though the ads were purchased by an “education” organization, they focused completely on issues they thought would sway women to Corzine, like health care and family leave. The ads also directed viewers to a website operated by a group called “NJ Kids and Families.”

How heartwarming, not to mention completely phony.

We all know Corzine went down to defeat November 3. But the New Jersey teachers’ union held its head high in one aspect - it successfully tore Christie down in the eyes of women under 45.

According to polling conducted in August, 36% of women under 45 favored Corzine while 32% supported Christie. But at the polls, following the advertising blitz, 54% of that demographic went for Corzine while 41% voted for Christie.

This leaked analysis underscores the fact that teachers unions are inherently political organizations that put the interests of their members first.  And kids?  Heck, what do they have to do with schools?

Of course, none of this should come as a surprise. While there are many teachers out there who care very much about educating kids, the same can not be said of the union that represents them. This story demonstrates quite clearly that the NJEA has little, if any, interest in providing kids the best possible education. Its main motivation is growing its ranks and greedily trying get their hands on every taxpayer dime it possibly can.

Cross-posted at Red County and CMNJ.

Here is the real story of Thanksgiving as told by Rush Limbaugh - a triumph of capitalism over socialism always worth repeating. Enjoy and have a great Thanksgiving!

RUSH: Time now, ladies and gentlemen, for The Real Story of Thanksgiving, as written by I — by me — in my second book, See, I Told You So. It’s page 70 in the hardcover version. “On August 1, 1620, the Mayflower set sail. It carried a total of 102 passengers, including forty Pilgrims led by William Bradford. On the journey, Bradford set up an agreement, a contract, that established just and equal laws for all members of the new community, irrespective of their religious beliefs. Where did the revolutionary ideas expressed in the Mayflower Compact come from? From the Bible. The Pilgrims were a people completely steeped in the lessons of the Old and New Testaments. They looked to the ancient Israelites for their example. And, because of the biblical precedents set forth in Scripture, they never doubted that their experiment would work.”

Now, you know the usual story of Thanksgiving: They landed. They had no clue where they were, no idea how to feed themselves. The Indians came out, showed ‘em how to pop popcorn, fed ‘em turkey, saved ‘em basically — and then white European settlers after that basically wiped out the Indian population. It’s a horrible example. Not only is that not true, here is the part that’s been omitted from what is still today taught as the traditional Thanksgiving story in many schools. “The original contract the Pilgrims had entered into with their merchant-sponsors in London called for everything they produced to go into a common store,’ when they got here, ‘and each member of the community was entitled to one common share. All of the land they cleared and the houses they built belong to the community as well.

“They were going to distribute it equally. All of the land they cleared and the houses they built belonged to the community as well. … [William] Bradford, who had become the new governor of the colony, recognized that this form of collectivism was as costly and destructive to the Pilgrims as that first harsh winter, which had taken so many lives. He decided to take bold action. Bradford assigned a plot of land to each family to work and manage, thus turning loose the power of the marketplace. … Long before Karl Marx was even born, the Pilgrims had discovered and experimented with what could only be described as socialism,’ and it had failed” miserably because when every put things in the common store, some people didn’t have to put things in for there to be, people that didn’t produce anything were taking things out, and it caused resentment just as it does today. So Bradford had to change it.

“What Bradford and his community found was that the most creative and industrious people had no incentive to work any harder than anyone else, unless they could utilize the power of personal motivation! But while most of the rest of the world has been experimenting with socialism for well over a hundred years – trying to refine it, perfect it, and re-invent it – the Pilgrims decided early on to scrap it permanently. What Bradford wrote about this social experiment should be in every schoolchild’s history lesson. If it were, we might prevent much needless suffering,” that happens today and will happen “in the future. ‘The experience that we had in this common course and condition, tried sundry years…that by taking away property, and bringing community into a common wealth, would make them happy and flourishing – as if they were wiser than God,’ Bradford wrote.

“‘For this community (so far as it was) was found to breed much confusion and discontent, and retard much employment that would have been to their benefit and comfort. For young men that were most able and fit for labor and service did repine that they should spend their time and strength to work for other men’s wives and children without [being paid] that was thought injustice.’ … The Pilgrims found that people could not be expected to do their best work without incentive. So what did Bradford’s community try next? They unharnessed the power of good old free enterprise by invoking the undergirding capitalistic principle of private property. Every family was assigned its own plot of land to work and permitted to market its own crops and products. And what was the result?”

Here’s what Bradford wrote, the governor of the Massachusetts colony. “‘This had very good success,’ wrote Bradford, ‘for it made all hands industrious, so as much more corn was planted than otherwise would have been.’ Bradford doesn’t sound like much of a Clintonite, does he?” or an Obamaite, if I can update it. “Is it possible that supply-side economics could have existed before the 1980s? … Anyway, the pilgrims found “In no time, the Pilgrims found they had more food than they could eat themselves. … So they set up trading posts and exchanged goods with the Indians. The profits allowed them to pay off their debts to the merchants in London. And the success and prosperity of the Plymouth settlement attracted more Europeans and began what came to be known as the ‘Great Puritan Migration.’”

Very few people have heard this story or have had it taught to them — and the “thanks” was to God for showing them the way. In later parts of the chapter, I quote John Adams and George Washington on their reminisces and their thoughts on the first Thanksgiving and the notion it was thanks to God. It was an entirely different story than is being taught in the schools. It’s been muddied down, watered down all these years — and now it’s been hijacked by the multicultural community — to the point that the story of Thanksgiving is the Pilgrims were a bunch of incompetents and were saved only by the goodness of the Indians, who then were wiped out. And that’s what kids are being taught today — ’cause, of course, you can’t mention the Bible in school, and that’s fundamental to the real story of Thanksgiving.

“…although we as Americans have many things for which to be thankful, none is more important than our liberty.”

Enjoy.

In what would ordinarily be a blockbuster story – except for the fact that the corrupt media has no desire to report it - the myth of global warming has been put on full display for the world to see. Late last week, hackers broke into the computers at Hadley CRU in Great Britain, and promptly unveiled on the Internet numerous e-mails among some of the most prominent scientists pushing AGW theory.

These e-mails exposed numerous frauds being perpetrated by these scientists, including (but not limited to) manipulation of evidence, suppression of evidence and attempts to prevent skeptical scientists from being included in the peer review process.  

James Delingpole, in a terrific article at the UK Telegraph, writes:

If you own any shares in alternative energy companies I should start dumping them NOW. The conspiracy behind the Anthropogenic Global Warming myth (aka AGW; aka ManBearPig) has been suddenly, brutally and quite deliciously exposed after a hacker broke into the computers at the University of East Anglia’s Climate Research Unit (aka Hadley CRU) and released 61 megabites of confidential files onto the internet. (Hat tip: Watts Up With That)

When you read some of those files – including 1079 emails and 72 documents – you realise just why the boffins at Hadley CRU might have preferred to keep them confidential. As Andrew Bolt puts it, this scandal could well be “the greatest in modern science”. These alleged emails – supposedly exchanged by some of the most prominent scientists pushing AGW theory – suggest:

Conspiracy, collusion in exaggerating warming data, possibly illegal destruction of embarrassing information, organised resistance to disclosure, manipulation of data, private admissions of flaws in their public claims and much more.

One of the alleged emails has a gentle gloat over the death in 2004 of John L Daly (one of the first climate change sceptics, founder of the Still Waiting For Greenhouse site), commenting:

“In an odd way this is cheering news.”

But perhaps the most damaging revelations  – the scientific equivalent of the Telegraph’s MPs’ expenses scandal – are those concerning the way Warmist scientists may variously have manipulated or suppressed evidence in order to support their cause.

Here are a few tasters. (So far, we can only refer to them as alleged emails because – though Hadley CRU’s director Phil Jones has confirmed the break-in to Ian Wishart at the Briefing Room – he has yet to fess up to any specific contents.) But if genuine, they suggest dubious practices such as:

Manipulation of evidence:

I’ve just completed Mike’s Nature trick of adding in the real temps to each series for the last 20 years (ie from 1981 onwards) amd from 1961 for Keith’s to hide the decline.

Private doubts about whether the world really is heating up:

The fact is that we can’t account for the lack of warming at the moment and it is a travesty that we can’t. The CERES data published in the August BAMS 09 supplement on 2008 shows there should be even more warming: but the data are surely wrong. Our observing system is inadequate.

Suppression of evidence:

Can you delete any emails you may have had with Keith re AR4?

Keith will do likewise. He’s not in at the moment – minor family crisis.

Can you also email Gene and get him to do the same? I don’t have his new email address.

We will be getting Caspar to do likewise.

Fantasies of violence against prominent Climate Sceptic scientists:

Next time I see Pat Michaels at a scientific meeting, I’ll be tempted to beat the crap out of him. Very tempted.

Attempts to disguise the inconvenient truth of the Medieval Warm Period (MWP):

……Phil and I have recently submitted a paper using about a dozen NH records that fit this category, and many of which are available nearly 2K back–I think that trying to adopt a timeframe of 2K, rather than the usual 1K, addresses a good earlier point that Peck made w/ regard to the memo, that it would be nice to try to “contain” the putative “MWP”, even if we don’t yet have a hemispheric mean reconstruction available that far back….

And, perhaps most reprehensibly, a long series of communications discussing how best to squeeze dissenting scientists out of the peer review process. How, in other words, to create a scientific climate in which anyone who disagrees with AGW can be written off as a crank, whose views do not have a scrap of authority.

“This was the danger of always criticising the skeptics for not publishing in the “peer-reviewed literature”. Obviously, they found a solution to that–take over a journal! So what do we do about this? I think we have to stop considering “Climate Research” as a legitimate peer-reviewed journal. Perhaps we should encourage our colleagues in the climate research community to no longer submit to, or cite papers in, this journal. We would also need to consider what we tell or request of our more reasonable colleagues who currently sit on the editorial board…What do others think?”

“I will be emailing the journal to tell them I’m having nothing more to do with it until they rid themselves of this troublesome editor.”“It results from this journal having a number of editors. The responsible one for this is a well-known skeptic in NZ. He has let a few papers through by Michaels and Gray in the past. I’ve had words with Hans von Storch about this, but got nowhere. Another thing to discuss in Nice !”

So, there we have it – damning evidence that global warming theory is a completely contrived deception. Now, if only the lamestream media would actually begin reporting on this huge story. In fact, I’m sure the 11 AP fact checkers who were dispatched last week to comb through Sarah Palin’s book must be done by now. Surely they can hop on this. And maybe one or two of them could seek out AlGore and obtain a comment or two from the AGW poster boy. Or would that be too inconvenient?

Cross-posted at CMNJ.

What’s that sound you hear? The slow drip of Obama’s approval numbers heading lower and lower. Today, Rasmussen reports a new low on their Presidential index (strongly disapprove vs. strongly approve): -15.

The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Tuesday shows that 27% of the nation’s voters Strongly Approve of the way that Barack Obama is performing his role as President. Forty-two percent (42%) Strongly Disapprove giving Obama a Presidential Approval Index rating of -15. This is the lowest Approval Index rating yet measured for President Obama (see trends).

Fifty-two percent (52%) of Democrats Strongly Approve while 68% of Republicans Strongly Disapprove. Among those not affiliated with either major political party, just 16% Strongly Approve and 51% Strongly Disapprove (see other recent demographic highlights from the tracking poll).

Cross-posted at CMNJ.

Scott Fenstermaker, one of the attorneys helping to defend the terrorists in NYC, appeared on O’Reilly last night. Fenstermaker’s appearance – as seen below – was enough to make anyone who cares a white about the 9/11 victims sick. But as O’Reilly pressed him Fenstermaker made this despicable comment about the 9/11 victims.   

O’Reilly: Are we gonna hear that they’re justified in killing 3000 American civilians because the country, the U.S.A., is a vile country, are we gonna hear that?

Fenstermaker: Uh, I think that the number of people was less than 3000.

O’Reilly: Alright, that’s the third time you said that, does it really matter whether it was 2800 or 3000? Why do you keep harping on that point?

Fenstermaker: (smirking) It does to the 200 people that are the difference.

Really nice. What a bum. Here’s the video.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VNOYzYNoOw0[/youtube]

Cross-posted at CMNJ.

The state is facing a staggering budget gap of around $10B dollars and Democrats in the legislature want to add almost $18M in more spending! Here is the story from Assemblyman Rible.

Assemblyman Dave Rible, R-Monmouth and a member of the Law and Public Safety Committee, said the four bills heard before the committee aimed at stemming New Jersey’s recidivism rate will increase costs to government at a time when the state can least afford it.  The bills, sponsored by Assemblywoman Bonnie Watson Coleman, D-Mercer, were released from committee today.

            “While the public policy to rehabilitate those who are incarcerated is laudable, the fiscal impact of the bills we heard today is something we cannot afford,” said Rible.  “The additional costs incurred from implementing an in-service training program for corrections officers or eliminating charges for inmates using the telephone are examples of expenses government cannot absorb. 

            “The public spoke loud and clear earlier this month, telling elected officials things must change in Trenton when it comes to spending,” Rible stated.  “The proposals made today will add to our fiscal problems.

            “The additional expense incurred by the parole board by expanding eligibility will result in significant cost increases and stretch the resources of that department,” continued Rible.  “At a time when our state will be facing at least an $8 billion budget deficit, proposals that result in additional costs to the state should be non-starters. 

            “We need to break away from the fiscal model that spends without regard to the financial impact,” said Rible.  “We need to freeze spending and get our finances in order. These bills will only add to the taxpayer’s burden.”

            Rible pointed out that the 2009 State Commission of Investigation report, “Gangland Behind Bars,” indicated that gang activity is being funded through inmate accounts, and that one of today’s bills, A-4199, would make it easier for those accounts to be supported.  

            Highlights of the package of bills considered include the following 

1. A-4197 –  eliminates inmate phone service charges to the incarcerated, thereby reducing state revenue (currently $4.8 million annually); creates a commission to examine strategies for strengthening the family bond between children and incarcerated parents and removes the requirement that individuals convicted of drug crimes enroll in a drug treatment program in order to receive food stamp benefits. 
2. A-4199 – requires the Department of Corrections (DOC) to work with the Police Training Commission to develop and implement an in-service training program for corrections officers that is to include a component on mental health sensitivity and cultural awareness.  The estimated cost for this program is approximately $13 million. 
3. A-4201 – requires the Commissioner of Corrections to appoint a Coordinator for Reentry and Rehabilitative Services who will disseminate information to inmates on organizations and programs that provide services to inmates reentering society; requires the DOC to establish a consumer checking account for the inmate 30 days prior to their release and creates an 18 member Re-entry Commission to study and offer solutions to problems facing prisoners reentering society.  The commission would consider expanding Medicaid eligibility to non-disabled adults and whether health care resources are adequate for former prisoners.
4. A-4202 – provides for expanded parole eligibility, creating a six month period of post-release supervision, by releasing inmates whose sentences are set to expire.  An inmate who has declined to participate in the parole hearing process or has been denied parole would be released on a date which precedes the date which the court’s imposed term of incarceration was scheduled to end by six months.

Yes, that’s right. $18M so those poor inmates no longer have to pay for their own phone calls and to make sure our corrections officers get mental health sensitivity and cultural awareness training. Then top it off by opening up the ex-cons a checking account and putting them on Medicaid. 

Truly unbelievable. I hope Mr. Christie has already bought himself a veto pen. He’s going to need to use it often.

[UPDATE] By the way, doesn’t Mrs. Watson Coleman have a conflict of interest here? Why is she on the Law and Public Safety Committee making decisions that affect inmates when two of her own sons are convicted felons?

Cross-posted at Red County and CMNJ.