Author: James

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Denying the Obvious About Islamist Terror , ( you sound like nothing but a Coward end of story )

Islamic Jihad philly shooter

After another ISIS-inspired shooting, Philadelphia’s mayor joins the chorus: It’s not about religion, no sir.

DOROTHY RABINOWITZ
Jan. 11, 2016 6:46 p.m. ET

It required only half a minute for the mayor of Philadelphia, Democrat Jim Kenney, to achieve national fame. On Friday, an already sensation-crowded day, it fell to the mayor to take part in the official pronouncements on the attempted murder of city police officerJesse Hartnett, shot and severely wounded as he sat in his patrol car when a would-be assassin emptied his gun at him—13 shots in all.

Police Commissioner Richard Ross Jr., appointed just three days earlier, delivered the details with noteworthy eloquence: The wounded officer, bleeding heavily from three wounds, one arm useless, had gotten himself out of the car, chased the attacker and shot him.

The drama of this recital needed no amplification, but there it was anyway: Clear security video images showed the assailant in his flowing white dishdasha—a robe favored by Muslim men—running toward the patrol car, shooting, sticking his hand in the window, and racing speedily away. Pictures too of the police officer lurching out of the car to give chase.

The wounded shooter, Commissioner Ross revealed, told police after his capture that he had mounted the attack in the name of Islam, that he believes that “the police defend laws that are contrary to Islam.” The man apparently wanted to talk only about his devotion to Islam.

Undaunted by anything he’d heard so far, Mayor Kenny then came to the microphone and declared: “In no way, shape or form does anybody in this room believe that Islam or the teaching of Islam” had anything to do with the attack. “This was a criminal with a stolen gun.”

Mr. Kenny’s tone was fervent. Out of this event—involving a murderous assault on a police officer, and a heroic response by that officer—the mayor, awash in excitation, had divined what was, for him, the most important concern of this day. Namely, persuading citizens that this attack had nothing to do with allegiance to Islam.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/denying-the-obvious-about-islamist-terror-1452556011

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U.S. Reps. Scott Garrett, and Rodney Frelinghuysen push U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, to open a Vetrans clinic in northwestern New Jersey

Scott Garrett

Lawmakers make pitch for veterans clinic

By Rob Jennings New Jersey Herald
Posted: Jan. 8, 2016 12:01 am

Sussex County’s two representatives in Congress met Thursday with a top official at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, seeking support for opening a clinic in northwestern New Jersey.

U.S. Reps. Scott Garrett, of Wantage, and Rodney Frelinghuysen, of Harding, spoke behind closed doors on Capitol Hill with VA Under Secretary for Health David Shulkin.

Shulkin was president of Morristown Medical Center until last spring, when the U.S. Senate confirmed his nomination by President Obama to the VA post.

Garrett and Frelinghuysen, in separate interviews afterward with the New Jersey Herald, recapped the meeting.

Garrett said, “We were expressing our concern about the lack of adequate facilities here and to get a clarification on exactly what the VA is doing.”

Frelinghuysen said, “I think we made some progress.”

“He was very positive in his reaction to our request,” Frelinghuysen said of Shulkin.

The meeting was prompted by a Nov. 24 letter from Frelinghuysen to VA Secretary Robert MacDonald after Frelinghuysen, who said he had been led to believe that the clinic was nearing approval, subsequently learned of an apparent moratorium on new facilities.

Garrett said, based on their discussion Thursday, the moratorium was actually a short-term delay aimed at giving Shulkin an opportunity to assess the sprawling system.

Garrett said he is optimistic about the clinic’s prospects for approval, though Shulkin offered no commitments.

“I think it was a productive meeting. We made our cases strongly. It was heard,” said Garrett, whose 5th District includes most of Sussex County.

“We put a strong case that our veterans in Sussex, and also in Warren, are important. They’ve served. They’ve put their lives on hold,” Garrett said.

“A lot of them are just not taking advantage of the services that are available and that is in part due to the distance,” Garrett said.

The VA’s New Jersey Health Care System consists of two “main campuses” in East Orange and Lyons, with additional “satellite outpatient clinics and access points” in Brick, Elizabeth, Hackensack, Hamilton, Jersey City, Morristown, Paterson, Piscataway and Tinton Falls.

https://www.njherald.com/article/20160108/ARTICLE/301089976

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Ridgewood Impact Study presentations for Multifamily housing Tonight at Benjamin Franklin Middle School

clock_cbd_theridgewoodblog

MEETING TUESDAY NIGHT

Tuesday, January 12, 2016 – 7:30pm – Benjamin Franklin Middle School- Impact Study presentations for Multifamily housing, North Walnut Redevelopment Zone, Hudson Street Parking Garage -Presentations by Vendors:
a. Heyer, Gruel & Associates
b. Maser Consulting
c. Ross Haber Associates
d. The RBA Group
e. BFJ Planning/Urbanomics

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Obamacare : Little enthusiasm in NJ for new breast screening guide

breast cancer screening

JANUARY 11, 2016, 6:41 PM    LAST UPDATED: TUESDAY, JANUARY 12, 2016, 7:11 AM
BY LINDY WASHBURN
STAFF WRITER |
THE RECORD

New recommendations about breast cancer screening — when to start, and how often to do it — were released Monday by a federal task force, but they appear unlikely to have much influence on doctors’ practices in New Jersey.

The guidelines by the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force update their previous recommendations, which led to a public outcry about rationing health care in 2009. That year’s most controversial recommendation — that women in their 40s at average risk of breast cancer should decide for themselves whether to start having screening mammograms every other year — was repeated this time.

Women in their 40s “must weigh a very important but infrequent benefit (a reduction in breast cancer deaths) against a group of meaningful and more common harms,” including callbacks for more imaging studies, biopsies for findings that turn out not to be cancer, and treatment of cancers that would not become life-threatening, the recommendations said.

https://www.northjersey.com/news/little-enthusiasm-in-nj-for-new-breast-screening-guide-1.1489540

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Health-Law Tax-Credit Payments to Insurers Questioned

1379441947-obamacare3-300x27721

“The Obama administration said last year that about 85% of enrollees received the subsidy and got an average tax credit of $270 a month.”

The only reason people were willing to buy the overpriced, poor value insurance, was that taxpayers were footing a major portion of the bill. How could our lawmakers have devised such an awful scheme, and then call it “health-care reform?”
A new automated system on the way should alleviate potential problems identified by federal oversight agency

By
STEPHANIE ARMOUR
Jan. 6, 2016 12:00 a.m. ET

The Obama administration wasn’t able to ensure that all tax-credit payments made to insurers under the health law in 2014 were on behalf of consumers who had paid their premiums, according to a federal oversight agency.

However, the agency noted the Obama administration this year is moving to a new automated system that should alleviate potential problems identified in its investigation. The Health and Human Services’ Office of Inspector General is scheduled to release the report Wednesday.

The findings raise questions about the oversight of tax-credit payments that went to insurers on behalf of consumers who qualified for financial assistance.

Tax credits are a major enticement to low- and moderate-income people who buy insurance on exchanges under the Affordable Care Act because they lower monthly premium costs. After consumers sign up for coverage, they can choose to have the federal government distribute the tax-credit payments to insurers to lower their premiums. Nearly $11 billion in tax credits were paid to insurers in fiscal 2014, according to a report by the Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration.

The Obama administration said last year that about 85% of enrollees received the subsidy and got an average tax credit of $270 a month.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/health-law-tax-credit-payments-to-insurers-questioned-1452056400

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Ridgewood school board reorganizes

BOE_theridgewoodblog

JANUARY 11, 2016    LAST UPDATED: MONDAY, JANUARY 11, 2016, 2:27 PM
BY MATTHEW SCHNEIDER
STAFF WRITER |
THE RIDGEWOOD NEWS

Sheila Brogan was reelected as president and Vincent Loncto as vice president during last week’s Ridgewood Board of Education reorganization meeting.

“I just want to thank the board for your support, and I’m so pleased to continue to work with Vincent and all of you,” Brogan said. “It is a real honor to serve this community in this capacity and to be on the board, so I thank you for that and I look forward to the challenges that we have.”

Loncto, who ran unopposed in the November election, also thanked the board for its confidence in him.

“I’d like to echo Sheila’s comments and express my gratitude for the opportunity to serve in this capacity,” Loncto said, adding that he is “honored by the opportunity.”

Loncto was sworn in Monday night to a three-year term.

Schools audited

Mike Andriola, an auditor for accounting and consulting firm Wiss & Company, presented the results of a recent district audit at Monday’s meeting.

Andriola noted that a few mistakes had been made, such as purchasing small amounts of supplies and asking for approval afterward. He said the district also racked up travel expenditures that exceeded the approved maximum.

“They weren’t big dollar amounts; there really weren’t many of them,” he said. “I don’t think it’s anything to be overly concerned with.”

Based on his findings, Andriola suggested that the district “strengthen its internal controls,” in order to ensure that nothing is purchased without consent and that over-expenditures are not made.

He also suggested that the district ensure that monetary transfers are made on a monthly basis, so that “any budgetary account lines that are in a deficit balance” are covered.

“I am confident that (the school district is) going to address these and fix them going forward,” he said.

 

https://www.northjersey.com/news/education/ridgewood-school-board-reorganizes-1.1489374

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Readers say Going to the BCIA is a back-door way of going around the electorate

3 amigos in action Ridgewood NJ

file photo by Boyd loving

Going to the BCIA is a back-door way of going around the electorate, plain and simple.$250,000 in additional cost to the taxpayers because the bond vote failed 3-2.

At the meeting on January 6th a few things were made clear. One is that the “threesome” stands firm as a bloc and of course voted in perfect synchronicity, in spite of the gigantic number of objections to the huge garage. Another point  is that Aronosohn is going rogue, going directly to the BCIA to get his funding, for which he only needs three votes.

Damn the laws of the land, just find a way around them. Another is that Albert’s trigger temper is still very much alive, as he went after a resident who alluded to the upcoming election. The resident was calm and polite, and Albert was wild, then Gwenn started holding up her cell phone. Such unprofessionalism from the dais, such calm in the audience.

A summary is SAME OLD SAME OLD. A million people spoke. Most were against the garage. The three amigos voted in favor of the bond. Susan and Michael voted against it. Aronsohn is immediately going to circumnavigate the law (legal, but still underhanded) and go to the BCIA, where he only needs three votes. He put that in motion before the ink was dry on the bond defeat. Good luck trying to find the Ustream on the new website. It seems to be nowhere.

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HOLD ONTO YOUR WALLETS: PROPERTY TAXES IN NEW JERSEY INCREASED BY THEIR FASTEST RATE IN FOUR YEARS IN 2015.

for sale Ridgewood_Real_Estate_theRodgewopodblog

Average Property taxes paid

Alpine $20,880.00
Tenafly $18,787.00
Demarest $17,937.00
Upper Saddle River $17,112.00
Haworth $16,940.00
Ridgewood $16,798.00
Saddle River $16,670.00
Franklin Lks $16,635.00
Old Tappan $15,765.00
Glen Rock $15,157.00
Woodcliff lake $15,139.00
HoHoKus $15,045.00
Allendale $14,551.00
Oradell $13,796.00
Wyckoff  $13,280.00
Midland Park $11,020.00
Waldwick $10,396.00
Washington Twp 10,157.00
Fair Lawn $10,012.00
Mahwah $8,154.00

file photo by Boyd Loving

EXCLUSIVE: Property taxes up $537 million

HOLD ONTO YOUR WALLETS: PROPERTY TAXES IN NEW JERSEY INCREASED BY THEIR FASTEST RATE IN FOUR YEARS IN 2015.

Michael Symons,

Hold onto your wallets: Property taxes in New Jersey increased by their fastest rate in four years in 2015, with landowners shelling out an extra $537 million.

The hike pushed the average local tax bill to $8,354 for homeowners, up $193 from the prior year, according to data compiled exclusively by the Asbury Park Press. That’s an increase of 2.4 percent, despite a supposed 2 percent cap enacted in 2010.

The jump marks the second straight year New Jersey’s property tax hike has gotten bigger, after three years of slowing growth in Gov. Chris Christie’s first term. Monmouth and Ocean counties fared worse most of the state with tax boosts of 2.6 percent and 3.3 percent, respectively.

The trend undercuts one of Christie’s selling points as he touts his gubernatorial record on the GOP presidential campaign trail. On his campaign website, Christie says property taxes are rising at their slowest pace “in more than two decades.” Growth has grown since dipping to 1.3 percent in 2013.

The new accounting tells a costly different story — in a state where homeowners already pay the highest-in-the-nation property taxes. That burden helped drive nearly 14,000 to sign an Asbury Park Press petition urging elected officials to cut property taxes. The petition came in tandem with Asbury Park Press’s investigation of the tax crisis last fall.

Stay or leave?

Adrienne DiPietro’s property taxes have tripled in the 20 years she has lived in Eatontown. She remains optimistic elected officials will do something about the problem but says “I’m not holding my breath.” She is considering whether she and her husband, Paul, will stay in New Jersey. Both are retirees.

“All of our retirement income, we have to start thinking about this in the next five years or so: Do we want to stay here and keep coughing up that much taxes?” DiPietro said. “Do we want to stay here, because the taxes are only going up and up?”

https://www.app.com/story/insider/2016/01/08/nj-property-tax-increases/78504096/

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Report: FBI expands investigation of Clinton

hillary-clinton-what-difference-does-it-make

January 11, 2016, 11:26 am
By Harper Neidig

The FBI has expanded its investigation of Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server during her time as secretary of State to determine whether her Clinton Foundation work violated public corruption laws, according to Fox News.

The report is based on accounts by three unnamed sources.

“The agents are investigating the possible intersection of Clinton Foundation donations, the dispensation of State Department contracts and whether regular processes were followed,” one of the sources told Fox.

Critics of Clinton have questioned whether her work with her family’s foundation during her time as secretary of State may have constituted a conflict of interest, and whether the foundation’s donors wielded influence over her while she was in office.

The FBI’s investigation up until now has been focused on the classified information shared in the emails.

https://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/265402-report-fbi-expanding-clinton-investigation-to-look-into-public-corruption

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The new way police are surveilling you: Calculating your threat ‘score’

Ridgewood Police

file photo by Boyd Loving

By Justin Jouvenal January 10 at 8:13 PM

FRESNO, Calif. — While officers raced to a recent 911 call about a man threatening his ex-girlfriend, a police operator in headquarters consulted software that scored the suspect’s potential for violence the way a bank might run a credit report.

The program scoured billions of data points, including arrest reports, property records, commercial databases, deep Web searches and the man’s social- media postings. It calculated his threat level as the highest of three color-coded scores: a bright red warning.

The man had a firearm conviction and gang associations, so out of caution police called a negotiator. The suspect surrendered, and police said the intelligence helped them make the right call — it turned out he had a gun.

As a national debate has played out over mass surveillance by the National Security Agency, a new generation of technology such as the Beware software being used in Fresno has given local law enforcement officers unprecedented power to peer into the lives of citizens.

Police officials say such tools can provide critical information that can help uncover terrorists or thwart mass shootings, ensure the safety of officers and the public, find suspects, and crack open cases. They say that last year’s attacks in Paris and San Bernardino, Calif., have only underscored the need for such measures.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/public-safety/the-new-way-police-are-surveilling-you-calculating-your-threat-score/2016/01/10/e42bccac-8e15-11e5-baf4-bdf37355da0c_story.html

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Europe is enabling a rape culture

muslim rape culture

By Ashe Schow

January 10, 2016 | 6:26pm

In the wake of horrifying tales of sexual assault perpetrated by potentially up to 1,000 men on New Year’s Eve, German officials have made two stunning decisions.

The first, from Cologne, Germany — where the attacks took place — was Mayor Henriette Reker telling women to adopt a “code of conduct” to prevent further sexual assaults, which crossed the line into “victim blaming.”

The second, from the broader German government, was to crack down hard — not on those responsible for the assaults, but for those criticizing the Muslim immigrants who may have perpetrated them.

Let’s take a step back and remember how all of this started. On New Year’s Eve, women celebrating in Cologne were reportedly groped, sexually assaulted and/or robbed as they walked the streets.

More than 100 criminal complaints have been filed, 75 percent of which were reports of sexual assault. Two women reported being raped by the men, who were allegedly of North African and Arab appearance. Women in Hamburg and Stuttgart also reported similar attacks.

So far several dozen have been identified, most of whom were asylum seekers.

But due to Germany’s desperation to prove not only that it’s the most tolerant country in Europe but also that letting in hundreds of thousands of immigrants would have no disastrous consequences, the female victims of the attacks were initially ignored by the political class. Had the alleged perpetrators been white members of a fraternity, the international response would have been completely different, as the Atlantic’s David Frum noted.

Suddenly the presumption that accusers of sexual assault must be automatically believed has gone out the window, the latest victim of European “multiculturalism” and Western political correctness.

Gone, too, are the demands that women receive no crime-prevention tips, since that amounts to blaming the victim, instead insisting we “teach men not to rape.”

https://nypost.com/2016/01/10/europe-is-enabling-a-rape-culture/?utm_campaign=SocialFlow&utm_source=NYPFacebook&utm_medium=SocialFlow

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Planned Ridgewood garage is too big

Hudson Street Parking Garage

Planned Ridgewood garage is too big

JANUARY 8, 2016    LAST UPDATED: FRIDAY, JANUARY 8, 2016, 12:31 AM
THE RIDGEWOOD NEWS

Planned garage is too big

To the editor:

My wife and I attended a meeting last week at Mount Carmel Church concerning the proposed garage on Hudson St.

I have been in favor of a structure at the site but was dismayed to see the overall size of the structure. It is massive. If I, as a private individual proposed a structure that size for that lot, the council would laugh at me. People would be up in arms.

I think that if the council informs residents of the size of the structure, they will be up in arms. It will permanently change the downtown area.

I also don’t understand the rationale behind the proposed traffic flow. It, aside from being a problem for Mt. Carmel, seems to me to be a disaster in the making. It will require the traffic to flow from Broad Street with the majority of vehicles making a left onto Hudson. It will also funnel the exiting vehicles to nowhere land since at the end of Hudson they will have the choice of making a left toward Ridgewood Avenue or a right onto Prospect.

I assume a traffic light will have to be put at the Hudson-Prospect intersection since the traffic from the park area will be head on to the Hudson Street traffic. Not a pretty picture.

Mayor Aronsohn, at the meeting, kept pointing to the referendum as a seal of approval for the garage as proposed. In my view, and probably most of those who voted for it, he received an approval of a garage on the site, not something so big it will tower over the neighborhood.

If the garage has to be this big to be financially viable, then maybe the council needs to rethink its location. The site at Walnut Street would be more appropriate. It is a larger site, has access to Franklin Avenue, a road that could better handle the traffic, and because of the larger site, it could be built lower so the structure would not be so imposing.

In closing I would ask the council to reconsider the size and site of the structure. At the very least, delay going forward until a proper traffic study is undertaken as has been proposed.

The council represents all the residents of Ridgewood, not just the 3,000 who voted for a garage.

Liz and Dave Pskowski

Ridgewood

https://www.northjersey.com/opinion/opinion-letters-to-the-editor/ridgewood-news-letter-planned-garage-is-too-big-1.1487390

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Ridgewood Art Institute 36th Annual Juried Art Show

RAI

Call For Artist Entries:

January 11,2016

the staff of the Ridgewood blog

Ridgewood NJ, The Ridgewood Art Institute 36th Annual Regional Juried Art Show. Open to all artists 18 years and older, in the New York Metropolitan area.
Two – Dimensional, traditional realism only. For complete prospectus visit www.ridgewoodartinstitute.org
The Ridgewood Art Institute is located at 12 East Glen Avenue, Ridgewood, NJ 07450 (201)652-9615

Receiving: Saturday, January 9th 12-5 pm *HAND DELIVERY ONLY*

Reception: Sunday, January 31st, 2-4pm- An Opening Reception and Awards Ceremony will be held at the Ridgewood Art Institute. Light refreshments will be served. Over $5,000 in awards and prizes, including a $1,000 grand prize, will be presented by the RAI President. Prize winners or representatives must be present at the awards ceremony.

Watercolor Landscape Demonstration Sunday, Feb.7 2PM by Joel Popadics
Show ends February 7.

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Poll: Self-identified Dems, Republicans near record lows

Democrats_theridgewoodblog

January 11, 2016, 08:21 am
By Mark Hensch

The percentages of everyday Americans describing themselves as “Democrat” or “Republican” are near historic lows for both political parties, according to a new poll.

Roughly 29 percent of respondents in a Gallup survey released Monday identify as Democrats, marking the lowest point in 27 years. The previous low occurred in 2013, when 30 percent identified as Democrats.

Twenty six percent, meanwhile, defined themselves as Republicans in 2015. That is just 1 point above the party’s low of 25 percent in 2013, Gallup said.

About 4 in 10 U.S. adults now say they are political independents, pollsters found. Approximately 42 percent used that label in 2015, pollsters said.

https://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/265387-poll-self-identified-dems-republicans-near-record-lows

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The Western Spring : The War on PC Culture

Ridgewood_-4th_of-_July_theridgewoodblog

BY RICHARD FERNANDEZ JANUARY 10, 2016

News that CAIR has demanded an apology from Donald Trump for evicting a Muslim protester at his rally and reports that left-wing protesters and police have turned out in force to bottle up “far-right” demonstrators in Germany bookend a single story.  It’s on — the long-awaited fight against PC orthodoxy is finally on. Trump is unlikely to apologize, and CAIR is even more unlikely to back down.  With 3 million Middle Eastern and African refugees due to arrive in Europe this year, the clashes between German protesters are only likely to intensify.

The commotion you hear is not going to stop, it will only get worse. The Western Spring is finally here, and before it’s done it threatens to change everything.

The tension between the forces of political correctness and the pent-up forces of repressed cultural traditions is now bursting like a spring wound up beyond containment.  Things may start slowly at first but ramp up rapidly, mirroring Cornelius Ryan’s famous description of the Berlin Philharmonic’s last performance as the Red Army stood at the gates of Berlin.

The drum beat was almost imperceptible. Softly the tubas answered. The muffled drum roll came again. Low and ominously the tubas replied. Then the massed basses came alive and the awesome grandeur of Die Götterdämmerung rolled out from the Berlin Philharmonic … it told of the evildoing of the gods, of Siegfried on his funeral bed of fire … with cymbals crashing and drums rolling, the orchestra thundered to its climax: the terrible holocaust that destroyed Valhalla

Actually the last performance of the doomed orchestra “was of Brünnhilde’s Immolation Scene at the end of the opera.” Ryan’s word painting may get the history wrong but nevertheless gets the analogy right.  It’s the twilight of the gods.  In 1945 the musicians wore escape clothes under their overcoats because it had been arranged for them to escape toward the American lines as soon as the performance ended.

Seventy years later, the question facing people caught in the middle is where to run. There is nowhere obvious. In Europe, Ross Douthat argues, all exits are temporarily blocked.  The left has destroyed the middle, leaving only a choice of extremes.  “Just last week Merkel rejected a proposal to cap refugee admissions (which topped one million last year) at 200,000 in 2016.”

 

https://pjmedia.com/richardfernandez/2016/1/10/the-western-spring