Come learn about lots of camps and summer programs in our area. Monday, March 31 from 6 to 8PM – Ridgewood Library Auditorium. This event will include options for children of all ages – will help parents get information about lots of camps and summer activities in one, casual, open house setting. Find out about activities in the area – most of which were invited based on recommendation from Ridgewood parents – engage in conversation with representatives, pcik up registration forms, and get all of your questions answered.
James Lovelock: environmentalism has become a religion
Scientist behind the Gaia hypothesis says environment movement does not pay enough attention to facts and he was too certain in the past about rising temperatures
Environmentalism has “become a religion” and does not pay enough attention to facts, according to James Lovelock.
The 94 year-old scientist, famous for his Gaia hypothesis that Earth is a self-regulating, single organism, also said that he had been too certain about the rate of global warming in his past book, that “it’s just as silly to be a [climate] denier as it is to be a believer” and that fracking and nuclear power should power the UK, not renewable sources such as windfarms.
Speaking to the Guardian for an interview ahead of a landmark UN climate science report on Monday on the impacts of climate change, Lovelock said of the warnings of climate catastrophe in his 2006 book, Revenge of Gaia: “I was a little too certain in that book. You just can’t tell what’s going to happen.”
“It [the impact from climate change] could be terrible within a few years, though that’s very unlikely, or it could be hundreds of years before the climate becomes unbearable,” he said.
Lovelock’s comments appear to be at odds with dire forecasts from a report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change on Monday, which leaked versions show will warn that even small temperature rises will bring “abrupt and irreversible changes” to natural systems, including Arctic sea ice and coral reefs.
On eve of Obamacare deadline, law remains a work in progress
BySTEPHANIE CONDONCBS NEWSMarch 30, 2014, 6:00 AM
After six tumultuous months, open enrollment on the new Obamacare marketplaces comes to a close. Once enrollment is over, a look at the marketplaces will give the nation a better picture of how well the Affordable Care Act is functioning. It’s already perfectly clear, though — to voters and lawmakers alike — that the law is a work in progress.
The first few months of open enrollment were disastrous, after HealthCare.gov — the site that serves as the Obamacare portal for 36 states — was launched with major technical problems. Still, the administration says it has largely recovered, with more than 6 million Americans enrolling in private insurance as of Thursday.
The public has noticed the improved enrollment process, according to an Associated Press-GfK poll released Friday. While just 12 percent of Americans said in December that the launch of the new marketplaces has gone well, 26 percent say so now.
Former Democrat presidential contender Bob Kerrey said Obama had to know he was lying when he promised his health plan would allow Americans to keep insurance plans
Former Democrat presidential contender Bob Kerrey said Wednesday Obama had to know he was lying when he promised his health plan would allow Americans to keep insurance plans they liked. “He had to know he was misleading the audience,” Kerrey said quietly. Heard that from your “objective” media? Brent Bozell
Bob Kerrey Calls Obama a Delusional Liar; Renders Himself MSM Nonperson
By P.J. Gladnick | March 29, 2014 | 19:39
Imagine if a former Republican presidential candidate and U.S. senator had called a current Republican president a delusional liar whose programs are wasteful. Would the mainstream media not be all over the story? Such a person would be interviewed at length by Wolf Blitzer on CNN as well as made the rounds of the morning talk shows and the Sunday news programs as well. The media buzz would be red hot on this topic for days extending into weeks.
Well, there is such a person but because he is a Democrat saying these things about President Obama, we can expect him to become an MSM nonperson. Such seems to already be the fate of former presidential candidate and U.S. Senator Bob Kerrey. It is no surprise that his extended criticisms of Obama appeared in in a Daily Mail article in Britain, not in America where the shunning seems to have already begun. Here is what Kerrey has to say about Obama which you most likely won’t see in any major liberal news outlet in America:
The Nebraskan straight-talker told MailOnline in an exclusive interview that Obama isn’t up to the job of bringing liberals and conservatives to the table to rescue America’s slowly choking entitlement programs.
And Obama, he said Wednesday in his Manhattan office, knew full well he was lying when he promised that the Affordable Care Act would allow Americans to keep insurance plans they liked.
‘He had to know he was misleading the audience,’ Kerrey said quietly, recalling the newly minted president’s countless promises as Congress and the public debated his signature health insurance overhaul.
‘On the other hand, he may have said it so many times,’ he added, ‘that the spell-checker wasn’t in the room – the spell-checker, the fact-checker – somebody who says, “Excuse me, Mr. President, but I hope you know this…”‘
Obama’s infamous four-Pinocchio pledges, Kerrey explained, never stood a chance of being fulfilled because there were ‘a million people out there with policies that, for one reason or another, run short of the minimum standard. I mean, they bought something cheaper!’
MARCH 30, 2014 LAST UPDATED: SUNDAY, MARCH 30, 2014, 1:21 AM
BY JOHN CICHOWSKI
THE RECORD
Cellphone yakkers and texters, beware!
Starting on Tuesday, hundreds of New Jersey police departments will be focusing on distracted-driving in a crackdown that is likely to yield more cellphone and texting tickets than have the token campaigns of the past.
The reason: For the first time, the state is putting federal money into this offensive, which means police in 60 communities, including Englewood Cliffs, Hillsdale, Paramus, Ramsey, Hawthorne and West Milford, will each be earning overtime pay to conduct distracted driving patrols. In the past, this strategy has been confined only to seatbelt and drunken-driving enforcement.
“But this year, the feds are encouraging the states to do more,” said Gary Poedubicky, acting director of the state Division of Highway Traffic Safety. “We don’t have enough to fund every town, but it’s a start.”
Mary Higgins Clark will be appearing at Bookends on Tuesday, April 1, 2014 at 7:00pm
Mary Higgins Clark is a New York Times Bestselling Author and one of hometown favorites, Mary Higgins Clark, will sign her new book: I’ve Got Your Under My Skin
Appearing authors will only autograph books purchased at Bookends and must have valid Bookends Receipt. Availability & pricing for all autographed books subject to change. Bookends cannot guarantee that the books that are Autographed will always be First Printings.Autographed books purchased at Bookends are non-returnable.
While we try to ensure that all customers coming to Bookends’ signings will meet authors and get their books signed, we cannot guarantee that all attendees will meet the author or that all books will be signed. We cannot control inclement weather, author travel schedules or authors who leave prematurely.
Bookends, 211 E. Ridgewood Avenue, Ridgewood, NJ 07450 201-445-0726
Balancing act for North Jersey towns, residents as tough times give rise to tax appeals
MARCH 29, 2014, 11:38 PM LAST UPDATED: SATURDAY, MARCH 29, 2014, 11:40 PM
BY MARY DIDUCH
STAFF WRITER
THE RECORD
As a deadline to file tax appeals looms Tuesday, municipalities in North Jersey are facing another wave of property owners asking for a break — and another round of worries about a dwindling tax base.
Tax appeals from residents and business owners remain high for the third straight year, a new normal that indicates the slow economic recovery still has people watching their expenses closely.
Outdated property assessments are partly to blame. But homeowners are also more savvy about the appeals process, experts say. Most have nothing to lose, save the nominal filing fee.
And big businesses are becoming serious about slashing spending by routinely filing annual appeals — even taking towns, like Woodcliff Lake, to court — to pay a smaller share.
All this has led some towns to face budget shortfalls or issue debt as they scramble to dig deep for refunds. For many officials, it’s a balancing act as they struggle to rein in costs and keep property taxes — some of the highest in the nation — down.
One reader says let’s do the math;
$460,000 over 25 months
25 months = 760 days
760 minus weekends = 544 days
544 days minus paid holidays = 524 days
524 days minus 3 weeks vacation = 494 days of work in 25 months
1.8 million quarters divided by 494 days = 3643 quarters per day!
If $100 in quarters equals 5 lbs, then $1000 = 50 lbs,
then 3643= approx 180 POUNDS PER DAY!!
But feel free to check my math.
Either way, this is WAY too much to be a one person job!
but some differ in their mathematical
To put this in perspective, and bearing in mind that $100 in quarters weighs 5 pounds, taking $460,000 in quarters requires carrying 31.5 pounds out of the building every single day. If he didn’t go to work on weekends or holidays, and was there 250 days per year, he’d have to carry out 46 pounds a day. If he missed a day, he’d have to carry out over 90 pounds, more than a sack of cement. You don’t put that in your pants pockets and converting that many quarters to cash would be a full time job by itself.
most think that he didnt act alone
I don’t think he took 12 tons of quarters. He stole some, and others stole some too.He got caught, and copped to it once he knew he wouldn’t go to jail. The trick will be watching his finances to see where he gets the money to pay it back. My guess is he will be getting lots of bank envelopes full of cash from various people over the next few years.
Ridgewood Police conduct Pedestrian Safety Enforcement in the Central Business District
March 30, 2014
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ, The Ridgewood Police Department conducted a pedestrian safety enforcement in the central business district.
Plain clothes officers were utilized in the pedestrian decoy program to enforce New Jersey motor vehicle statute 39:4-36 which requires vehicles to stop and stay stopped as a pedestrian crosses the intersection in a crosswalk.
Chief John M. Ward stated on Facebook that the public can expect to see an increase in Pedestrian Safety & Pedestrian Decoy details within the CBD and around area schools and that the Ridgewood PD appreciates your continued support and will continue to announce our enforcement activity.
Why America’s poisonous politics makes ‘Market Leninism’ an attractive alternative
By John Avlon
1:09PM GMT 29 Mar 2014
“Market Leninism” has become the biggest challenge to our society, writes John Avlon. And the problem with this alternative to Western governance is that it promises prosperity at the expense of individual freedom – while dismissing democracy as ineffective
So much for the end of history. Twenty-five years after the fall of the Berlin Wall gave rise to the idea that liberal capitalist democracy would carry the human race inexorably toward broad sunlit uplands, we are confronted with the ugly fact that culture outlasts politics.
The ideology of communism may have ended up on the ash heap of history like Nazism before it, but now “Market Leninism” is taking its place as a challenge to liberty in the 21st Century.
The fault lines reflect Cold War regions.
Russia and China and some of their old satellite states have traded Marx and Lenin for Market Leninism.
The militaristic one-party state endures – but the nomenklatura now attracts global capital, swilling champagne in jet set nightclubs instead of behind dacha walls.
Would you like to volunteer for RVH’s 8th Adopt-A-Pet Day?
Ridgewood Veterinary Hospital’s 8th Adopt-A-Pet Day is on Sunday, May 18, 2014 from 11am-4pm. This event gets bigger and bigger each year. As we adopt out more pets, we are looking for volunteers. Would you like to help these pets find their forever homes? If you are interested, please reply to this email and you will be given a short application to fill out. You must be at least 18 years of age to apply.
Thank you for your help, and we hope to see you at Ridgewood Veterinary Hospital’s 8th Adopt-A-Pet Day!
Sincerely,
The Doctors and Staff of Ridgewood Veterinary Hospital.
Mon: 8:00 am – 5:00 pm
Tue – Thu: 8:00 am – 9:00 pm
Fri – Sun: 8:00 am – 5:00 pm
Ridgewood PD Reminder : NHTSA urges owners of recalled GM vehicles – 2005-07 Chevrolet Cobalt, 2007 Pontiac G5, 2003-07 Saturn Ion, 2006-07 Chevrolet HHR, 2006-07 Pontiac Solstice, 2007 Saturn Sky – to follow GM recommendation to “use only the ignition key with nothing else on the key ring” and get repairs as soon as parts are available from GM.
Congress to seek answers on delayed GM recall
The Associated Press
— Mar. 28, 2014 7:46 PM EDT
DENVER (AP) — New General Motors CEO Mary Barra has been cooperative with members of Congress investigating why the company did not act sooner to address a potentially deadly defect in some of its small cars, U.S. Rep. Diana DeGette said.
DeGette, a Democrat from Colorado who is the ranking member of the House committee investigating GM’s recall of 1.6 million cars, said Friday that she appreciates Barra’s responsiveness.
But questions remain about why GM declined for a decade to alert car owners about faulty ignition switches that can causes a car’s engine to stall unexpectedly, DeGette said. GM last month recalled Chevrolet Cobalts and other compact cars, including the Saturn Ion, Pontiac G5 and Chevrolet HHR, to have the switches repaired.
The defect has been linked to at least 12 deaths and 31 crashes, DeGette said.
Later Friday, it was announced that General Motors was boosting by 971,000 the number of small cars being recalled worldwide for a defective ignition switch, saying cars from the model years 2008-2011 may have received the part as a replacement.
