‘Bad dates’ turn into success for RHS Alumni director Troy Miller
THURSDAY, JUNE 14, 2012
BY STEPHANIE SCHWARTZ
STAFF WRITER
PASCACK VALLEY COMMUNITY LIFE
Troy Miller met him on a subway platform, and after a few texts, they decided to watch a movie and share a bottle of wine at the man’s apartment.
At one point, they started chatting. In mid-sentence, his date got up and left. Just walked into the bathroom.
And stayed there for a good five minutes.
Miller didn’t know what to do. It had been a long time since he’d been on a date, after all.
After way too much time, he comes back – and immediately picks up where he left off.
Miller smelled cigarette smoke and confronted his date, who confessed that he had a cigarette.
“That’s fine, you could’ve had a cigarette right here. I rather you’d have said, ‘Do you mind if I smoke?’ than just disappear in mid-thought,” recounted Miller.
Ridgewood NJ , According to Joseph Henchman ,Vice President, Legal & State Projects, of the Tax Foundation:
Since 2008, several states have attempted to tax online purchases by their state’s residents, https://taxfoundation.org/article/trend-5-amazon-taxes even when the seller has no physical presence in the state. These laws, nicknamed “click-through nexus” or “Amazon tax” laws (after their most visible target), have been extremely controversial.
Contrary to the claims of supporters, do not provide easy revenue. In fact, the nation’s first few Amazon taxes have not produced any revenue at all, and there is some evidence of lost revenue. For instance, Rhode Island has seen no additional sales tax revenue from its Amazon tax, and because Amazon reacted by discontinuing its affiliate program, Rhode Islanders are earning less income and paying less income tax.
While efforts continue at the state level to enact these laws, their dubious constitutionality and lack of success in raising revenue or leveling the playing field has shifted attention to the federal level.
Congress is considering proposals to set standards for state sales tax collection on interstate sales. Two recent proposals in particular would eliminate the physical presence rule but otherwise make advances towards ensuring that states reduce the burdens associated with collecting their sales taxes.
If you’d like us to e-mail you these and all other Tax Foundation reports on state taxes, be sure to subscribe to our State Tax Fiscal Policy Reports and Releases e-mail list at https://taxfoundation.org/tax-foundation-e-mail-updates.
The Village of Ridgewood Ho-Ho-Kus Brook and Saddle River repair project expected to go well into 2013
June 7,2013
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Ridgewood NJ , According to Village Manager Ken Gabbert, the work to repair and mend the Ho-Ho-Kus Brook and Saddle River will likely begin during the late summer or early fall. The two waterways have experienced massive flooding and sustained significant amounts of erosion during last year’s record rainstorms.The Ho-Ho-Kus Brook in particular was heavily damaged by Hurricane Irene last summer. Gabbert told the Ridgewood News “Since Hurricane Floyd in 1999, there has been only spot work done in the brook,”
After a significant increase the village is looking to reduce localized flooding. The work will include the removal of sand bars, trees and other debris that have collected in the waterways after years of neglect and server storms.The scope of the work will span the entire length of the Ho-Ho-Kus Brook in Ridgewood, with only minor work performed along the Saddle River.
The Village council introduced an ordinance last month to appropriate $155,000 for the second phase of watershed protective measures. This includes $128,000 in grant money from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Natural Resources Conservation Service, and approximately $27,000 from Ridgewood’s capital fund account.In April, the Village Council moved more than $343,000 in grants and another $78,000 from the capital fund balance to support the first phase of the project.
Village Manager Ken Gabber told the Ridgewood News that the project completion date will depend on the state Department of Environmental Protection’s requirements, the contractor’s schedules and any “surprises” that arise after work begins.
10 Failed Attempts by the Government to Control the Internet
POSTED ON JUNE 7, 2012 BY ISP
The topic that was dangling at the forefront of most American’s minds at the end of 2011, and even seeping into the beginning of 2012, was the fate of the internet. The Stop Online Piracy Act, discussed further below, whipped citizens into a frenzy and led to the largest internet-based protest to date. In light of a slightly-reworked, renamed SOPA’s emergence, here are ten failed attempts by the American government to control the internet.
Communications Decency Act (1996) –The portions of the Communications Decency Act that were the most controversial were the ones that attempted to regulate internet pornography; a judiciary panel stated that the bill would infringe on First Amendment rights and the bill was squashed.
Child Online Protection Act (1998) – Though the Child Online Protection Act was passed in 1998, a federal injunction claiming that the language was too broad caused the law to never take effect.
Internet School Filtering Act (1998) – While many of the Internet School Filtering Act’s points were eventually enacted through other legislation that did pass, the original bill was struck down.
Deleting Online Predators Act (2006) – The Deleting Online Predators Act of 2006 would have prohibited the use of social networking sites on school or library computers; critics argued, however, that the bill would also limit access to educationally useful information, and as such the bill languished.
Intellectual Property Enforcement Act (2007) – Proposed during the 110th session of Congress in an attempt to shore up American intellectual property laws, the Intellectual Property Enforcement Act would have allowed the Department of Justice to press civil charges against those suspected of infringement.
Cybersecurity Act (2009) – Though reworded versions of the Cybersecurity Act have been reintroduced each year since the original bill was drafted, public outcry over the unprecedented level of control it would grant the government with has kept any of them from passing.
Protecting Cyberspace As a National Asset Act (2010) – Senator Joe Lieberman introduced the Protecting Cyberspace As a National Asset Act in 2010. He then promptly incurred the wrath of critics for citing China’s similar policies in an attempt to portray the bill as standard government procedure.
Combating Online Infringement and Counterfeits Act (2010) – Activist organizations launched a full-scale attack on COICA, and Oregon Democrat Ron Wyden publicly announced his intention to block the bill. Though it did pass the Senate Judiciary Committee, it was killed off before it ever reached fruition.
PROTECT IP Act (2011) – The Preventing Real Online Threats to Economic Creativity and Theft of Intellectual Property Act, a re-write of the failed COICA introduced by Vermont Senator Patrick Leahy, was one of the 2011 targets of internet activists. The protests launched by major internet players led to the postponement of the bill until the issues were resolved, granting Americans a temporary victory.
Stop Online Piracy Act (2011) – Arguably the biggest rallying point for activists in 2011 and early 2012, SOPA led to full and partial protests that shutdown major websites in January of 2012. The bill was postponed until “there is wider agreement on a solution.”
Entertainment industry heavyweights have not given up on their crusade to end piracy; rather than changing their business model to adapt to the needs of a changing world, they’ve chosen to attack the civil liberties of law-abiding Americans.
After primary win, Kyrillos makes overture to business
Fresh off Tuesday’s primary victory, state Sen. Joseph M. Kyrillos Jr. (R-Middletown) said he would be visiting businesses across the state as he plans to make job creation a focus of his challenge to U.S. Sen. Robert Menendez(D-Hoboken).
Kyrillos, who received 77 percent of the vote in the Republican primary, said he would use comments from business people in formulating a “jobs plan,” to be released after the tour. He said he plans to visit businesses of all sizes, as well as publicly and privately held firms.
“I want to really listen — not read the press releases and absorb the rhetoric that come from my opponent and others in Washington, D.C.,” Kyrillos said. (Kitchenman, NJBIZ)
The Village of Ridgewood is pleased to present the introduced 2012 Municipal Budget. A Public Hearing has been scheduled to solicit comment on the 2012 budget on Tuesday, June 26, 2012 at 7PM in the Village Hall Court Room, 131 N. Maple Avenue, Ridgewood.
Click Here for the state-submitted budget document. https://mods.ridgewoodnj.net/pdf/finance/2012MDSVOR.pdf
This document is also available at the Ridgewood Public Library. A summary of the budget will be printed in the June 8, 2012 Ridgewood News.
10 Ways to Lower Gas Prices
Rory CooperJune 4, 2012 at 8:43 am
The average price of a gallon of regular gas is now $3.66, and has been decreasing for eight straight weeks. This is causing some of the President Obama’s advisors to declare energy prices an irrelevant issue. Political advisor David Axelrod recently tweeted: “Gas prices have been going down for the past six weeks. You think the GOP will blame the President?”
In those six weeks, the only significant energy policy change at the White House was to make new coal production nearly impossible and thus vastly increase the cost of electricity. So, it is hard to assign this slight dip to the president after a record 75 straight weeks of prices exceeding $3.00. However, it is true that the president is not entirely responsible for gas prices.
Market and economic conditions play a large role. With unemployment creeping back up, new global turmoil and summer travel on the wane due to a sagging economy, demand is surely dropping. But that does not mean, and has never meant, that the president’s policies or Congressional action does not play any role in gas prices.
After three years of adding regulatory hurdles and blocking exploratory access and development, President Obama’s policies are helping keep prices higher than necessary. Having only three percent of federal land available for oil exploration is not a “market condition.”
But we are in luck. There are several steps Congress can immediately take, and President Obama can immediately support, that will help alleviate the pain felt at the pump by American families and would create economic growth, and importantly, jobs.
In a new paper, Heritage’s Herbert and Joyce Morgan Fellow, Nick Loris lists ten actions Congress could immediately take that would help improve gas prices in the short term and the long term:
1. Lift offshore and onshore exploration and drilling bans: We remain the only nation in the world that has placed the majority of its territorial waters off limits to exploration. Congress should lift the ban on exploration in the eastern Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic and Pacific coasts, and conduct more lease sales off Alaska’s coasts.
2. Approve Keystone XL: The Keystone pipeline has bipartisan support and continues to be consistently popular, polling at 60 percent in November 2011 and 57 percent in late March. 69 Democrats joined House Republicans on a vote of support in April with Rep. Dennis Cardoza (D-CA) saying: “I think the president has made a very serious mistake here.”
Yet, President Obama continues to block it and the jobs that come with it. Had Obama not delayed approval, up to 830,000 barrels of oil per day would have come from Canada to Gulf Coast refineries by as early as 2013. That’s more than we bring in from Venezuela, our fourth largest importer.
3. Require timely environmental review: Environmental review requirements for oil and gas projects to commence on federal lands under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) take too long. Congress should place a reasonable 270-day time limit on NEPA reviews.
4. Permitting process: The processing time for an Application for Permit to Drill (APD) extends well past the 30-day time limit. Loris recommends: “Congress should require the Department of the Interior to honor the law’s deadline unless the Interior finds fault with the application…[and] should ultimately transition the permitting process to state regulators, who are best able to balance economic growth and environmental well-being.”
5. Issue leases on time: Rather than implementing an efficient leasing process, the Department of the Interior keeps adding administrative regulations to make the process more burdensome and bureaucratic. Congress should remove unnecessary red tape and if Interior fails to issue a lease within 60 days, it should be considered issued by default.
6. Allow development of oil shale: Oil shale production in the U.S. could be a global game changer since we hold the largest known reserves in the world. However, 70 percent of those reserves lie beneath federal lands. The Obama Administration has introduced new regulations, time frames, and significantly reduced the land available for leases. Congress should make permanent the 2008 guidelines for oil shale development in order to provide regulatory certainty.
7. Stop the land grab: Through Secretarial Order No. 3310, the Department of Interior is unilaterally and arbitrarily classifying federal land areas as “Wilderness” or “Wild Lands” restricting access to new drilling areas, preventing production on existing leases and halting economic growth. Congress should permanently block Secretarial Order No. 3310 and any similar designation should require congressional approval.
8. Implement 50/50 revenue sharing: States receive 50 percent of the revenues generated by onshore oil and natural gas production on federal lands and Congress should apply this allocation offshore as well. This would encourage more state involvement in drilling decisions and help state economies, whether by closing a deficit or aiding coastal restoration and conservation.
9. Prohibit greenhouse gas and Tier 3 gas regulations: In 2010, Interior suspended 61 leases in Montana alone because environmental groups charged that the energy production would contribute to climate change, demonstrating the need to permanently prohibit any federal agency from unilaterally regulating greenhouse gas emissions. Additionally, the proposed Tier 3 gas regulations to lower the amount of sulfur in gasoline are costly with no measurable benefits. Congress should prohibit the implementation of these regulations. Unelected bureaucrats should not hold such power over the economy.
10. Repeal the Renewable Fuel Standard (RFS): Soon, refiners will be fined when the amount of ethanol mandated exceeds the amount that can be refined for use but the mandate requires production of cellulosic ethanol, which no companies have been able to viably produce commercially. As a result, refiners paid more than $6 million in waiver credits or surcharges in 2011. It is an economic and environmental disaster and must be repealed.
President Obama is keen to accept credit for the windfall of oil production in North Dakota and in other private areas outside federal control, where jobs are plentiful and unemployment has plummeted. Meanwhile, production on federal land is decreasing and regulatory conditions are worsening. It would be to the president’s benefit to embrace some or all of these reforms that could immediately help American families filling up the minivan. Another 75 weeks with gas prices over $3.00, and household goods and food costing more as a result, will not help an already anemic recovery.
AIG Chief Sees Retirement Age As High As 80 After Crisis
By Boris Cerni and Zachary Tracer – Jun 3, 2012 6:00 PM ET
American International Group Inc. (AIG) Chief Executive Officer Robert Benmosche said Europe’s debt crisis shows governments worldwide must accept that people will have to work more years as life expectancies increase.
“Retirement ages will have to move to 70, 80 years old,” Benmosche, who turned 68 last week, said during a weekend interview at his seaside villa in Dubrovnik, Croatia. “That would make pensions, medical services more affordable. They will keep people working longer and will take that burden off of the youth.”
“Human barcode’ could make society more organized, but invades privacy, civil liberties
As tech companies work to develop ID chips, how long until we’re no longer anonymous?
BY MEGHAN NEAL / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Would you barcode your baby?
Microchip implants have become standard practice for our pets, but have been a tougher sell when it comes to the idea of putting them in people.
Science fiction author Elizabeth Moon last week rekindled the debate on whether it’s a good idea to “barcode” infants at birth in an interview on a BBC radio program.
“I would insist on every individual having a unique ID permanently attached — a barcode if you will — an implanted chip to provide an easy, fast inexpensive way to identify individuals,” she said on The Forum, a weekly show that features “a global thinking” discussing a “radical, inspiring or controversial idea” for 60 seconds .
Moon believes the tools most commonly used for surveillance and identification — like video cameras and DNA testing — are slow, costly and often ineffective.
In her opinion, human barcoding would save a lot of time and money.
New Jersey stands to see as much as $40 million a year in sales-tax revenue from Amazon (AMZN).com Inc., the biggest online retailer, Governor Chris Christie said.
A deal the Republican governor disclosed today will bring to New Jersey $130 million in investments and 1,500 full-time jobs. Amazon will start collecting the 7 percent tax July 1, 2013, Christie said at a Trenton news briefing. Work on two new warehouses in the state may begin next year, he said.
“Today’s announcement marks a first step toward a long- term relationship with Amazon,” Christie, 49, told reporters. “With this agreement, Amazon is stepping up and making a real commitment to our state and to our people.” (Dopp, Bloomberg)
49% Consider Memorial Day One of the Most Important Holidays
Monday, May 28, 2012
Nearly half of Americans continue to rank Memorial Day as one of the nation’s most important holidays . A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that just five percent (5%) of American Adults consider it one of the least important holidays, but 44% see it as somewhere in between.
— Felix Roque, mayor of West New York, N.J., in an email to a resident of the small town who had contributed information to an anonymous website advocating that Roque be recalled. Roque, 55, and son Joseph, 22, were arrested Thursday, charged with unauthorized access to computers. A co-conspirator identified only as a West New York public official was not charged. The younger Roque allegedly took down the recall website just a couple of days after it was created in February — after searching on Google for “hacking a Go Daddy site” and “html hacking tutorial” — as well as gained access to email and Facebook accounts of those involved with the site. According to the criminal complaint (PDF), the mayor then proceeded to try to intimidate the creators of recallroque.com, at one point telling one: “A friend of mine, he works in the — I can’t tell you — three letters: C.I.A. You know, that’s how I get information.” The Roques face up to 11 years in prison and $600,000 in fines. They were released on $100,000 bond each, according to the New York Times.
Real federal deficit dwarfs official tally
By Dennis Cauchon, USA TODAY
The typical American household would have paid nearly all of its income in taxes last year to balance the budget if the government used standard accounting rules to compute the deficit, a USA TODAY analysis finds.
Under those accounting practices, the government ran red ink last year equal to $42,054 per household — nearly four times the official number reported under unique rules set by Congress.
A U.S. household’s median income is $49,445, the Census reports.
The big difference between the official deficit and standard accounting: Congress exempts itself from including the cost of promised retirement benefits. Yet companies, states and local governments must include retirement commitments in financial statements, as required by federal law and private boards that set accounting rules.
The deficit was $5 trillion last year under those rules. The official number was $1.3 trillion. Liabilities for Social Security, Medicare and other retirement programs rose by $3.7 trillion in 2011, according to government actuaries, but the amount was not registered on the government’s books.
POSTED: 7:27 pm EDT May 17, 2012
UPDATED: 11:47 am EDT May 18, 2012
INDIANAPOLIS — Health experts have been trying to combat obesity in America for years and have recently suggested a new way to solve the growing problem.
A new study suggests that imposing a fat tax on unhealthy food and drinks could help slim down expanding waistlines.
35 mph is dangerous but 25 mph is safe?, Readers are not buying it
Really – What are the facts FROM THE STREETS WHERE THE SPEED LIMIT IS TO BE LOWERED (not some generic “study” of reduction of speed limit changes)?
Will the “Citizens Safety Advisory Committee” recommend that the speed limit be increased in the future if there is no change in accidents (or an uptick in accidents)? Why not reduce it to 20mph or maybe 10 mph? How about banning all motor vehicles from RW? That would be safest.
The “Citizens Safety Advisory Committee” – what a bunch of useless authoritarian feel-good fools.
What data do they have to back up their reccomendation to lowere the speed limit on Monroe? EXACTLY how much less safe is it on Monroe than on other streets? I’d venture that their are other streets with lowere speed limits that are more dangerous (to pedestrians AND motor vehicles).
