>The Preserve Graydon Coalition: Vote for Wellinghorst on Tuesday
In the special Village Council election within the general election on Tuesday, November 2, the Preserve Graydon Coalition endorses Stephen Wellinghorst.
All four candidates support the preservation of Graydon. We believe that Steve would be the most effective in helping Graydon prosper and endure. Steve says: “I am a committed supporter of preserving Graydon Park. Graydon Park is a natural treasure. This past summer proved that Graydon Pool is not only recreationally and aesthetically viable, but economically viable as well. The Pool must remain affordable, accessible and natural.” (The Ridgewood Blog, Oct. 30, 2010)
Why is Steve the best candidate? Experienced in municipal government: will get up to speed quickly for this half-term Council position, which starts much sooner after the election than usual Experienced in the law: would be the only attorney on the current Council, providing a needed source of independent legal expertise Independent: won’t let private donations dictate public policy Public minded: has served on several boards and founded an organization that provides free legal advice for families with hospitalized children (through Ronald McDonald House children’s charity) Respectful: as a former judge, adept at maintaining civility in potentially contentious situations.
If you are among the Preserve Graydon Coalition supporters who no longer live in Ridgewood, please consider asking your friends and relatives who still live here to cast their votes for Steve Wellinghorst. If you do live here, see you at the polls.
>Steve Wellinghorst is the only truly electable candidate here.
The old signs we’re crap, so he fixed them? :
Sounds like he’s already making mistakes that this town can’t afford. Valley fixed them and put $4,000 toward that 1/2 page add in the paper. We’re not fools. Conk and Dowd tried this crap at the last election and I wish Mr Forenza nothing but the same fate.
Which relative of his works for the hospital. This fact came up at the debate that both Lembo and Forenza have relatives who work at Valley. They are a no vote.Train has blogged his way out of this seat. He should be ashamed at the comments he used toward Mr Wellinghorst.
Steve Wellinghorst is the only truly electable candidate here. I know, not a another lawyer, but he actually isn’t full of crap. I met him and I am a CRR supporter on more issues than just Valley!
>Stephen Wellinghorst : I started a non-profit organization wherein lawyers from across the Country donate their time to families in need staying at Ronald McDonald Houses
With just a few days left before the election, I wanted to take this time to congratulate my opponents for their efforts and for handling their campaigns like gentlemen. I have just returned from a long ago planned business trip to Chicago. I started a non-profit organization wherein lawyers from across the Country donate their time to families in need staying at Ronald McDonald Houses. I am passionate about this cause and that is why I missed the Council meeting this week. I travel about 4-5 times a year.
I was disturbed to hear that one of my opponents criticized me for missing the meeting without first determining why. Predictable, but once again lacking insight or judgment.
I have tried to keep the race above board and conduct myself as honorably as I can. That said, I couldn’t let this one slide.
>Pro Valley Russell Forenza : rolls out the check book News Flash: Mr. Forenza has run a full page advertisement in the Ridgewood News. A quarter page advertisement costs over $1,100. I can only guess what a full page advertisement would cost.
Additionally, I have now seen many new Forenza signs going up. These are a new batch and look different from the original ones put up two weeks ago. This fellow may have “backers”. None of the other three candidates are running any commercial advertisements in news papers or putting up many signs because its very costly. Unfortunately, candidate expense reporting is not available until 30 days after an election. This is unfortunate, as we learned with the prior election when two candidates took union money. Thankfully that incident was exposed on election day and I think it really affected the outcome. Accepting donations from outside interests has the serious potential to compromise the village in any bargaining processes.
I sincerely hope that is not the case here and I hope Mr. Forenza will come out and at least confirm that the money is his, if that is the case, or did not come from unions that do business with the village, unions that do business with the City of Patterson or Valley Hospital. This is a very sticky issue for many of us. We respect the privacy of donors but we can’t be naive and not look at motivations either. This is one reason why Villagers strongly prefer candidates that spend little beyond the sweat of their brow on local electioneering.
Again, I am sure Mr. Forenza is an honorable person but I would like to see clarity on this issue before the vote. I, for one, could not vote for Mr. Forenza without his comment on this issue. I know many Villagers feel the same. If it’s his own money paying for his campaign advertisements-more power to him! If not: Villagers beware!
>The League of Women Voters of Ridgewood Reminds YOU: Don’t forget to Vote this Tuesday, November 2
The League of Women Voters of Ridgewood Reminds YOU: Don’t forget to Vote this Tuesday, November 2. Polls open from 6AM-8PM. Your polling location is listed on the sample ballot that was mailed to every registered voter.
Please read the sample ballot carefully. There are three sections: General Election; Public Question; and NonPartisan Municipal.
Ridgewood’s municipal election candidates are listed on the very bottom of the ballot.
>Sen. Frank Lautenberg says he has launched an investigation into tunnel to Macy’s basement
Lautenberg to waste more of your money
Thought you had heard the last of the politicking about the tunnel to Macy’s basement. Ah, no. Sen. Frank Lautenberg says he has launched an investigation of what happened. Let me save you and the taxpayers a bundle of dough on this, senator, not that saving taxpayers money was ever a concern of yours. (Ingle, Asbury Park Press)
The erosion of Barack Obama’s popularity has lessons in it for every American who wishes to remain interesting and current, both professionally and personally. The real story in this election is not that America has no jobs, that the economy continues to falter, or that the national debt continues to balloon. While all three are true and, more importantly, Obama has failed to fix them, it is also true that these conditions existed prior to Obama’s election. Yet somehow his personal charisma and captivating charm elevated the electorate. The real story of campaign 2010 is how boring Obama has become. Obama, who had never run anything except a campaign in his entire life, performed an almost unprecedented conjuring act in 2008, getting the electorate to embrace him regardless of the utter absence of managerial skills. They believed not necessarily in Obama’s capacity to fix America’s transient problems but in his ability to focus us on more eternal, upbeat themes like hope, faith, and the future. Yet, this time his very presence seems irritating. A man whose oratory lifted him to earth’s highest office can’t seem to deliver a single uplifting speech. As a connoisseur of great oratory, I used to love hearing Obama’s staccato delivery, perfect timing, and mesmeric self-confidence – the mark of any great speaker – even as I disagreed with him on many of the issues. But Obama’s speeches have now become insufferable, devoid of charisma and personal magnetism. Here are three principal reasons why.
First and foremost, Obama has utterly overexposed himself. As a marriage counselor I always advise husbands and wives that, paradoxically, their marriages require intimacy on the one hand, but barriers and distance on the other. Wives walking around a bedroom unclothed, for example, is an invitation to erotic boredom and a dilution of body’s natural attractiveness. Overexposure, as everyone knows, breeds contempt. The Catholic Church is a master of mystery – from the shadows of its darkly lit gothic cathedrals to its insistence on innumerable divine mysteries – and it is therefore no wonder that it grew to become the world’s largest faith. It is the same reason why, in Judaism, Torah scrolls are secreted in an ark, obscured first by doors, then curtains, then a velvet covering, all of which increases hiddenness and thus reverence. In Hollywood it is specifically those celebrities who understand the need to stay out of the public eye that achieve the greatest longevity in it. Obama, by contrast, has the unfortunate flaw of always needing to be loved. He is forever in our face. From weighing in on every issue right down to the Ground Zero mosque to becoming the President who travelled most in his first two years, Obama lives permanently in the sun. President Bush used to vacation on his ranch where he’d disappear for two weeks. Not so Obama who even on holiday is constantly photographed buying ice cream and shooting hoops. Less is more, Mr. President. Sometimes you have to give the people the opportunity to miss you. Superman knows that his grand entrances depend on being disguised the rest of the time as Clark Kent. But by being forever available, Obama has made himself pedestrian. He went from Messiah to mortal, rock star to bland stone.
Second, Obama has betrayed a lack of substance. When he was more mysterious, Obama encouraged our belief that there was subterranean depth beneath the gleaming surface. Just give the man some time and out will come the magic. But it turned out that vacuous speeches on hope and change were not the thin veneer that concealed great complexity but the very substance itself. I have yet to hear one truly new or exciting idea from Barack Obama since becoming President. President Bush was dismissed as a lightweight. But love it or hate it, the Bush doctrine of preemption and its corollary of exporting democracy to recalcitrant states was a compelling and divisive idea that invited ferocious debate. But with Obama we are back to the tired, yawn-inducing discussions of big versus limited government and whether Keynesian stimulus spending or reducing the national debt is the best way to kindle the economy. I’m bored.
Third, Obama comes across as perfect. The most interesting people are always the most tortured. Bill Clinton clogged his arteries with cheeseburgers and had sex with an intern in the Oval office. Yet, he left the presidency with a sixty percent approval rating. America never lost its fascination with this angst-ridden and highly imperfect leader, so unpredictable that we never knew what he’d get up to next. Not so no-drama-Obama who evinces an imperturbable cool utterly bereft of inner trauma. Of course we don’t want the President to cheat on his wife. But show us a tiny demon or two, other than the fact that you light up a cigarette. Demonstrate that you wrestle with moods the way we do when we can’t pay our bills, that you struggle with life’s disappointments like us ordinary mortals. When I was a boy I revered but had no deep interest in our founding fathers because they were portrayed as marble busts who were perfect. It was only later when we discovered how inconsistent the slave-owning Thomas Jefferson could be about human freedom, how depressed and suicidal Lincoln became, and how Martin Luther King, Jr. wrestled with marriage that these aloof figures were humanized and became so endlessly fascinating. In this sense I believe Obama was poorly served by seemingly being a golden boy who suffered few setbacks. Perhaps it’s time for him to talk about the pain of being an abandoned child who was later orphaned of his mother as well, or the pain of seeing his popularity plummet. Perfect people are boring and monolithic. But flawed human beings who rise above adversity to reach great heights are inspirational. And if the President wants to recapture the public imagination, he would do well to expose a wart or two before the November elections.
>New Jersey Tea Party Coalition : Mr. DeStefano has no connection to any legitimate Tea Party in the State
On Thursday, October 28, the New Jersey Tea Party Coalition received word that fraudulent advertisements (Google Ads) have been appearing on the internet connecting the NJTPC to Peter DeStefano. Mr. DeStefano has no connection to the NJTPC, nor does he have a connection to any legitimate Tea Party in the State.
In New Jersey’s Third Congressional District, Congressman John Adler (D) is in a tight race with challenger Jon Runyan (R). Peter DeStefano is a third party challenger claiming to be the Tea Party Candidate.
According to press accounts, Congressman John Adler’s campaign manager Geoff Mackler directed the collection of signatures to get DeStefano on the ballot as a third-party spoiler.
A poll sponsored by Richard Stockton College’s Hughes Public Policy Center puts Jon Runyan and John Adler in a statistical dead heat. We can only conclude that this attempt to link Peter DeStefano to the NJTPC is an attempt to legitimize his candidacy in the minds of conservative voters and to draw votes from John Runyan’s campaign.
At this point, we have filed complaints with Google in regard to at least 6 different ad links. We are awaiting a response. The NJ Tea Party denounces these advertisements as well as the actions of the DeStefano and Adler campaigns and is seeking the person or group that has placed these ads. We believe this action was not only corrupt and immoral, but illegal as well.
We would ask anyone with knowledge of who placed these fraudulent ads to contact us through our website: www.njteapartycoalition.org
>Oliver Train responds to accusations Wow. Do a little work, take my kids to a Halloween party for a few hours…look what happens.
I live and breathe computers…I know that nothing that I would post Anonymously here would truly be anonymous. Why would I bother? Especially for a post that I think is right on. Even better – how do you know that the posts marked Oliver Train are really me? There could be several “Oliver Trains” running around posting away. Anybody can type Oliver Train… at the end of a post.
This is a blog, not a newspaper or other journalistic outlet. All that’s happening here is that PJ is providing a forum for people to interact. Believe what you want.
That one sentence at 11:16 sparked almost entire day of accusations and name calling. All of which are trying to draw attention away from the fact that Steve was not at the meeting. That’s the issue here. Not credentials, not who’s a nice guy, not who is posting what — who is going to show up and do the job they were elected to do. And that’s me.
Oh, yes, to the brilliant “detective”. I don’t have an accurate head count of the meeting, but I do know that Lou and I were there from the begining with about 20-25 others, including reporters from all the news outlets in the Village. A group did get up at around 8:00 and went into the hall. No Russ, and no Steve. So yes, if Steve had somehow snuck past the people in the hall (including the Mayor at one point to quiet them down) and arrived to the meeting late, I would have been one of the few people in a position to see him. You are forgetting one pretty critical fact though – I could have told somebody else that Steve wasn’t there. In fact I did, I made sure the reporters knew it, I made sure my supporters knew it. There were also people watching on TV. They knew it too.
8:21 – what’s baseless about Steve not showing up at a meeting? Please explain.
Correct 9:34 – Emory never had a Football team, so it could not be in the Ivy league. Lots of Kudzu, no Ivy.
Wellinghorst may have been a gentlwman, but his supporters have behaved badly towards Mr. Train, trying to push him out of the race. They have called him a “bumpkin”, made fun of his frequent Blog replies, accused him of being untrustworthy, criticized his public speaking style, accused him of having a “thin skin”, accused him of being a “fifth column” for Valley, and accused him (with no proof) of planting anonymous postings critical of Mr. Wellinghorst. Mr. Train has done a good job of generating creative ideas, yet Mr. Wellinghorst’s supporters just insult him and call him names instead of debating the merits of his ideas. Wellinghorst may have been a gentleman, but his supporters have acted like high school punks during the past week. Just for the record, my name is not Oliver Train. I’m just a voter who is disappointed with the behavior of my fellow Villagers, who are behaving like brats because an unexpected (and inconvenient to them) candidate may prevent Mr. Wellinghorst from being able to waltz into office with minimal opposition.
>The election of Steve Wellinghorst would be a wise and complimentary addition as he brings both professional and personal qualities that truly round out the council
Steve Wellinghorst is well known by his neighbors as a local dad in the Travell School District and is often seen walking his kids to school in the morning. He is a socially and intellectually engaging fellow. However, I think his profession is more suited to loud self-promoter types-that’s not Steve. He is a bit of a hidden gem.
I came to know Steve professionally several years ago and what most people don’t understand is how incredibly detailed, professional and focused this guy is. In the legal and business world its important to surround yourself with level headed intelligent people that make good decisions-not just decisions for a reason but for good reasons. Steve is just that type of person. When you elect someone like Steve – someone who gathers the facts, explores the relevant context and develops good reasons for action – he can’t be bullied. Its nice to have people like that representing you.
If you have ever attended a village council, planning board or sports council meeting you would instantly understand the importance of these qualities in the public domain where every special interest bemoans their plight and seeks to impose the greatest pain and stress on our public figures. Most typical people (myself included) wither under that type of constant stress and consequently, governments cater to citizens that scream the loudest (or otherwise game the system) and not citizens in greatest need.
Today, the existing village council, perhaps by luck or good judgment of the people, appears composed of capable and competent individuals that, appear to function extremely well. The election of Steve Wellinghorst would be a wise and complimentary addition as he brings both professional and personal qualities that truly round out the council.
>Reader says it’s time for Mr. Train to drop out of this race Dear Mr. Train,
Your barrage of baseless, personal and acrimonious attacks on other candidates, especially, Mr. Wellinghorst, is unconscionable.
But what I, and many others in Ridgewood, find totally unacceptable, is your horrendously bad “Anonymous” behavior. Is that how you would conduct the Village’s business? This certainly is not the behavior of an adult and it certainly is not behavior that would be in the Village’s best interest. That behavior goes way beyond any acceptable level of immaturity. This is not a Tenafly/Mountain Lakes jr. high election and you need to grow up. You are not Al Franken and this is not a joke.
Now that you have been systematically uncovered, do we have to tolerate your total silence? Its amazing how you were capable of typing 90 words per minute under your own name, penning post after post. Or, I assume, you were merely posting letters and comments that were pre-written months earlier. Of course this is the most likely route as this is what you did at the debate when you, not once, looked up from your pre-written script. Someone said you were “Robotic”, but robots are less predictable and devoid of malice.
It is time for you to man-up and drop out of this race. You have completely dishonored yourself and lost all of my respect.
>RHS field lights : It certainly appears that the BOE intended to install the field lights all along
As you may have seen or heard, I spoke at the Village Council last evening about the RHS field lights issues. Attached for your edification are my remarks.The more that I look at this, the stranger it looks. For instance:
How did the BOE pay for the engineering work that went into the field lights bid request on May 16 to possible contractors. Supposedly, the state budget cuts forced the BOE to eliminate teaching positions while at the same time they were spending on professional services for construction engineering for which they told the Planning Board that they had no money?
The actual bid request has language that tells prospective bidders that they must put in the pole foundations before the artificial turf has been installed. This means that the bids that they were seeking for the lights could only be used if the light work was done with the turf installation. Yet at the time the bid packages were prepared (May 16) there was no money to install the lights. Was the BOE clairvoyant in that they knew that they were getting the money in gifts?
How did the BOE approve the contracts with the lighting contractor at the July 19 or August 30 meeting when these monies were not in the Council approved budget? While the BOE accepted restricted contributions from sports groups totaling $79,500 at the August meeting, this was short of the $100,000 needed in the financing that was approved at the August meeting.
It certainly appears that the BOE intended to install the field lights all along and that their surprise at the sports teams getting their act together was just an act.
>European air officials say US security goes overboard; British Airways calls demands excessive European air officials accused the United States of imposing useless and overly intrusive travel security measures, calling Wednesday for the Obama administration to reexamine policies ranging from online security checks to X-raying shoes.
British Airways’ chairman made the first in a wave of complaints, saying in a speech to airport operators that removing shoes and taking laptops out of bags were “completely redundant” measures demanded by the U.S.
He was joined less than 24 hours later by British pilots, the owner of Heathrow airport, other European airlines, and the European Union. The EU submitted formal objections to a program that requires U.S.-bound travelers from 35 nations to complete online security clearance before departure. It called the system burdensome and said it could violate travelers’ privacy.
