The Ridgewood Blog Brings a Free Market Laissez-faire Point of View to Local, New Jersey State and National Issues.
the staff of the Ridgewood blog
Lodi NJ, Governor Murphy allows over 70 people inside the NJMVC in Lodi to get a privilege ie… driving in New Jersey ,but won’t allow one at a time to exercise the constitutional right to vote.
Continue reading You Can Stand in Line at NJMVC , but You Can Not Vote in Person
Dear Ridgewood Community
Thank you again for your ongoing support for One Village One Vote and our efforts to consolidate Ridgewood’s local elections to November. As a quick update, the Village Clerk has rejected our petition. After the Clerk’s office declined to provide guidance on the proper approach to writing the petition, we tried to use friendly language within the petition and collected it electronically as permitted under our understanding of Gov. Murphy’s Executive Order 132. The Clerk has now notified us of two deficiencies with the petitions:
Move makes Colorado only state to date to opt out of early nomination process
By John Frank
The Denver Post
POSTED: 08/25/2015 02:06:20 PM MDT193 COMMENTS
UPDATED: 04/10/2016 10:01:32 PM MDT
DITOR’S NOTE: This story was first published on Tuesday, Aug. 25, 2015 at 2:06 p.m. Please see Angry Donald Trump blasts Colorado GOP results as “totally unfair,” published on Sunday, April 10, 2016.
Colorado will not vote for a Republican candidate for president at its 2016 caucus after party leaders approved a little-noticed shift that may diminish the state’s clout in the most open nomination contest in the modern era.
The GOP executive committee has voted to cancel the traditional presidential preference poll after the national party changed its rules to require a state’s delegates to support the candidate who wins the caucus vote.
The move makes Colorado the only state so far to forfeit a role in the early nomination process, according to political experts, but other caucus states are still considering how to adapt to the new rule.
“It takes Colorado completely off the map” in the primary season, said Ryan Call, a former state GOP chairman.
JANUARY 9, 2016, 11:46 PM LAST UPDATED: SUNDAY, JANUARY 10, 2016, 12:04 AM
BY DUSTIN RACIOPPI
STATE HOUSE BUREAU |
THE RECORD
Word bubbled up in November at a Democratic conclave in East Brunswick that state lawmakers were considering new rules on how to configure the state’s legislative map, but they offered no details and quickly moved on to other topics.
Then, just days before a harried year-end session in Trenton, a formal proposal to overhaul the process for redrawing New Jersey’s 40 legislative districts was circulated to Republican members of committees that would have to advance the plan. The proposal was to create at least 10 “competitive” districts using results from selected elections. An Assembly panel approved it in 20 minutes after hearing one public comment, and its chairman did not allow questions from any of its members.
The once-a-decade ritual required by the state constitution to redraw New Jersey’s legislative map has always been a political exercise. Democratic and Republican leaders each appoint five of their members to a commission to draw the maps; they always deadlock on which version is fairest and the deciding vote is cast by someone appointed by the state Supreme Court’s chief justice.
But this year’s push — the first in more than50 years — to significantly alter the process through a constitutional amendment has drawn the most criticism, if not sheer outrage, from the people who will be directly affected by any changes: the legislators themselves.
Depending on how it is drawn, the map could help to determine who is elected to the Legislature and which party holds power in Trenton. That would determine who controls what bills are posted, who gets assigned to what committees and who has final say over judicial and Cabinet-level nominations. Democrats have held the majority in the Legislature since 2004.
https://www.northjersey.com/news/n-j-plan-for-revamp-of-voting-districts-remains-vague-1.1488593
Nj senate president Steven Sweeney
In our judiciary committee hearing yesterday I point out the utter hypocrisy of Democratic Party leaders holding a public hearing on an unprecedented four constitutional amendments while keeping the public in the dark and refusing to answer questions. ( Rep. Holly Schepisi New Jersey GOP)
Academics, others slam Democrats’ redistricting amendment
By MATT FRIEDMAN 2:24 p.m. | Jan. 7, 2016follow this reporter
TRENTON — It’s not just Republican lawmakers who oppose redistricting changes that could secure Democrats’ electoral advantage for decades to come.
Two New Jersey academics who have extensively studied how the state draws its legislative districts gave scathing testimony Thursday against the proposed constitutional amendment.
Patrick Murray, director of the Monmouth University Polling Institute, said wording of the amendment is deliberately misleading to voters, who must decide whether to approve it.
“This is a bald-faced attempt to pull the wool over voters’ eyes; making them complicit in a process that will only serve to increase their cynicism about politics,” Murray told a Senate committee.
