Did New Jersey Lose $400 million Education Grant for Opposing Obama & Teacher's Union?

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In a state long accustomed to knowing the price you pay for corruption and whose new Republican Governor, Chris Christie, made his mark prosecuting corruption in the state, it seems as if there were some strange actions by the Obama administration, the teacher's union and some of New Jersey's old politicians to inflict cruel and extreme punishment for an innocent clerical error that cost the people and students of the state $400 million in Obama education funds.

The New Jersey application lost the $400 million dollars for two reasons, a clerical error where TWO LINES had the wrong fiscal year data, and because the state teacher's union refused to sign off on the application. Had the reviewers asked the state to correct the two lines out of over 1,000 pages of application they would have received the money. Or, had the teacher's union backed the state plan for students they would have the money.

New Jersey is the only state that was facing a severe financial crisis because of bizarre tax increases and corruption after nearly a decade of Democratic leadership in the governor's office and used the ballot to clean house. The people threw out the old guard, brought in a former straight talking prosecutor, and backed him as he took on the teacher's union to bring sense to the budget and eliminate ridiculous health and pension benefits that would bankrupt the state over time.

That is democracy at work. Unfortunately, the old governor, Jon Corzine, was one of Obama's top economic advisors who had been CEO of Goldman Sachs, the top Obama contributor and fund raiser, and was one of Obama's top political supporters, while he was raiding the Jersey treasury. Obama went out of his way to campaign for his buddy, and the news media said Christie did not have a chance to win. Fortunately, the Democratic party and media no longer tell the voters of Jersey who to elect.

So we know the victory of Christie over Corzine was a huge embarrassment to the Obama gang, in particular the Rahm Emanuel political operatives who grew up playing Chicago hardball. Did I mention the teacher's union is one of the strongest financial supporters of Obama, and of the Democratic Senator from New Jersey Robert Menendez? The teacher's union spent hundreds of thousands of dollars trying to stop the governor from reforming the entire state budget before being overwhelmed by the people in local school board elections.

Did I mention that Menendez is the head of the most powerful political machine of the Democrats in the Senate, he is Chairman of the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee and a strong Obama ally? Did I mention that two citizen watchdog groups, SourceWatch and Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, both say the same Senator Menendez is, well here are their words about Menendez.

Under Investigation by: The Department of Justice.

Under Investigation for: Sen. Menendez is under investigation by the Newark, NJ U.S. Attorney’s Office for collecting rent from an anti-poverty group for which he helped win federal funds, the North Hudson Community Action Corporation. The group was run by a donor to Sen. Menendez’s campaign. More recently, in 2007, federal investigators began looking into Sen. Menendez’s relationship with his former chief of staff, lobbyist Kay LiCausi, to determine whether the senator improperly helped her or her clients win contracts and federal funding.

So why do I mention all these different factors in a story about Jersey losing $400 million? Because I worked for governors (including New Jersey) and congress along with federal administrations and I can guarantee you no applicant for a program of this nature would be denied funds for an obvious clerical error that could have been corrected with a phone call.

This incident has all the earmarks of political retaliation by the Obama White House gang to punish the governor and people of New Jersey for daring to take on the all powerful teacher's union. A full investigation of the application process and the refusal of the federal reviewers to ask for the clerical corrections is surely warranted.

More important, as every insider in Washington knows, a US Senator has more influence than anyone else in Congress. Menendez is supposed to have direct links to Emanuel and Obama because of his Democratic party leadership position. He also has no love for Governor Christie who disrupted the plans of the Democrats to keep control of the state.

If Menendez had done anything to ask the Education Department or Obama to allow the state to fix the innocent clerical error it would have been done because that is the Washington way. Never underestimate the power of a sitting senator. Obviously Menendez did nothing to help his own state and students. Or he does not have the ear of the White House. Also did Menendez call the teacher's union and asked them to sign off for the $400 million benefit to students and teachers? I mean is their hatred of the new governor so consuming that the children of New Jersey are mere pawns in a political -power play?

What happened defies logic, is contrary to the Washington way, seems to indicate the Obama people and Menendez used the action to punish the new Republican governor, and would be worthy of criminal action if anyone in the White House or Menendez's office failed to help the state do something that was always done by agencies, help the applicants have a complete application and receive the money they deserved for the students and people of New Jersey. FOR SHAME!

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New Jersey Governor Christie Leads Nation Toward Economic Sanity

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Since stunning the political pundits and national media with his victory last November over the state and national Democratic machine, New Jersey Republican Governor Chris Christie has been leading the state through a tea party revolution that has changed the fortunes of the state for many years to come.



After 18 years of Democrats running the state, during which time two governors were tossed from office for corruption and corrupt secrets, Christie inherited a pretty bleak mess. There were 115 tax increases by the Democrats over the past 8 years. The state had a deficit of $11 billion. Jersey had the highest property taxes in the nation and highest corporate taxes in the Northeast.

For the first time in decades Jersey lost it's leadership position for population gain and job development in the Northeast and the population of Jersey was actually dropping. State union pension and health care benefits, the highest in the nation, were crippling the state budget and out of control.



When Christie proposed his new budget with $11 billion in cuts the special interests for the unions spent millions of dollars in television ad campaigns misleading the public on the budget, clearly adopting the Obama strategy of spending hundreds of millions of dollars to influence votes on social policy issues.

Christie took his impossible fight directly to the citizens of all the towns in the state and the citizens gave him what the politicians did not have the guts to pursue, support for a major overhaul in the New Jersey budget.



In the end Christie overcame the odds and fierce opposition and got 99% of everything he requested in his budget and cuts. A $29.4 billion balanced budget was intact and even some prominent Democrat politicians put partisanship behind and supported the Governor's budget for the good of the state, people like Mayor Corey Booker of Newark, a rising star in the Democratic party.

For the first time in history all state employees and teachers will pay one and one half percent of their benefit costs, still far below the national average. Unemployment benefits will no longer be paid to workers who were fired for drunkenness, drug abuse or stealing from their employers.

As the Governor said, "New Jersey has changed and is now a contribution society, not an entitlement society."



With the huge budget and deficit victory and public support now behind him Christie has set his sites on a Constitutional cap on property tax increases of 2.5% maximum to stop local governments and school districts from their reckless spending habits and spiraling property tax increases.



Thanks to the relentless pursuit by the governor of his campaign promises to end the political nonsense and get New Jersey back on the road to greatness there is a very good chance the Garden State will be in full bloom again soon.



By the way, government belt tightening is not all the governor delivered, he also has lost 35 lbs. since taking office, another promise he made on national television.

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New Jersey Super Pride - First Real Open Air Super Bowl to Meadowlands

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For the first time since the Super Bowl began it will be played in an open air outdoor stadium in the snow belt as New York/New Jersey broke the 47 year stranglehold of Super Bowls in domed or warm weather stadiums when they won the right to stage Super Bowl 48 at the new stadium in 2014.



The game, which will be played at the Giants' and Jets' new $1.6 billion, 82,000-seat home in the Meadowlands within eyesight of Manhattan and the number one city and metro area in the world, Metropolitan New York - New Jersey will get to show us what they've got.



New York/New Jersey was one of three bidders for the 2014 game. The other two were South Florida, which already has hosted 10 Super Bowls, including the most recent one in February, and Tampa Bay, which has hosted four. NY/NJ won on the fourth ballot by a majority vote by team owners over Tampa. South Florida was eliminated after the second ballot.





Newly elected New Jersey Governor Chris Christie and Mayor Mike Bloomberg of NYC played key roles in breaking the 47 year hold the domed and warm weather stadiums have enjoyed and finally football in America will decide a champion based on the four key fundamentals of winning football at it's highest standard of competition. The fundamentals are the winner must exemplify true grit, determination and skill while overcoming the weather conditions to win.



Once upon a time the NFL championship games were played up north where weather was often as big a factor as skill and some of the most exciting games in history were barely visible to the viewers. But this is America and football is not a sport for creampuffs so it is only right the weather be a factor.



For the New York and New Jersey area this game will generate up to $100 million or more in new revenue which is needed. It is also appropriate that the first cold weather game be played in the newest, most modern and most expensive stadium in the world.



After nearly a decade since the 9-11 terrorist disaster in NYC it will also show the world that the New York New Jersey area is back in the spotlight as one of the most vibrant areas in the world.



Note to reader: I am definitely not objective about this story. Having lived in Jersey for 18 years and served with Governor Kean when the Meadowlands was first coming to the forefront as a major sports complex in the nation, it is great to see this vibrant and dynamic area be given such an honor and you can bet it will be one of the best Super Bowls of all time.

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