Beach replensishment – the fleecing of America

Note: This is an updated version of a post from a couple of years ago. I thought I was doing some minor grammatical edits but WordPress had other ideas and updated the whole thing, including the publication date.

Once again, certain beaches along the Jersey shore need to be replenished. I would really like to know how many tens of millions of dollars have been spent to keep sand on these beaches when it is clear that mother nature is clearly telling us “no, no….that’s not how things work.” Mother Nature is bringing an entirely new meaning to the words “If you build, he will come.” What she is saying is “if you build it, I will just throw a nice big nor’easter at you, and put it back the way it was because you guys screwed up my barrier islands.”

Here in NJ, the barrier islands are made entirely of sand. If you build on them, pave them and generally screw them up, Mother Nature is going to do her best to take them back.  The fortunate few who have property on these barrier islands, than coming crying to the government and the Army Corps of Engineers, silver spoons in hand, begging to save their beaches. And they do and who fits the bill? We all do. One woman on the news tonight sounded like she wanted us to feel bad for her because her house couldn’t be rented without the beach. I have a great idea – build your own f’in beach and you can use that silver spoon of yours to do some digging. I don’t ask you to take care of my backyard, so don’t ask me to take care of yours.

Stuff like this doesn’t just happen along the beaches. Let’s look at the folks who buy houses near major highways. For the most part, those highways were there when they bought there house. Didn’t they think it might be a tad noisy living next to the Garden State Parkway or some major interstate? Than they move in and oh my god, they are in shock. The noise is unbearable and can’t the government build sound barriers that stop the noise.  And who fits the bill? We all do. The great thing about these sound barriers is they suck. They don’t absorb the sound, they just bounce it around as if the cars driving by were in an echo chamber.

I live 3 houses off South Orange Avenue, not a highway but busy nevertheless. I also live 3 blocks from St. Barnabas Medical Center. Do you know what comes flying up South Orange Avenue on the way to St. Barnabas Medical Center at all hours of the day and night? Ambulances, that’s what and they don’t come quietly.  Oh my god…can the government build a sound wall around my house? That even sounds stupid.

Well guess what? So is rebuilding the beaches and putting up sound walls. I have a great idea. The next time a big storm comes, wiping out the beaches and maybe taking a few houses with it, don’t let these people rebuild with our tax dollars. If you have to continually rebuild the beaches to protect a few houses, than maybe…just maybe, you shouldn’t have put houses there in the first place.

If you bought one of those houses, you had to know that beaches were always going to be an issue when you bought it. And if you bought one of those houses thinking the beaches weren’t going to be a problem, than I suggest you build a barrier around your brain because it’s not like anything is getting in there.

No More Rosebud

This week in New Jersey, we had the great Fizzard (that’s a blizzard that fizzles) of 2015. Everyone and their meteorologist mother was predicting the great snowpocalypse and all we got was 6 to 8 inches. Just enough to break out the snow-blower.

When you’ve got that much snow, schools are cancelled and that can only mean on thing….it’s sledding time. Sure enough, the hills of South Mountain Reservation were filled with kids and their parents.

As I drove past this sea of sledding humanity, I couldn’t help but think of the joy I had growing up, going sledding with my friends. Unfortunately, this is a joy some children will have a hard time experiencing. Much like the Orson Welles title character in the movie Citizen Kane, whose final word before his death is “rosebud,” the name of his childhood sled, it appears that there are some folks who want to deprive us of simple joy of sledding down a hill.

Take the city of DuBuque in Iowa, where sledding has been outlawed in most of their city parks. Why would they ban sledding? Did you ever hear the one about 1000 lawyers on a boat at the bottom of the ocean? (And to one of my most loyal readers in Houston…sorry).

The answer is simple. In 2 recent cases, a person injured while sledding was awarded a multi-million judgement when they sued the city they were injured in. Doesn’t common sense tell you there’s an inherent risk when you put your body on a piece of wood or plastic, and go zooming down a snow and ice covered hill? There’s bumps, there’s trees, there’s other people, and there’s a good chance someone is going to get hurt. According to what I’ve read, some 20,000 injuries from sledding are treated each year at hospitals throughout our country.

If you read the articles about the paralyzed little girl or the man with the spinal cord injury, both suffered while sledding, you want to feel bad for them. Than you read they sued the cities they live in, those suits paid out over $2,000,000 per case to settle and you don’t really want to feel that bad for them. The victims and their lawyers have taken the fun out of one of life’s great joys – flying down a hill with the wind in your face, not a care in the world.  Except now you might get sued if you hit another person on the hill. I’m sorry you got hurt but you, your families and your lawyers are just another reason why the joy of childhood ain’t what it used to be.

One time, when I was about 5 or 6 years old, my father took my sisters and me sledding at a hill on Community Drive in Manhasset. Another sledder came down the hill and smashed right into my leg.  There was some blood, a bruise and more than a few tears but no lawsuit. In those days, you picked yourself up and went back up the hill. The funny thing about that hill is that it’s now part of North Shore Hospital.

I’m not comparing my bruised leg to that little girl but I do think something needs to be done to a system that allows for these types of lawsuits. Instead of using children’s toys as firewood, maybe it’s the books in which these laws are written that need to be burned to ashes.

Raise The Gas Tax

Drive down Millburn Avenue, make a right hand turn on to Vaux Hall Road to head into Union and you know what you will find? One pathetic piece of NJ roadway. It’s not very long but what it lacks in quantity it makes up for in it’s utter lack of quality.  How about JFK Parkway, not too far The Mall at Short Hills, one of the more high-end retail centers in our country. Drive down that road and you are sure to feel a bounce or two. As a matter of fact, driver down almost any road in NJ and you are bound to see potholes. These daze, potholes come in all sizes, just like clothes – small, medium, large, all the way up to XXXXXL….and beyonds. Highways, byways, local roads, residential streets, avenues, lanes, boulevards…doesn’t matter what you call them.

Here in New Jersey we have potholes, lots of them. Now, these potholes are not something new. They have been there for months, some spots have had the same potholes for years. You can actually find sizable chunks of asphalt laying alongside some roads, right next to the hubcaps that get destroyed everytime a car finds it’s way into one of the many cavernous potholes that seem to be swallowing up New Jersey’s roadways.

Why haven’t they been fixed? I can’t say for sure but it might have something to do with the fact that the State of New Jersey Transportation Trust Fund is broke, busted, dazed and confused. For the past several years that fund has been looted by our elected officials to cover the shortfalls of our state budget. What is supposed to be a dedicated fund, used for the sole purpose of maintaining our state’s infrastructure is used but that.

At 14.5¢ per gallon, NJ currently has one of the lowest gasoline tax rates in the country. With gas prices lower than they’ve been in years, you’d think maybe now would be the time to raise that rate to replenish the fund that repairs and maintains the state’s crumbling infrastructure but nooooooo! A recent poll finds 60% of all surveyed opposed to raising the gas tax. So when presented with driving on our state’s shitty roadways in their current shitty condition or raising the gas tax to fix, NJ residents would rather leave things the way they are.

My first thought was these people must be morons! My second thought was “did the person who asked you the question explain about how low the gas tax rate is in NJ? That the transportation fund is broke? That the roads will probably get much, much worse if we don’t so something and soon?”

Common sense (and you know how much I love common sense) says if you have a problem that requires money to be fixed, but the money that’s supposed to be used to fix that problem is used for other purposes, you need to find another source for that money. So why don’t we?

Let’s start at the top…our “no new taxes” governor who has done a good a job as anyone looting the state coffers and leaving NJ high and dry. As for the legislature…please. Whether they are in Trenton or Washington DC, politicians suck at everything except getting themselves re-elected and screwing their constituents.  Not to be forgotten, are the residents of the Garden State, who don’t really want to pay a penny more for gas, especially now that it has dropped over a dollar per gallon in just the past few months. Listen, I like cheap gas as much as the next guy but I also like safe roads and not running the risk of gashing a tire or losing a hubcap everytime I go out the door.

I honestly don’t know what we are waiting for. It will probably take some sort of disaster for everyone to realize the fact that our infrastructure is getting older every day and crumbling right before our eyes. Next time you are driving, see how long it takes before you see a pothole, a hubcap or a whole car seemingly swallowed by what you’d think would be a smooth, nicely paved roadway. Maybe when you have to pay $200 for a new tire, hundreds of dollars more for a new rim, thousands of dollars to fix whatever else breaks, even tens of thousands of dollars for a new car, you’ll realize that a few cents for a gallon of gas isn’t so bad after all. In this case, common cents makes common sense.

Common Sense Gun Control

Common Sense Gun Control

And here we go again. Another shooting at school, more senseless killings of Americans who are way to young in a place that is supposed to be a safe haven. What drives people to do such things is beyond my comprehension of human nature. What I do know is that something needs to be done and done now.

As with an emotionally charged issue, the conversation is dominated by the fringes. On one side, you have folks that want all guns banned.  Let me tell you Mr. and Mrs Lefty, that is never going to happen and you just need to come to that realization.

On the other side you have the NRA and their constitution waving gun fanatics who claim the right to keep and bear arms is their god given right. I have a question for you Mr. and Mrs. Righty.  Do you think our founding fathers had semi-automatic weapons in mind when they wrote? They were using single shot muskets back in the day. Why don’t you use one of those one of these instead of an Uzi?

This is like a game of chicken and no one wants to be the first to flinch, the first to show weakness, the first to give an inch for fear of having to give more than the other side. That is exactly why nothing gets done.

So what do we need?  Leadership, someone with the balls to take on both sides and get them to talk to each other. The problem is the NRA has so much money and so many elected officials hiding their heads in the sand for fear of Wayne LaPierre and his armed band of merry men. I’m not saying the fault is entirely on the right, it’s just that they yell louder and carry a much bigger stick. Unfortunately, it’s a not a stick that’s inflicting all the damage.

Legal Sports Gambling Daze

Many years ago, when the annual boys golf trip used to take me to Vegas, our trip coincided with The Preakness Stakes. On the day of the race, we’d usually leave for the golf course around 7 AM Pacific Time/10 AM Eastern Time, and the sports book would already be starting to fill up. By the time we got back to the hotel, usually just in time for the race, it was standing room only and you could feel the excitement in the air. It’s not just horse racing. Name a sport and you can bet on it Las Vegas.

With 4 of the casinos in Atlantic City having closed or soon to be closed, and with the competition from casinos in neighboring states continuing to put pressure on the remaining NJ casinos, the Garden State has decided to allow legal gambling in their casinos. So what do the NFL, MLB, NBA,  NHL and NCAA do?  They sue to stop legalized gambling in NJ for fear that it will hurt the “integrity of the game.” Oh give me a break.

Forgetting the other 3 professional sports, let’s focus on the NFL. The NFL –  home of Fantasy Football – thinks letting casinos in NJ take bets on their games is going to have an effect on the integrity of their sport? This is from a league that openly sponsors Fantasy Football, actually has entire shows devoted to Fantasy Leagues on their own TV network and the other networks that carry their sport to millions of viewers. What do they think all these people who play Fantasy Football are doing with all this information? Playing for points or peanuts? No, Fantasy Football is organized gambling encouraged by the NFL as a way to boost it’s popularity, drive-up TV ratings and keep fans interested. During some TV coverage, they even run the fantasy points in the scroll at the bottom of the TV. You can smell the hypocrisy from here all the way to NFL headquarters.

And don’t get me started on the NCAA and their objections. The NCAA is an organization that can’t get out of it’s own way right now, and could be headed to the sports organization graveyard in the next few years if they are not careful. I read somewhere the NCAA Basketball Tournament is the number one sports gambling event in the United States. Ask anyone who has been to Vegas for the first weekend of the tournament and they will tell how insane things are there. The sports books routinely fill up when the first games tip-off and don’t clear out until the last game ends some 12 hours later.

Personally, I don’t gamble on sports, don’t play fantasy, haven’t participated in NCAA tournament pool in years, and have only been to the race track once or twice in the past 5 or 6 years. But I know lots of people who are big fantasy players, have more than one team, have elaborate draft day events at home or the local sports bar, and who spend their entire Sunday watching NFL RedZone so they can keep track of their fantasy points. If you took the fantasy out of football, I wonder how many of these diehard fans would still watch? What effect this would have the ratings? Subsequently the effect on the pocketbooks of the league, the owners, and the players.

My opinion is that the popularity of the NFL is driven in a big way by the illegal gambling that goes on through Fantasy Football. For the NFL to deny this is the height of hypocrisy and for them to sue the State of New Jersey to keep gambling on their sport illegal because it calls into question “the integrity of the game” is just beyond crazy and a waste of money for the state of NJ to defend itself. Makes me think that it’s not only the players who have been getting their bells rung all these years, but it’s really the owners and league officials who should have their heads examined.

I Feel Bad That I Don’t Feel Bad

In the hit Broadway show A Chorus Line, the character Morales recalls the story of her drama instructor Mr. Karp,  who tormented her, calling her “nothing.”  Years later, Morales learn that Karp had died and sings “and I reached on down to the bottom of my soul and cried….cause I felt ‘nothing’.”

Tuesday in Arizona, a 9 year girl old shot and killed her fire arms instructor with an Uzi. My first reaction was that I felt nothing. Now as I think about this, I realize I’m feeling many things. I am sad that a man who had served our country had been shot and killed. I am amazed that parents thought it was OK for their 9 year old daughter to be shooting an Uzi. I find it incredible that a man who was trained to use an Uzi did not know enough to realize that this young girl would be unable to handle the recoil from that submachine gun when he set it to automatic mode.

Most of all I’m angry. Angry that the entire conversation of common sense gun control regulations in our country is dominated by one side and its fanatical leadership group. A group that refuses to budge one inch on any new regulations, despite the growing outcry from the public, despite the epidemic of gun violence and gun related deaths.

Let me say, I’m not a fanatic in favor of the total ban of all fire arms. Common sense tells me that this is unrealistic in a country where people cling to the “right to bear arms” even when that right was granted in an age of muskets and one shot pistols. You want to own a pistol or two, OK. A rifle for hunting, fine. But explain to me why a 9 year old, or anyone else for that matter, needs to have the right to own, or needs to know how to shoot an Uzi. Makes absolutely no sense no matter how much the NRA spins it.

I guess in the end I really felt a lot of things, but being sad about this unfortunate death is not on the top of my list. Although I am sad. Sad that it wasn’t Wayne LaPierre (President of the NRA) or one his gun toting disciples on the receiving end of that Uzis bullet. If that were to happen, then I’d feel something.

Aurora, Religion, Guns,

Aurora, Religion, Guns

I just read the comments of Rep. Louis Gohmert, a republican from Texas and he has gotten me really worked up. Using the tragedy in Aurora as a platform, he blames “ongoing attacks on Judeo-Christian beliefs” in our country and goes on to question why no one else in the theater had a gun to take the shooter. As I write those words I get even more outraged by them.

I’m not going to respond to his statements about this being an anti-religious statement by the shooter or an attack on our Judeo-Christian beliefs. If there’s any evidence of this so far, I haven’t read a single word.

Who I really want to hear from are my friends and colleagues who are deeply religious. Could you please explain to me what in God’s name is this guy talking about? How does he come off as “good Christian” by making these types of inflammatory remarks within hours of this tragedy? Did God tell him that this was an attack on his Christian beliefs? If he were alive today, would Jesus carry an assault weapon to fend off his enemies? What am I missing?

My own faith is always in state of flux. I am Jewish but my Judaism is more cultural and spiritual than grounded in a deep belief in God. I believe in some sort higher power but have no clue as to what that is or what that means. What I do know is that throughout the course of history, religion has been used to fight wars, used in many attempts to exterminate entire cultures, and does as much bad as it does good as I think is the case here.

So, all you deeply religious folks out there, explain this guy to me because statements like this make me loose a lot of my own faith in our country and the religious/cultural diversity that makes this a great nation.

Old and Overburdened Infrastructure

Old and Overburdened Infrastructure

As many folks are aware and many are living through, a large section of New Jersey and other parts of the other northeast got hit by a freak October snowstorm last Saturday. With fall foliage at it’s peak and the leaves still on the branches, the wet and heavy snow wreaked havoc on trees, bushes and utility wires.  As of today, 5 days after the storm, many of my friends and neighbors are still without power, 2 of the 5 schools in the Millburn School District are still closed (and we’ve used up all our snow days), and things are generally a mess.

Ran into my high school friend Scott this morning, who told me his street in Livingston “looks like Beirut.”  My friend Jodi thinks we are beginning to look a lot like a third world country. Others have described their streets and neighborhoods as “a war zone” or “having been struck by a tornado.”  Coming just 2 months after our area got struck by Hurricane Irene, residents are angry, frustrated, angry, cold, angry, tired, angry and they are angry. If you don’t believe me, read this:  http://millburn.patch.com/articles/cold-angry-residents-want-answers-on-power?ncid=following_comment

Folks are complaining about the utility companies, the local governments lack of response, the governor, whoever they can think of. As much as I think the utility companies and the government have definitely and completely screwed this whole thing up, I haven’t heard anyone say anything about what’s at the root (pardon the pun) of the problem – the fact that the infrastructure responsible for delivering these basic services to us is in a state of rapid decline. This all goes back to the IraSez philosophy of common sense when it comes to these types of issues.

When you build in a flood plain, it still floods. When you build more houses, offices and other commercial space without more roads and mass transit, you get traffic. When you don’t invest in aging utility poles and electrical wires (let alone new power plants), and you don’t take the time and effort to maintain the areas around those poles and wires, you get what we have now…a gargantuan pain in everyone’s ass! Nobody wants more taxes, nobody wants to spend money on infrastructure, and nobody wants to live through this kind of mess again, let alone twice in 2 months. But at what point do we become proactive instead of reactive? At what point do we say enough is enough? At what point do we start to realize that mother nature has played a big part in all these messes we keep getting into but the lack of investment in the basics that we take for granted will only make situations like this more and more common?

To me the answer is simple – invest in our infrastructure. Common sense, right? How to pay for that?  I’m not getting into that right now but I’m sure there’s a way. Here’s an interesting bit of trivia. Do you know what the name of our nation’s interstate system is? It’s the “Dwight D. Eisenhower National System of Interstate and Defense Highways” because it was built during his administration. Everyone once in awhile you will see a highway sign that says “Part of the Eisenhower Interstate System” or something along those lines. Think about this for a moment. Eisenhower was President in the 50s and there are probably large parts of our nations vital infrastructure that are that old, if not older. People, that’s over 50 years ago! Are the alarms going off yet? Now I’m not saying everything is that old but you gotta think that this is a symptom of the greater cause of our national infrastructure issues.

We all read the news and hear reports about other countries spending billions of dollars on their infrastructure. Economically these countries are leaving us behind, so for anyone who is screaming our government can’t spend more money because it’s going to kill the economy, again let’s think about common sense. Do we have a modern interstate highway system to transport people, goods and services? Do we have a modern national transit system to transport people and goods in a quick and environmental friendly mode (and alleviate the vehicular traffic)? Do we have a power/utility system that is properly maintained, uses the the latest technology and handles the needs of our citizens? Just my opinion but my answers are no, no and no.

What I’m really saying is our towns, our states and our country are beginning to show their age and it’s not a pretty picture.  Common sense tells me we need to do something and it needs to be soon. Common sense also tells me I could re-post this blog in another year and things will be the same…maybe even worse.  Common sense is also telling me it’s time to buy a generator.

Common Sense Political Party

Common Sense Political Party

Last week, I posted on facebook that I was thinking of starting my own political party and running for congress. Some folks suggested I should skip the whole congress thing and run for president right away. Unfortunately, there isn’t enough hush money in the world to cover up all the skeletons that would inevitably come charging out of that closet.  As I stated, my political party would be “The Common Sense Party” because it’s become quite apparent that common sense is completely lacking in our government today.

If I’m going to start my own party, I guess I need to start developing the ideas and ideals that my party would stand for. Now what I think is common sense might not be everyone’s cup of tea, so I’m open to suggestions. Let’s consider this the first in a series of blog posts that will address what The Common Sense Party stands for and how we will look at some of the serious issues in today’s political arena.

Issue 1 – War and Taxes
The last guy who was the leader of the free world started 2 wars and cut taxes at the same time. Common Sense tells us that if you are going to start a war that requires a major capital expenditure, cutting taxes is a bad idea. If you can’t pay for guns, air force planes, bombs, ammunition and most importantly, the people to fight your wars and protect them with the best body armor money can buy, than war is an even worse then it sounds. The Common Sense Party is anti-war and anti raising taxes but if you are going to go around wreaking havoc on the world, you better have some way to pay for it that won’t bankrupt the country.

Issue 2 – Pro Life and/or Pro Choice
This is one of my favorites. People who tend to be pro life when it comes to abortion issues also tend to be pro death penalty when it comes to criminal issues. It’s a right wing thing. They want to protect you in the womb but once you get out, you are on your own. And if you screw things up really bad, it’s “off with your head.” The Common Sense Party is pro choice. Nobody can really tell another person what to do with their body. But what to do if that person really screws up their life and does harm to others? I’m sure this won’t make left wing friends too happy but I’m going off with “off their head.” Common Sense tells me there’s better things we can do with our money, time, effort and space than keep hardened and dangerous to society criminals alive when it costs hundreds of  thousands of dollars per year per criminal alive to do so. Without apologies I’m going right on this one.

Issue 3 – The Legalization of Marijuana
If single malt scotch is legal, well pot should be too. It’s that simple. If you don’t believe me, go pour yourself a nice tall glass of McAllan’s 12 year old, drink that baby down and see if you don’t recognize the buzz.  If ever a war has been fought and lost it’s the war on drugs. Nancy Reagen said “just say no” but no one was and no one is listening, especially her neighbors in California where pot is a multi-billion dollar a year industry. The war is over and the stoners won. Whole communities depend on the pot industry for their livelihood and survival, so Common Sense says give up the fight and legalize it, regulate it, tax it, make money off it, just like tobacco and alcohol. As for pot being a gateway drug, oh please…if that were true, than everyone I know in college would have been addicted to cocaine or strung out on heroin. Guess what?  They weren’t then and they are not now. As a matter of fact, the one person I knew in college who didn’t smoke pot turned out to be the biggest whack job of them all.

I think that’s enough for today. Common Sense tells me my audience has a short attention span and 3 issues is enough for one sitting. Must be all that pot you people smoked in college!