Related: Christie Had Concern About Bridge Traffic
He shouldn't have:
"Internal report clears N.J. governor" by Michael Barbaro | New York Times March 28, 2014
NEW YORK — The Port Authority official who directed the shutdown of lanes to the George Washington Bridge said that he informed Governor Chris Christie of New Jersey about it at a Sept. 11 memorial while the lanes were closed, according to an internal review released Thursday by lawyers for the governor.
The official, David Wildstein, told Christie’s press secretary, Michael Drewniak, of the conversation at a dinner in December, on the eve of his resignation from the Port Authority, according to the inquiry.
But the report said that Christie did not recall Wildstein’s raising the topic and, in a sweeping claim of vindication, found no evidence that he — or any current members of his staff — was involved in or aware of the scheme before it snarled traffic for thousands of commuters in Fort Lee, N.J., from Sept. 9 to Sept. 12.
The inquiry instead blamed, almost entirely, Wildstein and the governor’s deputy chief of staff, Bridget Anne Kelly, describing Kelly as scrambling to cover up her role.
Christie has said he did not know of the lane closings before or while they were occurring, making the account of the purported exchange between Wildstein and Christie perhaps the most provocative revelation in the report, commissioned by Christie at a cost to taxpayers of at least $1 million.
I hope the cover-up was worth it.
Throughout its 360 pages, the document wove together panicked private e-mails, derisive text messages, and descriptions of dramatic confrontations between the Republican governor and his staff as the scandal unfolded.
Two parallel investigations, by the state Legislature and federal prosecutors, are not yet complete.
At a heated televised news conference, the former federal prosecutor who led the internal inquiry, Randy M. Mastro, frequently sounded like a defense lawyer making his case to a jury.
A fish out of water!
He called Kelly a “liar” and cast doubt on the credibility of the mayor of Hoboken, who accused the Christie administration of political intimidation.
Strong words.
Mastro, and his report, went so far as to describe a romantic relationship between Kelly and a top adviser to Christie who has been caught up in the imbroglio, seemingly insinuating that its breakup may have colored her judgment.
Oh, this wait on the bridge is getting steamy!
Wildstein, Kelly, and Bill Stepien, the former Christie campaign official to whom Kelly, it was suggested, was romantically linked, all declined to be interviewed for the internal report, raising questions about its thoroughness.
Dawn Zimmer, the mayor of Hoboken, also declined to be interviewed; she had accused the Christie administration of threatening to withhold recovery money for Hurricane Sandy if she refused to back a real estate project. The review, conducted by the corporate law firm Gibson Dunn & Crutcher, found her claims groundless.
The report did, however, outline extensive access to Christie, his lieutenant governor, Kim Guadagno, and the members of their staffs. But for all its tantalizing details, gleaned from a review of 250,000 pages of documents and interviews with more than 70 individuals, the report failed to resolve a central question: What motivated the closings?
Gibson Dunn lawyers wrote of an “ulterior motive” but could not identify it.
Christie later fired Kelly and cut ties to Stepien.
Despite Kelly’s senior status, the internal inquiry concluded that her behavior was “aberrational” and dismissed claims from Democrats that Christie fostered or condoned a culture of partisan payback.
“We found that this was the action of the few,” Mastro said at the news conference, in Gibson Dunn’s offices. “This is not reflective of the whole.”
Nevertheless, Mastro and his legal team recommended a series of immediate changes to the structure of the governor’s office: the creation of an ombudsman to begin restoring public trust, the appointment of an ethics officer to train the governor’s staff, and the elimination of the intergovernmental affairs office that Kelly oversaw.
I always laugh when they talk that way. The TRUST is GONE, guys!
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This is what he (and all of us) should be concerned about:
"Hillary Clinton, Jeb Bush see college as key force; Potential ’16 foes agree on its value" by Ken Thomas | Associated Press March 25, 2014
IRVING, Texas — Hillary Rodham Clinton and Jeb Bush, potential foes in the 2016 presidential contest, said Monday that higher education has the power to transform lives and be a force for democracy around the globe.
It also enslaves you to lenders, be they the profit-making government loans or banks that will get bailouts for defaults.
Clinton and Bush spoke separately at the Globalization of Higher Education conference, but chatted briefly offstage.
Related: Taking the Initiative
The event, co-organized by Bush, offered a bipartisan twist for the nation’s two dominant political families, both of whom could return to the presidential campaign trail next year. Bush, a former Florida governor, is the brother and son of Republican presidents.
W ruined that name, but we are talking rigged elections here with really no difference between the two families. Same secrets need to be kept.
Clinton’s husband, Bill Clinton, served two terms in the White House before she returned to political life as a senator from New York and President Obama’s first secretary of state.
On stage in solo performances, Clinton and Bush each focused on education policy and the need to make higher education affordable and accessible across the globe.
‘‘When people around the world have access to this kind of American model of education it illustrates . . . that we believe in spreading opportunity to more people, in more places, so that they too have the chance to live up to their own God-given potential,’’ Clinton said at the Dallas event.
She is worried, she added, ‘‘that we’re closing the doors to higher education in our own country so this great model that we’ve had that has meant so much to so many is becoming further and further away from too many.’’
She thanked Bush at the start of her speech, citing his focus on education and his ‘‘passion and dedication’’ to the issue in the private sector.
Bush spoke briefly at the start of the conference.
‘‘Higher education in America has a growing affordability problem while billions in the developing world struggle with accessibility. Exporting US post-secondary education and global consumers at scale can help really resolve both issues simultaneously,’’ Bush said. ‘‘Expanding access through technology can bring down the cost of delivery at home and abroad.’’
Bush has been a vocal supporter of the politically divisive Common Core standards, which specify what math and reading skills students should achieve in each grade. Some conservatives have criticized the standards as a federal intrusion into local classrooms.
The two families have produced three presidents since the 1988 election, a streak broken by Obama’s election in 2008.
Related: Conceding the Nomination to Clinton
She will be running against either Bush or Romney.
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Also see: George H.W. Bush to receive Kennedy award
The Kennedys have obviously been cooped for a long time now, and the brave brothers long dead and steeped in mythology.
How interesting it is, however, that a certain special prosecutor died recently? This is the nexus of two-family control and the crux of the $hit-fooley $how called politics. Guns for the Contras went from Mena air base in Arkansas to Honduras, dropped off the guns, filled up with cocaine, and headed back north.
Since both Bushes and Christie are bullies....
Related:
"Teens are defendants in bullying suit" by Geoff Mulvihill | Associated Press March 26, 2014
Nearly a dozen students and their parents have been brought into a lawsuit filed by a New Jersey teenager who accused two school districts of not doing enough to stop eight years of bullying.
A judge last week allowed 11 teens and their parents to become third-party defendants, a novel ruling that could have broader consequences when bullying is litigated. The judge and lawyers say it is the first time a New Jersey judge has been asked by a school district to add students as defendants in a bullying case....
In a lawsuit filed last year, the teen contended that he was tormented from fourth grade until last year, when he graduated as a junior. The teen says he was harassed first for being overweight, then for being perceived as gay.
Over the years in the Flemington-Raritan Regional district, he said, bullies dumped pasta and sauce on his clothes, poked him with their fingers, threw balls at his midsection, and made fun of him on Facebook.
At least they didn't tell colossal lies that led to mass-murdering war maneuvers and torture.
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Related:
"A fire early Friday destroyed a New Jersey shore motel that was housing people displaced by Hurricane Sandy."
That might slow him down a bit.
Looks like I'm stuck for the night. I'll see if I can get going early tomorrow for you.
