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What did Christie know, and when did he know it?
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KGB-NP



Joined: 25 Jul 2001
Posts: 2856

PostPosted: Thu Apr 03, 2014 5:29 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

pueno wrote:
bajaDean wrote:

Thanks for proving my point.... as I said the crime was committed by the savings and loan and cost taxpayers dearly.

I'm not arguing with you... I'm adding details to (clarify) your point. We're saying the same thing.
.


Laughing Laughing Laughing Are you sure? It sure sounds like you're arguing. Laughing Laughing Laughing
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pueno



Joined: 03 Mar 2007
Posts: 2807

PostPosted: Thu Apr 03, 2014 5:55 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

reinerehlers wrote:
Are you sure? It sure sounds like you're arguing.

If that's what it sounds like, then I suggest you have your ears checked.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Very Happy
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KGB-NP



Joined: 25 Jul 2001
Posts: 2856

PostPosted: Thu Apr 03, 2014 10:48 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Cleaning ears is easy, altering ones demeanor is difficult.
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pueno



Joined: 03 Mar 2007
Posts: 2807

PostPosted: Thu Apr 03, 2014 11:22 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

reinerehlers wrote:
Cleaning ears is easy, altering ones demeanor is difficult.

Those voices in your head speaking to you again?
.
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KGB-NP



Joined: 25 Jul 2001
Posts: 2856

PostPosted: Thu Apr 03, 2014 12:22 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

No voices, but I'm not void of decency or conscience, or incapable of introspection, which is more than can be said for many these days.
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real-human



Joined: 02 Jul 2011
Posts: 14834
Location: on earth

PostPosted: Mon Apr 07, 2014 3:50 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

at least one of Christies top people have now gone in front of grand juries last week. Not the ones that appear to be in big trouble. But for instance his former press secretary at the time who is not a person of interest but may have details.

and some of the top ones at least one who plead the fifth, this weekend were seen coming out of the federal prosecutors office. Which could mean they are working on stay out of jail deals so that higher ups do go to jail.

http://www.nj.com/politics/index.ssf/2014/04/in_bridge_scandal_grand_jury_investigation_is_underway_upping_the_ante.html
Quote:

Among those who have testified before the grand jury in Newark is Michael Drewniak, the governor’s chief spokesman, his attorney, Anthony Iacullo, confirmed.

Iacullo stressed, however, that Drewniak is not a target of the investigation.

_________________
when good people stay silent the right wing are the only ones heard.
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mac



Joined: 07 Mar 1999
Posts: 17742
Location: Berkeley, California

PostPosted: Mon Apr 07, 2014 6:42 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Some of the battle over State pension funds has stemmed directly from the ability of those funds to generate political patronage--and campaign contributions. Here from the Nation, on another scandal that may dog Chris Christie:

Quote:
Lee Fang is a reporting fellow with The Investigative Fund at The Nation Institute.

Four months into his first term, Governor Chris Christie stood at the podium of the Manhattan Institute, a conservative think tank, and laid out what was billed as the “Christie Reform Agenda.” To enthusiastic applause, the New Jersey governor railed against what he described as an out-of-control state public pension system. “Our benefits are too rich, and our employees aren’t contributing enough, either,” he said. “We are careening our way toward becoming Greece.”

Christie had just won his first statewide election with the help of Paul Singer, the hedge fund manager who chairs the Manhattan Institute. The month before Christie’s election victory in November 2009, Singer had given $100,000 to the Republican Governors Association (RGA), which aired a barrage of advertisements in Christie’s favor.

In that campaign, among Christie’s lines of attack against incumbent Democrat Jon Corzine was that he had mismanaged the state pension system and had unethically invested retiree money on Wall Street. “Jon Corzine made it easier for his friends from Wall Street to manage New Jersey’s pension fund,” blasted a “Christie for Governor” press release.

But once he was elected, Governor Christie moved to award big pension management contracts to the Wall Street donors who have helped boost his political fortunes. In his second year in office, Christie’s administration proposed giving Singer’s hedge fund, Elliott Associates, a contract to manage $200 million in state public pension funds. Elliott Associates won the contract in 2012. Singer again demonstrated his political loyalty to Christie in December 2013, shortly after Christie became chair of the RGA, a coveted post for GOP presidential aspirants. This time, Singer gave the group $1.25 million, making him the largest contributor that year and significantly enlarging the RGA’s war chest under Christie.

Another hedge fund manager with close political ties to Christie, Daniel Loeb, has also won big contracts to manage state retiree money under the governor, The Nation has found.

Before it was tarnished by Bridgegate, Christie’s political brand hinged on the governor’s celebrated efforts to reform the public pension system—including his moves to increase the retirement age for some workers, cut benefits, and make adjustments to how much state employees pay into the plan. Less noticed was how, under Christie, the amount of retiree money in the hands of outside managers, such as private equity firms or hedge funds like Singer’s, dramatically increased, while the share going to less risky and more traditional investments like treasury notes or the S&P 500 declined.http://www.thenation.com/article/178862/pensiongate-christie-campaign-donors-won-huge-contracts#



How big? In 2013 the New Jersey pension funds generated $1.2 billion in management and performance fees. Worth fighting over, eh?

If you want more, look into the Kentucky story, http://www.forbes.com/sites/edwardsiedle/2013/01/23/kentucky-retirement-system-whistleblower-gives-unite-here-union-report-to-sec/

and http://wfpl.org/post/kentuckys-zombie-pension-problem
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mac



Joined: 07 Mar 1999
Posts: 17742
Location: Berkeley, California

PostPosted: Mon Apr 14, 2014 2:03 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

He's toast. The problem with bullies in politics is that they leave footprints because they want everybody to know how they can hurt you. So much for bully boy Chris:

Quote:
CROSSING CHRISTIE What the bridge scandal says about the Governor’s political style, and his future.
BY RYAN LIZZA
APRIL 14, 2014

Chris Christie’s mentor, former Governor Thomas Kean, says that one of Christie’s flaws “is that he makes enemies and keeps them.”Chris Christie’s mentor, former Governor Thomas Kean, says that one of Christie’s flaws “is that he makes enemies and keeps them.” Illustration by Daniel Adel.

On April 1st, Chris Christie, the beleaguered Republican governor of New Jersey, attended a celebrity roast, in Newark, to celebrate the ninetieth birthday of Brendan Byrne, the state’s governor from 1974 to 1982. “He’s an inspiration,” Christie told the audience, referring to Byrne, who won reëlection against long odds, because he has “shown that political comebacks can actually happen.”


Read the rest here: http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2014/04/14/140414fa_fact_lizza?currentPage=all
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mac



Joined: 07 Mar 1999
Posts: 17742
Location: Berkeley, California

PostPosted: Tue Jan 20, 2015 1:06 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Who would know better?

Quote:
BY HERB JACKSON
WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT | THE RECORD

As Governor Christie goes before the Legislature to deliver his annual State of the State speech today, residents are skeptical about his motives and increasingly pessimistic about New Jersey’s direction, a new poll says.

Just 36 percent of the state’s voters believe New Jersey is headed in the right direction, while 49 percent say it’s on the wrong track, according to the new PublicMind poll released today by Fairleigh Dickinson University. That’s a decline from last March, when 41 percent said right direction and 45 percent said wrong track.

The poll also found those who disapprove of the job Christie is doing exceed those who approve by 47 percent to 39 percent. In January 2014, those numbers were almost reversed, with 48 percent approving and 39 percent disapproving.
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mac



Joined: 07 Mar 1999
Posts: 17742
Location: Berkeley, California

PostPosted: Tue Mar 10, 2015 10:27 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

More things you won't learn on Faux news, talk radio, or most mainstream media:

Quote:
LINDEN – Reports that New Jersey had settled a pollution lawsuit against ExxonMobil for $250 million — a fraction of the $8.9 billion the state has been fighting for more than a decade — got it wrong.

The state actually settled for less: $225 million.

"It's worse than we thought," said state Sen. Raymond Lesniak, the Union County Democrat who's been leading the charge against the settlement since news of it was reported last week by the New York Times.

On Thursday, in the middle of a snowstorm that closed state and government offices, Gov. Chris Christie's administration confirmed the settlement for the first time.

While state officials called the $225 million amount "historic" and estimated it to be as many as six times greater than previous cases, critics say the settlement shortchanges the state in a case involving decades of industrial contamination to 1,500 acres of wetlands and waterways in Bayonne and Linden, where the Bayway refinery left deep lagoons filled with toxic sludge.

The case may now turn into another scandal for Christie, with Democratic lawmakers announcing a March 19 hearing in the Assembly to get answers from state officials.

State officials on Thursday did not explain why the administration settled for nearly three cents on the dollar.

The proposed settlement must undergo a 30-day public comment period and be approved by a Superior Court judge.

A growing number of Democratic lawmakers, environmental groups and local officials have blasted the Christie administration for the deal.

State Sen. Raymond Lesniak (pictured) is challenging the Exxon Mobile settlement and suggested that Acting Attorney General John Hoffman resign if a report saying that the governor’s office interfered in the lawsuit is true.

Lesniak plans to challenge the settlement and on Thursday said that acting Attorney General John J. Hoffman should resign if former state Department of Environmental Protection Commissioner Bradley Campbell's accusation that Christie's chief counsel muscled his way into the settlement negotiation is true.

"Former colleagues of mine in state government, where I served as commissioner of environmental protection from 2002 to 2006, have told me that Mr. Christie's chief counsel inserted himself into the case, elbowed aside the attorney general and career employees who had developed and prosecuted the litigation, and cut the deal favorable to Exxon," Campbell, who ran the state DEP under Gov. Jim McGreevey, a Democrat, said Thursday in a New York Times op-ed.

On Thursday, a spokesman for Christie called Campbell's comments "baseless allegations" coming "from a known partisan," and pointed out that under Campbell's watch the DEP had settled environmental cases for far less.

"Campbell's attacks are even more irresponsible, disingenuous, and baldly political when you consider that as DEP Commissioner, Campbell projected Exxon's liability could run into the 'hundreds of millions of dollars' and said the case would likely have a reasonable basis to be settled, rather than fully litigated," he said.

"The notion that this settlement represents something less than what is fair for New Jerseyans is absurd and baseless when you consider the facts of the settlement and Campbell's prior comments on this case."

In a separate joint statement, Hoffman and DEP Commissioner Bob Martin said the settlement is "on top of ExxonMobil's separate obligation to remediate the contaminated Bayonne and Linden refinery sites at the company's sole expense... The agreement reinforces ExxonMobil's obligations to clean up the sites, which are ongoing pursuant to Administrative Consent Orders (ACOs) previously entered into between ExxonMobil and the state Department of Environmental Protection (DEP).

"Under the ACOs, ExxonMobil must thoroughly investigate and fully remediate contamination at both the Bayway and Bayonne facilities to standards specified in DEP regulations," the statement said.

But Lesniak on Thursday dismissed the state's praise of its own deal, saying that the remediation "was something they always had to do."

"We always knew that they had to remediate the sites. The $8.9 billion was for restoration and for economic value damages," Lesniak said. "They are trying to gild the lilly on a bad deal and now it's worse."

Jeff Tittel, director of the New Jersey Sierra Club, called Hoffman's statement "a snowjob in the middle of a blizzard."

"This is a case that New Jersey was going to win, but the Christie administration decided to sell out the people of New Jersey. They settled this case for pennies on the dollar," Tittel said.

"This is a bigger scandal than Bridgegate. Bridgegate was about retribution. This settlement is costing the taxpayers billions of dollars. When you sell out the public and let the polluters off the hook, it sends a message that you can get away with anything in the Christie administration. There needs to be an investigation because it looks like the attorney general is involved in a cover-up not a cleanup."


Gov. Chris Christie’s administration is taking heat from Democrats and environmental groups over an Exxon Mobil pollution lawsuit settlement.

Debbie Mans, executive director of NY/NJ Baykeeper, which advocates for the Hudson and Raritan estuary, said part of the settlement could be diverted from cleanup in order to balance the state budget.

The state used much of the $355 million obtained in similar litigation involving the Passaic River as general revenue in the budget. Just $67.4 million went toward river cleanup and restoration.

"Budget holes should not be filled with dollars meant to restore the places where New Jerseyans live, work and raise their children. It's irresponsibility bordering on immorality," Mans said in a statement.

"Once again, Gov. Christie has turned his back on our communities who have suffered years of pollution impacts. Not only will the proposed settlement not address the cleanup, or ultimate restoration, of the site, ExxonMobil has pushed to leave the pollution in place and simply place a cap on the pollution and walk away."

Martin and Hoffman said the ExxonMobil settlement money "would not be received by the state until, at the earliest, fiscal year 2016; the allocation of these funds will depend upon the appropriations act enacted for that respective fiscal year."

Exxon owned the Bayway refinery from 1909 to 1993 and paid millions to settle previous pollution cases. In 2005, Bayway owner ConnocoPhillips agreed to spend $60 million on air-pollution controls as part of a state and federal settlement.

Staff Writer Sergio Bichao: 908-243-6615; sbichao@mycentraljersey.com


New Jersey had won the case involving contamination of a marsh, and the judge was considering the level of penalties. Here from another source is the money connection:

Quote:
Since Christie's first run for governor in 2009, Exxon has donated more than $1.9 million to the Republican Governors Association, which financed his campaigns.

The more details of this case come to light, the more clear Christie's ties to Exxon become. He even hired a former Exxon lawyer as his attorney general in 2010.
http://action.sumofus.org/a/exxonsettlement/?sub=fwd

I'm sure apologists for the carbon industry can spin this away. I'm equally sure that big carbon will contribute mightily to Christie's run for president.
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