Rob Tornoe Posts

So South Jersey, are you ready for your new natural gas pipeline? It's kind of a rhetorical question, because it seems you may get one regardless if you want it or not.

Ever seen an old, worn-down punching bag hanging lonely in the back corner of a run-down gym? That's Camden, which has repeatedly suffered blow after blow following years of negligence, public corruption and gross incompetence.

It was delivered another body blow on Thursday, when news broke that in an effort to cut costs, Camden School District will lay off about 400 people, 300 coming directly from schools.

Noted in the news was the fact that enrollment

Christie's ethos of personal responsibility is proving to be as fictionalized as the notion of a traffic study happening on the George Washington Bridge.

Christie's ethos of personal responsibility is proving to be as fictionalized as the notion of a traffic study happening on the George Washington Bridge.

Bridgegate may have unleashed the hounds, but it's the slow-trickle of Sandy-related malfeasance that could harm the wounded emperor the most. Remember, he built his popularity largely on his leadership during the aftermath of Sandy, and his ability to embrace President Obama and chastise members of his own party endeared him to supporters statewide.

Call me crazy, but as I listened to Gov. Christie go through his policy priorities for the coming year in his annual State of the State speech, I got the sense his legislative agenda was being upstaged by the scandal that has surrounded him and his administration over the past week.

Unlike excessive military spending, the benefits to our culture, society and future are clearly understood for every NASA mission that widens our view of the universe. No one ever had to ask the value of studying the soil on Mars, or the need to fund a telescope that can catalogue the very beginnings of our universe.

As of Sunday, your drive to work or enjoyment of "The View" will no longer be marred by those annoyingly catchy "Strong than the Storm" ads. 

But with a gubernatorial campaign being increasingly waged on Christie's response to the aftermath of Superstorm Sandy, it will be months before New Jerseyans are completely free of the entanglements of that anger-inducing jingle. 



As of Sunday, your drive to work or enjoyment of "The View" will no longer be marred by those annoyingly catchy "Strong than the Storm" ads. 

But with a gubernatorial campaign being increasingly waged on Christie's response to the aftermath of Superstorm Sandy, it will be months before New Jerseyans are completely free of the entanglements of that anger-inducing jingle. 



Starting next year, a student a Rutgers University's College of Arts and Science at New Brunswick, who is on the most popular meal and housing plan, will have to shell out $25,007 for a single year. Keep in mind – Rutgers is a state university.

Starting next year, a student a Rutgers University's College of Arts and Science at New Brunswick, who is on the most popular meal and housing plan, will have to shell out $25,007 for a single year. Keep in mind – Rutgers is a state university.

Florida teenager Trayvon Martin, dangerously "armed with concrete," was found guilty of his own murder over the weekend, and gun-toting George Zimmerman, the man who pulled the trigger that ended Trayvon's life, was nothing more than an innocent victim of reverse racism.

According to many, this is justice, a defense of the mindset that says people should be suspicious of young black men because chances are they're doing drugs, acting thuggish and probably up to no good. A shining example of a judicial system that seems inclined to punish black men much more harshly than it does everyone else, even when they themselves are the victims.

Gay marriage, legalized marijuana, climate change, women's healthcare funding - there are big items that a majority of New Jerseyans support that Christie has all but given the "shore bird salute" to, yet they still love him. Why?

As politicians in Washington continue to ignore the plight of students drowning in student loan debt, a new proposal developed by students in Oregon takes an innovative approach that could alleviate the need for student loans all together.

Under the proposal, referred to as Pay It Forward and lauded by Senator Mark Hass as an example of "out of the box thinking," local students would be able to attend public universities and community colleges in the state for free.

Over 60 percent of New Jerseyans want gay marriage, and both the Assembly and state Senate passed a law legalizing it. The only thing standing between same-sex couples in New Jersey and equal rights is Christie's veto, which he's been unwilling to relinquish following the U.S.Supreme Court's landmark ruling on gay rights.

Deen polarizes the "New South" for me, and showcases the reason why the Supreme Court's decision is so flawed. People have changed in the south, but there remains an unsettling willingness to defend racism as a leftover of a bygone era that's romanticized and remembered fondly in certain quarters.

Poor Barbara Buono. The only Democrat in New Jersey with the guts to take on Chris Christie has languished for months beneath a media radar that's begun to turn her obscurity into a campaign narrative. 



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"Protect the child molesters" doesn't appear anywhere in the Bible that I know of, but the New Jersey Catholic Conference seems to be acting like it does, hiring the most expensive and powerful lobbying firm in Trenton, Princeton Public Affairs, to fight against a bill that would extend the statute of limitations for sexual abuse victims.

And the Academy Award for best actor in a leading performance goes to... Chris Christie, governor of New Jersey.

Still think Christie is that refreshing, say-what's-on-his-mind politician? Just re-watch Christie's press conference announcing a special election to fill the seat of the late Senator Frank Lautenberg to see a modern day Wizard of Oz, revealed to be nothing more than a self-serving, calculating politician doing what's best for himself.