Opinion

On Election Day 1872, Susan Brownwell Anthony, a life-long Republican and community organizer, boasted to a friend that she had "positively voted the Republican ticket -- Strait." Two weeks later, she was arrested and eventually tried and convicted for illegally voting in a presidential election -- a right women were denied for another half century. She never paid the fine.

This year's historic candidacy of U.S. Sen. Barack Obama wouldn't even be possible without the work of organizers like Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin might not even be allowed to vote, let alone run for office had it not been for women's suffrage leaders like Susan B. Anthony.

But that thought probably didn't cross her mind last week at the Republican National Convention when she compared her experience to Obama's: "I guess a small-town mayor is sort of like a 'community organizer,' except that you have actual responsibilities."

It's a farcical insult, especially when almost within the same breath, Palin told us that her own political career began with a community organization. "I was just your average hockey mom, and signed up for the PTA because I wanted to make my kids' public education better," she said without a hint of irony.

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Steering NJN's ship away from rocky financial uncertainty won't be easy. In fact, it may not even be possible according to the some of the folks on deck.

"It's difficult to steer a ship if the crew is in mutiny," stated NJN's Interim News Director Michael Aron.

Aron was commenting on the NJN proposal to transition the station from a state-licensed entity to a community licensed broadcaster.  The audience and the mission of NJN would remain largely unchanged from the perspective of Elizabeth Cristopherson, NJN's executive director. However the station would no longer have to rely on diminishing state funding  (not to mention fickle politics)  to pay its way into the 21st century. 

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There's something missing from the Republican Convention. There is a need for a camera behind the curtain where speakers greet friends and family after they speak. Then we could discover if some of the Republican speakers can actually keep a straight face after their remarks.

It's a fair question. Mitt Romney assailed the Democrats for the growth in government spending. I assume that he is aware that there's been a Republican President for the last eight years who governed during most of that time with a Republican Congress. He expressed outrage at the mounting federal debt. Everyone in the convention hall must know that Bill Clinton balanced the budget and was reducing the debt until the  Bush Administration added more debt than any President in history.

My favorite was the assault on Democrats over national security and the continuous praise of American soldiers. I can't be the only one who remembers George Bush sending young Americans into combat without flak vests and in unprotected Humvees. Wouldn't protecting these soldiers be a better sign of devotion?

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The Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee spent an additional $43,000 last week in support of state Sen. John Adler's (D-Cherry Hill) 3rd Congressional District bid, bringing their total expenditures in the race to $65,000.

That's less than the $93,000 in independent expenditures made this cycle in the 7th district for Linda Stender (D-Fanwood).

The Republican Congressional Campaign Committee has not made any independent expenditures in the state.

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And now we go back in time, to Mr. Dembo's eighth grade science class and JHS 278, and a sixteen millimeter film about the seasonal migration of a very special species of ‘birds'----the Politicus Presidentius Candidatus. This year, the migration started particularly early....

In the quadrennial running of "the presidential candidates" [Politicus Presidentius Candidatus], within both ‘Republicanus' and ‘Democraticus' varieties, there seems to be one common similarity amongst the species: it is how those who previously attacked opponents viciously during their year long migration around the country in search of the nourishment of ‘votes', now lavish praise upon the most popular presidential candidate, as they settle in for a brief gathering before the hard ‘political season'.

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To view a larger version of this cartoon, click here.

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Some political humor just writes itself. And who says Sarah Palin's not ready to be president, anyway?

She has a brother-in-law like Jimmy Carter's brother, that she tried to fire. A sex scandal with her daughter equal to any Bill Clinton ever did. Her husband drives drunk like George W. Bush. And she is being investigated for ethics violations in her home state. Ready for president? She is pre-scandalized, for heck's sake! What could happened to her in the White House that already hasn't happened? The odds are with her. So, for your enjoyment, but before she's dropped from the ticket, I offer this song. Read More >