Seth Grossman has questions about the prosecutor’s role in solving the rampant homeless, crime, and drug issues in Atlantic City.
Tuesday, Oct 15, 2024 2:30pm to 3:30pm. 1400 AM, 92.3FM Near Atlantic City, NJ. WOND Radio.com online.
TRANSCRIPT:
DAN KLEIN: Good afternoon here. We got Seth Grossman in the studio, executive director for Liberty and Prosperity, and more info on them at libertyandprosperity.com.
SETH GROSSMAN: . Last week, I was talking about the Republicans, candidates running in Atlanta County. That for whatever reason, Christine Masker running for City Council in little Estell Manor is the only Republican candidate in Atlantic County with a lawnsign that says “Republican” on it. And I I just could not understand why, especially this year. This year, the issue is not whether it’s the personality of Trump or the personality of Kamala Harris. It’s about the policy. The Democratic Party has been hijacked by people who want to tear down everything this country stands for. Republicans may not be the sharpest tools in the in the in the shed, but they don’t want to destroy the country. So all a Republican candidate has to do to win this year, in my opinion, and based on a lot of voters I’ve talked to, is just say I am a Republican and I am against what the Democrats want to do. So if you want to stop the Democrats, you need to vote for me and every Republican from Trump all the way down to me. They used to have signs that said “Vote Republican.”
So some of the Republican candidates came to one of our liberty and prosperity breakfasts, and we talked about this. One of them said, we now realize we ought to do something like that, but look at the bright side. They said at least all of our signs are red, and everybody knows Republicans are red. Well, not everybody knows that.
DAN KLEIN: And then, of course, you have certain candidates who don’t have branding experience. I’m a marketing guy. Alright. I can see the argument. And and then, the Democrats, of course, most of their signs are blue.
SETH GROSSMAN: That’s right. The Democratic signs are blue. And in Democratic areas, they’ll say vote Democratic. In Republican areas, of course, they usually don’t say they’re Democrats. But my message to Republican candidates, especially in Republican majority areas, you could pretend that you’re not a Republican and everybody who doesn’t like Republicans is going to vote for you anyway because you are just a wonderful person. But when they look for you in the ballot, you’re going to be on the ballot with a label that says “Republican”. So, you’re not fooling anybody. They’re going to find out you’re Republican before they decide whether or not to vote for you. And as you point out, considering the environment we’re in today, it is a very easy way to differentiate and distinguish yourself from the other side. It’s actually it’s almost like gift wrap for crying out loud. But it would be easier if you had the word Republican.
But now you have most Republicans saying they have red signs, even if they don’t say Republican on them. And they’re also saying, we have a chance to pick up a Republican in the U.S. Senate by getting Curtis Bashaw elected. They say he can beat Andy Kim. I would agree with that. And that’s great. Every Republican should support him. So I’m driving down Amherst Avenue in Margate back from my morning swim, and he, taking my morning swim, and I’m driving down Amherst Avenue, and I saw my first Curtis Bashaw for senate sign. Democrat Blue! You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make it think!
DAN KLEIN: Years ago (after Richard Nixon), Democrats were on top and Republicans were in the doghouse. So they they brainstormed in the backroom. Alright. Listen. Here’s what we’re gonna do. We’re just not gonna put the party affiliation in there, and we’ll just, you know, be candidate against candidate. And we’re gonna hope that no one’s gonna know that we’re tied to a party. Meanwhile, something else before we get to the calls I just have to comment on. So the Democrats are saying how horrible and unpatriotic Republicans are to criticize FEMA, the Federal Emergency Management Administration, for the job it’s doing. Why is that unpatriotic?
SETH GROSSMAN: It’s not unpatriotic at all to criticize FEMA. But I just want to share my experience. And this goes back to when they first set up FEMA. And if you go back to what FEMA is all about, remember when we had the Cold War and fallout shelters. We had a federal Civil Defense agency that kept these barrels of water and survival crackers in these fallout shelters in the basement of every school and public building. That was so if, God forbid, there would be a nuclear attack, we’re all supposed to go into that fallout shelter and drink that water and eat those crackers for a couple of months until it’s safe to come out. So we had a federal agency called something like the U.S. Agency for Civil Defense.
So when Reagan ended the Cold War in the 1980s or maybe in 1990, you had this big federal agency with a big budget and nothing to do. So what did they do? They didn’t say we don’t need it any more and get rid of it and save all the money it was spending.
No, they talked about a “peace dividend” but we never got one. No, they created FEMA and fully funded it with the money that we didn’t need for Civil Defense anymore.
My first experience with FEMA was in 1991. I remember it because it was called the Halloween storm, and they made a movie out it called The Perfect Storm. We had flooding. Especially in Chelsea Heights in Atlantic City and the motels where they were keeping the homeless on the Black Horse Pike.
The first thing I noticed with FEMA is they’re giving out money, and they were giving out money to a bunch of homeless bums living in the those motels on the Black Horse Pike who said all their clothes were ruined because the water came up 6 inches. So all you had to do, if you know the water is gonna come, you just put the your clothes on your bed or on the dresser drawer. And even if your clothes did get wet, you just wash them. You know?
But they were giving $300 vouchers for the homeless to get new clothes. And FEMAs set up shop on the first floor of the All Wars Memorial Building on States and Pacific Avenues in Atlantic City. And the Red Cross was set up on the second floor of that building, and they were also giving out $200 or $300 vouchers to anyone who came in and said their clothese got wet.
I remember going up to both groups and telling them that this was a ridiculous duplication and waste of money. But then I realized that they didn’t care. It was there job to give out money, and the more money they gave out, the more important they were.
The second thing I noticed was that all of the FEMA people were from Florida and Puerto Rico and that they knew absolutely nothing about the area. They didn’t know which street flooding was normal, and what was not. And again, they didn’t care. Someone could have said their clothes were ruined from flooding in Hammonton, and these guys wouldn’t know the difference.
They would have been much better off hiring a local engineer who knew the area. This is so different from what we used to do. My dad told me about the hurricane in 1944 where you had the local fishermen, your national guard, the police. Everybody local worked together to help the people in the low lying areas, and they did the same thing during the March Storm of 1962.
So this whole idea of a federal agency to do this local stuff shows how we’ve lost our way. And you really saw the evil of it when you had Hurricane Sandy in 2012, which wasn’t even a hurricane. It was not a severe storm, but it came during a full moon high tide after sitting still off the coast for a day. Then the eye of the storm came ashore over Somers Point, and it caused the wind to instantly shift. So there was almost zero flooding from the ocean, but lots of flooding in the back bays.
So we had this flooding, and it was critical when the water went down to get back to your house or business and drain the water and dry out your place before mold started growing. Everybody wanted to get back on the islands as soon as the water went down. But what did FEMA do? They got Governor Christie to say they were going to lock you up if you try to get back to your home by the shore.
They they basically blockaded Brigantine, and Atlantic City. They actually had a guy die of cold in his house because his family could not get back, to see him.
DAN KLEIN: So, you know, when and all because their all purpose is to give out money. The iron hand We don’t know yeah. The iron hand of government.
SETH GROSSMAN: They have the full authority of government, but they’re not, a, they’re not efficient. They don’t seem to they have all nothing but money, but they don’t also don’t seem to care too much about getting the job done or doing the right thing. I’m not saying everybody. I’m just saying, as a whole, they seem to be very difficult to deal with. And by the way, anyone who has dealt with any agency, and I remember being on city council. I remember being, you know, involved with the school. When you get a government grant for a $1,000,000 and it’s and it’s to cover for the year, and now it’s in October, and you still have $300,000 he didn’t spend yet. And you know that if you want to get a $1,000,000 next year, you better spend that $300,000 on something, and they’ll know just, all this money gets spent away on garbage, overtime, whatever. It’s upside down. And FEMA does the exact same thing. And that’s why, you know, on these trivial things, they spend all their money, and then we have a real disaster. The money’s not there. . . .
Seth Grossman is executive director of Liberty And Prosperity, which he co-founded in 2003. It promotes American liberty and limited constitutional government through weekly radio and in-person discussions, its website, email newsletters and various events. Seth Grossman is also a general practice lawyer.
