LIBERTYandPROSPERITY.org UPDATE
1.?? Thanks to the dozens of individuals and groups from around South Jersey who made last Friday?s?? Teach-In on the Ocean City Boardwalk such a success.?? We taught all about the ignorance, dishonesty, tyranny, and corruption of the Wind Energy racket.? We especially thank Steve Lonegan of Americans for Prosperity for bringing this opportunity to our attention.?? Lonegan and his group also helped with ?publicity, transportation, etc., and even hired an airplane to carry a banner with our message along the Ocean City beach.?? Thanks to Rose Wakeman and her Tea Party Group and Rob Eichmann and his group from Gloucester County.??? We also thank Brenda Roames and her Greenwich Tea Party Patriots of Cumberland and Salem Counties taking part.?? Thanks also to that vacationing couple who posted Seth Grossman?s column on their blog http://quixoteslaststand.com/
2.?? If you didn?t notice, we got fair and balanced coverage in the Press of Atlantic City, http://www.
the Ocean City Gazette,?? See http://www.shorenewstoday.com/
3.? More on the Wind Energy Scam:??? Our President, Dennis Mahon discussed these details of wind energy at our Saturday breakfast discussion the next day.
A study was done by the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities as part of ?NJ?s Clean Energy Program. The information for this study was from the year 2002, but will do nicely for our calculations.
In 2002, New Jersey the in-state capacity of our public utilities was 18,000 megawatts. Another 3,421 megawatts was generated on-site (co-generation facilities). And the state needed to import 6,400 megawatts from outside sources. So in 2002 New Jersey had access to 27,847 megawatts of generation capability. So how many windmills would we need to replace this capacity?
The industry standard windmill is manufactured by GE and has a rated ?output of 1.5 megawatts. If we divide 27,847 megawatts by 1.5 megawatts,? in 2002 New Jersey would have needed 18,565 windmills in order to replace? ?the electric generation capacity that the state needed. Now that is a lot of??windmills!
The next thing to figure out is how much area we would need to install all of ?these windmills. To prevent interference from other windmills each windmill ?of the 1.5 megawatt range is placed on a footprint of 10 acres. Since there are ?640 acres in one square mile we could put up 64 windmills per square mile.? ?To put up the 18,565 windmills all we need is 290 square miles of land or ??ocean. Of course this area would be greater than the size of Bergen County?? (and most counties in New Jersey) so the environmentalists say we should? ?build them off-shore. This sounds nice but there is one more consideration to ?take into account if these windmills are going to be placed off-shore and this ?is the depth of the water they are constructed in. In order to be cost efficient,??? ?or as much as possible, the depth should not exceed 100 feet. So where could ??all of these windmills be placed?
There are shallow areas a fair distance from the shore but for all real world applications, the require depth to put all of these windmills is very close to the? ?beach.
Now the length of the Jersey shoreline is 127 miles. If we divide that number? into the 290 square miles of area we need to install all of those windmills we? would have to construct windmills along a 2.7 mile width along the length of ?the Jersey shore. Even if some of the windmills would be constructed farther? out to sea, it doesn?t take a rocket scientist to see that many of them would? ?have to be sited well within line sight of the beach. Oh, and keep in mind, this ??is the minimum amount of windmills that would be needed to replace the? ?electricity capacity for New Jersey in 2002 at fully rated output. No? ????allowances have been made for the times that the windmills are not running at maximum capacity. Just think of how much more area would be needed if ?we had to double the amount of windmills in order to insure adequate electric capacity.??? (On the morning of last Saturday?s meeting, there was no wind whatsoever?all of the flags were hanging limp, and the five wind turbines in Atlantic City were not moving.?? On the average, wind turbines function at 20% to 30% of their stated capacity, so we would need three to five times as many wind turbines as indicated above.)
And finally we come to the cost of such a project. The typical cost to install 1 megawatt of windmill power; on-shore is $2.6 million. To install the same capacity windmill off-shore would be 3 times more expensive; $7.8 million. ince our windmills will be 1.5 megawatts each the projected installation cost ?????would be $11.7 million per windmill. Finally, since it will cost $11.7 millioner windmill, and we need 18,565 to meet the electrical capacity requirements ?of New Jersey the anticipated cost would be $217 billion! And to put this number into perspective this price tag would be what New Jersey taxes and spends from all? sales tax, all income taxes, and all lottery, casino, and hotel tax income to run itself, at the current budget of about $30 billion, for over 7 years.
One last thing to consider in conclusion, this exercise is only for the amount of windmills that would have been needed to replace the needs of the citizens of New Jersey in 2002. It is also for the exact amount of generation, based on deal conditions. If one was to build into the project for those times when an ?individual windmill will only generate 50% of its rated capacity the price tag ????for the project would be $434 billion. If we planned on times when it would ???only produce 25% the cost would be $868 billion. And for all of this money, we ????would still have to build conventional generation facilities for those times when no electricity is being produced by our almost $1 trillion windmill system. (Submitted by Dennis Mahon, President, LibertyAndProsperity.org)
4.? July 4 Parade in Galloway Township.? We will be marching in that parade which begins at 9AM in the shopping center parking lot on Smithville Blvd.??? We must assemble there by 8:30.?? We again agreed to hire up to three drummers for this event.?? You must be fit enough to march and carry a flag or a six foot wooden pike draped with a red liberty cap.??? We need at least 24 participants to make an effective presentation.? Can you join us?? If so, contact Seth Grossman at sethgrossman49@gmail.com.
5.?? We are spending too much money!??? We need another summer fundraising event this year, and a successful Richard Somers Day event in September to maintain our current level of activity.??? Do you know anyone with a nice beach house who can host a ?high-roller? fundraising even in July or August???? Can you help us with our Richard Somers day event in Somers Point in September??? Again, please contact Seth Grossman at sethgrossman49@gmail.com.
6.?? Become a full voting member of LibertyAndProsperity.org!??? Dues are $60 per year, attend 3 business meetings each year, and work on at least one volunteer project each year.??? Or be a non-voting supporting member for just $30 per year, with no other? commitment.
7.? Help us design a new LibertyAndProsperity.org logo and slogan.?? We will review all suggestions at our July meeting and award a $50 stipend to the winning design.????? There is a consensus so far that the new log will depict a red liberty cap and pole, and words similar or comparable to ?LibertyAndProsperity.org?Free Citizens must do more than just vote.?
8.?? Please preview Seth Grossman?s proposed column for the Current and Gazette newspapers and give him your corrections, criticisms, and suggestions as sethgrossman49@gmail.com.
Last week,? Republican Governor Chris Christie held? a? ?Town Hall Meeting? in Galloway Township in Atlantic County.?? Those who follow politics no by now that ?Town Hall Meetings? are a useful way to sell bad ideas to uninformed voters.
Democrat? Governor Jon Corzine? used them in in 2008 sell his scheme to hock the Parkway, Turnpike, and Expressway for $30 billion, and then and raise tolls by 800%.?? Democrats in Congress used them in 2009 and 2010 to sell ObamaCare.
That is because while ?Town Hall Meetings?? appear to be open and spontaneous, they are easily? controlled and manipulated.?? They let politicians get their main talking points reported as facts in the newspaper and TV news without being challenged? or contradicted.
They do this by stacking the audience with friendly supporters.?? Most others who attend these things are there to talk about local or personal issues that are of little interest to anyone else.??? Questions and answers are brief, and no follow-up questions are permitted when the politician gives an incomplete, dishonest, or evasive answer.
On rare occasions, informed citizens can prepare, organized, and hijack a Town Hall Meeting and? upset the politician?s agenda.??? Steve Lonegan?s Americans for Prosperity and our LIBERTYandPROSPERITY.org? did that to derail? Corzine?s toll hike? scheme in 2009.??? Tea Party conservatives around the country dominated the Town Hall Meetings of Democratic members of Congress who tried to sell ObamaCare in 2009 and 2010?and then voted many of them out of office to put Republicans back in control of the House of Representatives.?? But that takes lots of time, money, and preparation.
But nobody challenged Christie last week, and all of his talking points came out as ?news?.???? ?Governor Christie courageously cut the New Jersey state budget by $11 billion during his first term. . . He reformed the state pension system. . .? He revived the New Jersey economy and created jobs.??? He now wants? to cut taxes, but the Democrats in the Legislature won?t let him.
All of these are lies.?? Christie never? cut Corzine?s Democrat budget of? $29.8 billion for 2009-2010.???? Christie?s first budget of 2010-2011 budget was? $29.3 billion–a half billion less than Corzine?s budget.?? Christie did not do this by cutting spending.? He instead cut the Constitutionally mandated return of state income tax money for property tax relief in the form of homestead rebates and state aid to suburban towns.?? (Another billion dollars was also cut from Corzine?s budget when Obama?s federal stimulus spending of 2009 came to an end.?? Republican Christie actually spent more on state government salaries and programs than Democrat Corzine did!
Christie also applied electric rate hike money to his budget as a hidden tax hiked, and borrowed to bail out private business failures like the Revel Casino.?? According to www.sunshinereview.org, NJ now has total debts, (including unfunded pension debts)? of $281,544,674?about $200,000 for every family that pays taxes in New Jersey.
Christie did nothing to curb the undue influence of government employees in New Jersey.??? Unlike Governor Walker in Wisconsin, Christie said he ?loved? collective bargaining for public employees in NJ.?? He never opposed the law that forces every one of the 103,000 public school teachers in New Jersey to? pay dues of roughly $1,200 per year to three? unions (national NEA, state NJEA, and local chapters).??? Those dues give those unions $123 million each year to buy political clout?far more than what billionaires like? the Koch Brothers spend here.
Christie did nothing to fix the public employee pension mess.? ?The June NJEA newsletter reported that total? New Jersey pension fund assets were $70.7 billion in March of 2012.?? That money is for 590,200 active public employees in New Jersey and 800,000 retirees now collecting pensions.??? If you divide the total pension funds by the number of active and retired members in the system, you get about $50,000 per person.
No private employee with $50,000 in his or her 401(k) would dream of retiring at age 55 and expect a yearly retirement income of $40,000 per year for the next 26 years of his or her expected life.???? But teachers and government employees in NJ do it all the time.? Until this Ponzi scheme crashes.
By September, when the Revel Casino lays off the employees it hired in May with taxpayer loans, grants, and tax breaks, Christie?s ?Jersey Comeback? sign at his Town Hall Meeting will look as ridiculous as the ?Mission Accomplished? sign of former President George Bush during the Iraq War.
Craniac -I have to admit your logic about the honesty of pitalociins, and have to say that I wouldn’t trust any of them further than I could throw them (which is an interesting thought in itself). I think though, that there is just something about President Obama that frightens me just a bit, in a way that even Clinton and Carter did not. It is difficult to explain, except that in all of my years of growing up and living in this country, I have never really felt the need before to put away a modest amount of food, and determine where to hide away the firearms and ammunition. Both my husband and I have felt a concern about where the country is headed. We could just be overreacting, and there is no harm done to have a few extra bags of rice and beans laying around. It is similar to when my youngest son was about twelve, and I started realizing the sorts of things he was talking about. I had always had just two rules: Don’t catch the house on fire, and don’t do a permanent injury to a sibling. I added a third rule, which was that there were no explosives allowed on the property. I had no concrete evidence that he was making anything explosive, but just had an inkling that a third rule was appropriate. He has since told me that I was a wise woman to create that third rule.So, I now have a special rule, which is to have enough food and supplies to last two older people for a few months. It will probably turn out to be unnecessary. I have no plans to build a cabin out in the wild and set up mines around it. Just simply buying some extra dry goods when I go to the store.I hope that President Obama simply turns out to be the vastly inexperienced politician which he is showing himself to be, and grows into the role as time goes by. I hope he reverses some of the decisions he and congress have made recently. I hope he becomes more adept at foreign policy. I hope that he shows more respect toward the position that he has been voted into.But he is simply in for four years. We can put up with anyone for four years. This blog is simply a way to vent anger about things that will not change for a while.But, Craniac, you are lurking here as well. You must find this somewhat amusing on some level, or you would not be here at all. Do you have some secret misgivings about the man, some private thoughts of things not being as right as they should be? Or do you see us as some sort of zoo, or collection of the mentally deranged, and come to point a finger at us and laugh at our discomfiture? We may sometimes say trite things, but isn’t there an undercurrent of truth here? A possibility of hitting a nerve? It may be buried within the remarks of Michelle’s wardrobe or physique, or whether Barack can actually be considered a naturally born citizen, but there is a feeling that something is not right about this man.We hide our fear behind our humor. May God have mercy on us all.