Blogger's Note: Opinions Online is a regular Saturday feature. If you'd like to express your opinion on any topic, click on the Opinions Online button on my left sidebar. You can also call 385-325-2564. In addition to these submissions, I sometimes highlight comments from throughout the week and re-publish them here. Please keep your comments brief, if possible.
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#AllLivesMatter
pray for us all
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Bernie, did you check into keen's promotion of his Bangor secry to personnel director of the prison? snd she's worked in the jail about two years and still can't navigate her work environment since she never left her penthouse office.
Blogger's Note: I have run down several complaints that, like this one, are really about Director Dan Keen. All of them had no foundation or were outright lies. For the first time, an outsider has been placed in charge of the jail and is making a big difference. He is cleaning out the dead wood in is own administration. It is only natural that attacks like this will occur. Some of the insiders are very uncomfortable. The flak gets heavy when you are over the target, and he is over the target.
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What ever happened to military parades in this country? When I was growing up in the coal regions I can remember military units in parade. I don't remember this happening in recent years and what better way is there to honor men and women in service? In addition we don't even have parades on July 4 , the nations' birthday. But guess what come Halloween...................
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The same state legislature and Governor that used smoke and mirrors in their revenue strategy to financially support the 2016 PA budget have also liberalized the CRIZ program to dedicate future state revenues to support economic development initiatives that may appear to be initially attractive but have no long term guarantee to provide lasting public benefit to local communities. All this has happened at the same time that Allentown officials quake in their boots over the possibility that Talen, now controlled by out of area investors, may abandon the Allentown NIZ and the Lehigh Valley. NIZs and CRIZs are potential mirages that may be beneficial but also pose serous long term financial risks for the Commonwealth when private ownership entities are no longer controlled by people with the best interests of the region or state in mind. Unfortunately our state leaders hardly seem to notice and appropriately protect the long term massive investment of limited public resources involved in such efforts.
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Big stink going on across the bridge in P'burg where Warren County is going to build a library 3 miles from the P'burg library, and stop funding their share of P'burg's library. They're gonna spend 6 million to buy a building appraised at 1.9 million. The player in this is that carpetbagger from Allentown, city of limits: Polaris LLC, better known as J.B. Reilly et al.
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Should Bethlehem Township repair it's troubled community center or as Pat Breslin said: Sell it as is?
Today's one-liner: "The shortest way to the distinguishing excellence of any writer is through his hostile critics." Richard LeGallienne
Local Government TV
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Saturday, July 16, 2016
45 comments:
You own views are appreciated, especially if they differ from mine. But remember, commenting is a privilege, not a right. I will delete personal attacks or off-topic remarks at my discretion. Comments that play into the tribalism that has consumed this nation will be declined. So will comments alleging voter fraud unless backed up by concrete evidence. If you attack someone personally, I expect you to identify yourself. I will delete criticisms of my comment policy, vulgarities, cut-and-paste jobs from other sources and any suggestion of violence towards anyone. I will also delete sweeping generalizations about mainstream parties or ideologies, i.e. identity politics. My decisions on these matters are made on a case by case basis, and may be affected by my mood that day, my access to the blog at the time the comment was made or other information that isn’t readily apparent.
I see a pattern above, all local government related. Is anyone listening?
ReplyDeleteHow about the Human Services workers in Lehigh County. They have been working without a contract forever. Musty Muller is letting them hang. Nice guy, not!
ReplyDeleteOnce upon a time, many Democrats, including Senators Obama and Clinton mocked President Bush for saying that we were fighting them over there so we wouldn't have to fight them here. President Bush's idea was that we should go and kill rats rather than wait until they came inside our homes.
ReplyDeleteTen years ago, we had them hiding in caves and running all over Iraq. They didn't have the time to go to Europe and get on the internet and find recruits. Today, they are blowing up concert halls, government offices, discos, and now a resort.
It may be time for President Obama, the same one who ended wars, to admit that there was something about that Bush theory of killing the rats before they reach your kids' bedroom.
Oh yeah.....let's turn the war over to Haliburton, Bush, and Cheyney so they can invade the wrong Country again and line the pockets of Haliburton and friends. Why wasn't that sonuvabitch charged for all the innocent lives that were lost and the Billions of tax dollars that lined that scum bags pockets?
ReplyDeleteAlways found it peculiar that Hillary top aide has Saudi ties and Obama's top aide has Iranian ties.
ReplyDeleteBush created ISIS. He stormed into Iraq in 2003 and disbanded the Iraqi military (against some of our top military officials' advice), leaving 250,000 Iraqi men angry and unemployed. These men were already armed and they had military training. They formed the insurgency.
ReplyDeleteThe US never should have invaded Iraq. We did so based on Bush and Cheney's lies.
"What ever happened to military parades in this country? When I was growing up in the coal regions I can remember military units in parade. I don't remember this happening in recent years and what better way is there to honor men and women in service? In addition we don't even have parades on July 4 , the nations' birthday. But guess what come Halloween..................."
ReplyDeleteBernie
Thought you might have written about this school board decision. Glad this person wrote on the topic of patriotism because the issue of Northampton School Board deciding all students should not stand for the Pledge of Allegiance is disgusting. Not saying students should be forced to recite the Pledge but not even stand? Would Americans travel to another country and not stand for its national anthem? We need the Northampton American Legion to plan a peaceful walk through town only after securing proper permits. Are we to believe not one veteran ever lived or lives in Northampton? Of course not.
Obama's CIA chief Brennan has stated that ISIS was "decimated" at the end of the Bush era. Drawing a red line in Syria and later backing down is how the metastasizing began. It's also why Russia is now a prominent player in the Middle East. Power abhors a vacuum and Obama created a vacuum. Remember when he bragged of the foreign policy success that was Syria? And Libya? All that time shooting 115 on the golf course might have been better spent conducting a less disastrous foreign policy. Bush was dishonest and misguided. But Obama has redefined those terms and taken them to a new level.
ReplyDeleteBush laid the time line to pull out and Obama followed through. With the rise if IsIS, Congress did not support ground troops and limits our action militarily.
DeleteThe lack of an indictment is doing Hillary Clinton in.
ReplyDeleteIt has HURT her more than helped her.
Russia has always been a prominent player in the middle east. I agree that Obama should not have backed down in Syria. He declared that al-assad had to go but failed to follow through and that made us look weak. But ISIS would not be what it is today were it not for Bush's actions. Bush made the US, and all western countries for that matter, remarkably less safe.
ReplyDeleteAgree that Bush made it less safe. But that's no excuse for any next president's utter ineptness. They all inherit messes from the previous guy. ISIS was decimated and confined to a few square miles, again, according to Obama's CIA chief Brennan in Congressional testimony. Consider for a second that both Bush and Obama were/are dangerously inept foreign policy presidents.
ReplyDeleteWhat is the problem with the Bethlehem Township Community center? We attend a meeting there once a month, though we live in Bethlehem, and the place is very nice, there are always crowds inside and outside in the warm weather months, pursuing various activities, walking, playing ball, kids on the playground, picnic...and we are envious of Bethlehem Township for having such a great community resource.
ReplyDeleteNewt Gingrich’s advocacy this past week of new laws to make belief in Shariah Law a deportable offense for Muslims already in the United States created a firestorm.
ReplyDeleteGood. We need a political firestorm now if we are to prevent a real one later.
Trump has already demonstrated he cannot handle that 2am phone call. Already waffling on his VP pick. Maybe his pick did not register in his mind because he did not say it three consecutive times.
ReplyDeleteWhere was Hillary at 3am when our people were dying in Benghazi ?
ReplyDeleteRaising money, or course, for the Clinton Foundation as political bribes while Secretary of State
A five-day tracking poll backed by the Los Angeles Times shows Donald Trump leading Hillary Clinton, 43 percent to 40 percent
ReplyDeleteCalifornia is where Hillary expected to win by a landslide. Apparantley this is not the case.
It should be noted that the Los Angeles Times hid the actual poll numbers in the eighth paragraph, including the news that Trump has the support of at least 30 percent of Hispanics.
We are in trouble,on either side.I don't like either candidate for President. The issue is ,are we a country of wimps or are we going to control at least our own future. Look at the Express times of late. Nice high school kids that do drama -so largely publicized , at the State Theater going to up hold our values for example. I say not. Males have turned into sissies and they are at the 'FREdDIES' when other brave men a little older are at the battle fronts in our interest around the world being shot at. We are coultering a whole generation of folks that are nice kids but can't defend a dog house. Because of liberal agenda, and it will cost this nation dearly as result.
ReplyDeleteIn Bengahzi, Clinton and others were frantically trying to find resorurces that could be there quickly to save them. The were believed to be in a safe house but the exact location was unknown. Forces in Germany could not be there for hours and other resources were saught. Local security forces assisted by Egypt were in a fire fight within minutes. To suggest that there was a stand down issued is downright filthy lie based on all the testimony and conclusiins of 7 Congressional hearings. The GOP held 7 congressional hearings with the same results...it was a tragic incident. To suggest our military leaders stood down is a filthy lie. If Clinton was not a candidate for President, we would not be talking about Bengahzi.
ReplyDeleteWhat about 1983 Beiruit barricks where 281 American, 4 civilians and 58 french paratroopers were killed. The US knew our barracks was at risk and unprotected. WAS Reagan culpable? The French retaliated within hours but the US waffled. Reagan's response to the extrimists was to the pull out....cut and run. What about the fixed intelligence about WMD that sent our troops into war and resulted 1000s of casualties? How many Congressional hearings?
My POINt....stop using a tragic attack as your political platform. The GOP...a party divided with Trump at the helm trying to use ever national event as a politicsl tool to divide us further. NeVER TRUMP.
Regarding the Bethlehem Township Community Center, what a travesty that a 10 year old building is in such bad condition and needs hundred of thousands in repairs. I noticed that the building was designed by Kimmel Borgette who is also the firm that designed the public works building in Forks which is another disaster and everyone is getting sued. Seems like a common thread?
ReplyDeleteISIS rose under a Democrat House and Senate. Hat's off to anyone who took the JV Team and Wrong Side of History in their brackets.
ReplyDelete"In Bengahzi, Clinton and others were frantically trying to find resorurces that could be there quickly to save them."
ReplyDeleteMove on if you wish. But this statement is simply untrue. The attack was coordinated and took place over nine hours. There were commandos within two hours of Benghazi.
And why the large CIA installation there? Were they spoiling for a secret war? That's the real question of one of this administration's worst foreign policy blunders (i.e. Libya; not Benghazi specifically.
As I watched the reporting of the carnage that just took place in Nice, France, I cannot understand how anyone with two neurons to rub together could support a political party or candidate that allows Muslim immigration, refugee or otherwise, into these United States.
ReplyDeleteI get this insane blood pressure spike every time I see footage of American citizens who were forced to choose between burning to death in agony or plummeting to their deaths from the Trade Center Towers. The footage from Nice instigates those same spikes.
Our choice is clear: do we support a candidate who puts the interests and security of the United States first? Or do we support a candidate who has a record of criminal activity who looks at her political career as a way to fill her personal financial coffers?
Now you7 have some whacko claiming that kids in the Arts and Theater are sissies? What the Hell is wrong with people? This is part of the problem with religion in general. All religions are based on a judgment of someone or something. Until people use their own brains and realize they are being manipulated you will l have stupid comments like the sissy one and the extreme views of so many.
ReplyDeleteIn the 21st century in America we still have this nonsense. This from the people that scream about law, yet then want to impose their religious law on people? Amazing
The Bush haters (Hillary lovers) are pathetic. Get over it, he's out of office now almost 8 years. Your hope and change has created stronger enemies that now wage war on our soil. It was never about blood for oil, it was about taking the fight to them. Now they bring the fight to us but there is no fight, only an administration that calls this workplace violence and blames the proliferation of guns.
ReplyDeleteGood work moonbats, you are the reason that we have animals running people down in trucks en masse. You cannot claim to support the troops but not the mission. They are one in the same. Let us off of our leashes so that we can get our hands dirty and bring some pain. We will gladly trade our lives for the benefit of our country. It separates us from the great American chickens who supported The W0n and now Hillary.
Despite his decision not to recommend that Hillary Clinton be prosecuted, FBI Director Comey told America that to a very great degree, Hillary Clinton gave insufficient attention and thought to her position as secretary of state in order to avoid harm to our nation.
ReplyDeleteHillary Clinton’s performance and actions as secretary of state as documented by the FBI investigation are the final straw that proves beyond a doubt that she is unqualified and unfit to be president of the United States.
Bernie please enlighten me, what "dead wood" has Mr. Keen gotten rid of in his administration? You've used this line before and it's just not true. Not a single member of his administration have been terminated and that's a fact! 99% of "his" administration are remnants of the Buskirk regime so I'm actually a little hesitant to refer to it as "his" administration. He had numerous opportunities to clean out the "dead wood" in his administration but he lacks the back bone to do it unfortunately. Take a look at how he handled a recent sexual harassment allegation involving a member of his administration and then tell me if he's getting rid of the "dead wood" or if he's preserving the "dead wood".
ReplyDeleteBuskirk is gone, is he not? I believe Crivellaro has retired, has he not? I believe the LT who does background checks is suspended and under investigation. I am very leery of anonymous commenters making accusations, especially since nearly all of them have proven to be wrong.
ReplyDeleteTodd and Al both retired on their own and we're not forced out in any way. Al broke his leg which took him into retirement and Todd drug out his retirement well past its time. Considering that as getting rid of "dead wood" is laughable! The investigator is not a LT but he is currently suspended pending an investigation. The funny part is that the investigator was suspended by HR because the director was shockingly missing in action as usual and wasn't on site to suspend him. The investigator you refer to had the audacity to launch an investigation against one of Mr. Keen' administration concerning the sexual harassment of a subordinate and was promptly suspended. These are facts that cannot be disputed. I'd love to know which accusations against Mr. Keen have been wrong because I nor my fellow officers can recall a single accusation on this blog that have been inaccurate. The men and women in gray won't be silent! This is just the tip of the iceberg, we haven't even touched the mold issue at the prison yet but stay tuned!
ReplyDeleteThe gray tidal wave
Except you're no CO. You are one of the administrators who is collecting dust in a top heavy administration. And yes, every single anonymous criticism of Keen has turned out to be false. I won't repeat them bc tgat gives them a dignity they don't deserve. And no one has silenced you. You are free to raise whatever complaints you want. But I am free to say you're full of shit and you are.
ReplyDeleteBT Community Center. Why is nobody mentioning who designed and built this apparently piece of crap building? The township really has no recourse? I have seen building owners sue builders for faulty construction in this sort of time frame of ownership. Sometimes successfully, sometimes not.
ReplyDeleteBernie you just said that Mr. Keen got rid of "dead wood" in his administration and now you are claiming his administration is top heavy, which is it? Our argument is that we do have "dead wood" in the administration but Mr. Keen has done nothing about it. He is actually being victimized by the administration that he's protecting.
ReplyDeleteThe GTW
I do not believe the lying Conservative social media. There was no 9 hour standdown. The Congresional findings lay out the timeline.
ReplyDelete4pm. Time of tbe attack. Building se on fire
4:15. Acces gained to the compound
4:25. Sean Smith found deadn
4:45 US security forces in hwavy fire fight
5:20 US and Libya security forces regarepack bi'dugin control of the main building.
6:00 Mission annex came under fire. Duringn the 2 hour engagement, 2 more resulted.
8:30 Lybian and US forces gain total control over tbe situitiin. Before that Chris Stevens was found alive and rushed to a hospital and leater died.
10pm State department issues a ststement on tbe situation.
"Bernie you just said that Mr. Keen got rid of "dead wood" in his administration and now you are claiming his administration is top heavy, which is it? "
ReplyDeleteBoth.
Any news on the search for Norco's county administrator? Will be tough with Lehigh in the same predicament.
ReplyDeleteAt least two policemen were shot in Baton Rouge Louisiana this morning
ReplyDeleteIt appears that because of the race-baiting of Obama and Hillary Clinton, what we have is an entire nation going stark raving mad.
And, if you think Black Lives Matter is a fringe group, well think again. I rarely talk to an African American, regardless of social rank who doesn't sympathize at least on some level with the underlying premise of BLM.
America has spent trillions on "restitution" in order to try and ameliorate the effects of slavery and Jim Crow. Ideologically, America has pretty much turned its back on the primary idea of its founding in order to "make things right", i.e. liberty.
What do we have to show for it? Nothing, nothing but concentrated pockets of criminality, more poverty, and an excuse to murder cops.
"The police acted stupidly". Obama's utterance began the war on police.
ReplyDeleteAny cop that votes for Hillary needs to have their head examined.
Hillary: "White people should not jump to conclusions. After all we used to have slaves."
ReplyDeleteAnyone who votes for Hillary Clinton is voting against our brave police. Do you want four more years of this??!!
It was terrible to hear on the car radio this morning the reports of the shootings of the police officers in Baton Rouge. Our condolences to the families of these brave men who were killed and I hope those who were injured recover quickly.
ReplyDeleteThere is no report on who did this crime, a description of those who were killed and who are being hunted by law enforcement, so lets not jump to conclusions until the facts are known and the shooters are identified.
So what people are trying to say is that the directors executive secretary is also acting as the operations administrator of personel and does not know shit about that job.True.
ReplyDeleteMo, It is what YOU are trying to say, not people. YOU lack the personal integrity to ID yourself, and have been pretty much completely full of shot in your criticisms at the jail. I am delighted that outsiders are taking a hard look at a place that was an insider's club.
ReplyDeleteObama sounded like a robot in his speech after today's shootings. He used his monotonous, professorial voice, hollow of any real empathy for the officers who were killed. He looked like he was going through the motions, nothing more. Compare this with his emotional response to the deaths of Trayvon Martin and others. Obama began the hateful rhetoric against cops. Now he has to nerve to preach moderation. He started the fire that is now out of control. And Hillary will only fan it further with her white guilt speeches.
ReplyDeleteObama said "We Don’t Need Inflammatory Rhetoric" about the killing of the Haton Rouge police officers.
ReplyDeleteHe should be the first one then to stop using it.
The right wing haters blame everyone else for their "rhetoric". Yet somehow they don't see the damage they have done over the past thirty years.
ReplyDeleteFrom what I hear from my source the Jail is a much better place with Mr. Keen as director. Most of these accusation's are merely a smear campaign against him by the officers Union which are never happy if they are forced to work. Most of them prefer to hang out in either the lobby or their so called union office on their cell phones doing nothing. Yet, they complain they are understaffed. What a joke ! Mr. Keen has tried to make the facility a secure and safe facility. All administrators are screened upon entering. This is a great start. However, the officers union needs to get on board with change. They seem to feel that they are exempt from being screened which is a joke. The past has shown most contraband comes into the facility via the Officers. Keep up the great job Mr. Keen !!
ReplyDelete