From the Press of Atlantic City:
Home-price reports show gains, declines in South Jersey
Home prices continued to increase moderately nationwide in the third quarter, the National Association of Realtors said this week, but in the South Jersey shore region, they kept declining.
The 1.7 percent decline in single-family-home prices from the same quarter a year ago in the combined Atlantic, Cape May and Cumberland counties represents an improvement from the 12-month drop of 8.2 percent in the second quarter.
The NAR survey considers the three counties one statistical area, which masks the considerable differences among the local counties.
A report by market information firm CoreLogic this week showed that in September, the home price softness was all in Atlantic County, while Cape May and Cumberland counties saw price increases.Atlantic County home prices, including distressed sales, dropped by 3.8 percent in September compared with the same month a year ago and by 1.3 percent compared with August, CoreLogic reported.
In Cape May County, meanwhile, home prices were up 1.5 percent for the year through September, and 2.5 percent higher than in August. Cumberland County prices rose 2.3 percent for the year and 0.2 percent from the prior month.
…
The combined Atlantic, Cape May and Cumberland counties market saw a median sale price of $213,100 in the third quarter.
Frist, and I can’t believe I’m awake
To Joyce in last thread.
One of the big cultural issue in the 2nd Amendment/Gun restriction fight is a subliminally perceived and understood issue by both sides but rarely vocalized.
It’s in one side – more cops / less guns, otherside less cops / more guns.
As much as I might not want to agree with it the less cops/more gun side has human nature and history backing them. Cops are becoming the new Praetorian guard. Fed by the War on Drugs, the legalize thievery of keeping asset forfeiture impoundments and the bluntly in out face authoritarian Patriot Act.
Joyce. What you are seeing is what minorities saw in cops for a long time. Its just now that the whites are seeing it as the Praetorian gloves have come off.
There is a reaction to this of course. The reaction is to defund them. You saw it first after Waco. But most recently in the Bergen County election, where the county executive Donovan was a shoeing. But her support for keeping the bloated and expensive trigger happy county police cost her the election.
So the southern more guns/ less cops is looking good. Simply because human nature will ensure what Lord Acton said. Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
Flying to Memphis this AM. Mom informs Detroit might be in better shape these days.
Will report back on what I see when I look into the abyss.
Then again, as long as the BBQ industry hasn’t been impacted, I don’t really care. The town has been a necronomic sinkhole my entire life- except for 10 years where they drew a bunch of giant corporations by letting them set up shop tax-free. Natch, one the tax moratoria expired, the companies left town.
my liver, my liver!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lvl_lfNyHuM
My kingdom for a liver. Jesus, everybody down here is the size of a battleship.
Fcuking real-life Wall-E.
Toon wins! Fabius gutted! It’s been a good day.
I’d sell for soul for good barbque
You would think by 2014 enough towns and cities would have been duped that the tax free scam no longer exists. Just goes to show you how stupid the avg citizen is. The definition of insanity. Doing something over and over and expecting a different result. Same thing with developers, how many times can towns keep getting scammed by developers. When do you learn your lesson?
Liquor Luge says:
November 9, 2014 at 9:27 am
Then again, as long as the BBQ industry hasn’t been impacted, I don’t really care. The town has been a necronomic sinkhole my entire life- except for 10 years where they drew a bunch of giant corporations by letting them set up shop tax-free. Natch, one the tax moratoria expired, the companies left town.
I was at a Trader Joe’s this afternoon, usually my wife does that stuff so I haven’t been around for a while. I was surprised to see they cary spirits now, not just wine and beer. I was flabbergasted that they have their own brand of blended scotch – $9.99 a liter! I almost couldn’t bring myself to buy it because of the Taco Bell rule. I never go to Taco Bell because they can’t possibly have real meat in their offerings at those prices. If Taco Bell doubled their prices, I would give them a try. Anyway, I bought a bottle of the TJ Scotch. It’s dreadful. Maybe OK in a LI iced tea, or in a Rob Roy that’s heavy on vermouth, but on it’s own it’s just awful, which made me think. I found some bottles of Canadian Club from the early 1970’s a couple years ago, complete with NJ paper tax stamps over the caps. They were unbelievably good! My guess is the extra 40 years of aging in the pantry did the trick. What are the chances that awful scotch at bargain prices will become decent scotch if left on the shelf long enough?
10- apply bankers to this too. How many times can they get away with the same crimes before people say enough is enough. Based on the intelligence we are working with here, my bet is never.
(2)
http://bcpd.bergen.org/index.php/2013-06-03-14-58-01/what-we-do
What the heck is the guy on the right of the BCPD picture? bomb squad?
[11] expat
I learned long ago never to buy TJ’s own labels for wine (they aren’t obvious, you have to read the bottles). They uniformly suck, and the prices on more common offerings were never good enough to justify not driving into JC to see Clot.
grim lets idiot posters repeatedly effuse the garbage produced by their weak, uneducated minds unabated here, so who knows?
10- apply bankers to this too. How many times can they get away with the same crimes before people say enough is enough. Based on the intelligence we are working with here, my bet is never.
Nom – I generally agree. I had a good wine guy here who worked under an older good wine guy near by for many years before he was my guy, but my guy moved a couple towns West and now I’m on my own.
[11] expat
I learned long ago never to buy TJ’s own labels for wine (they aren’t obvious, you have to read the bottles). They uniformly suck, and the prices on more common offerings were never good enough to justify not driving into JC to see Clot.
Joyce, that was part of the issue.
Bergen County has 4 police agencies at the county level + 68 local agencies. Most of these jobs are highly paying, and restricted to “connected” people. Average kid can’t get a job.
1-BC PD has its own bomb squad + SWAT Team – Average pay $130,000
2-Palisades Interstate Parkway Police – @25 guys – $95,0oo
3- County Sheriff – @$85,ooo – has own SWAT Team + Bomb squad.
4- County Prosecutor’s Office Investigators
If you drive in certain roads, Rt 80, 95,4, 46, 17. You actually see the County Police, County Sheriff, Local Police, and State Police fighting for speed trap positions with each other.
Other states are more honest about the ticket trap. This is because NJ has the if you plea bargain, money goes to the town, if you plea guilty the State gets the money. So tickets written, generally are made so you have to show up in court and they hope you plea bargain and pay twice the fee for the no-points option, but they keep the money. It can be something like (guilty=$85 to State $30 to town – you get points, plea bargain with points $160 + $30 court fee to town + you get 1-2 points, plea bargain with no points $350+$30 court fee to town)
Now compare the above, with what the show Southern Justice in National Geographic shows in a northwestern North Carolina county. Smaller population but they only have to deputies patrolling the county, with the highway patrol back up if needed. But everyone has plenty of guns.
The bigger point is an area where the cops are few, they depend on the public support for survival and assistance, including the need to deputize.
When there are too many cops. Human nature and psychology shows they become their own gang. A world unto themselves, where others don’t count. A praetorian guard if you will.
In this view, I’m now becoming more of a convert of the “southern” way of keeping cops in control. Forget about civilian review boards, internal affairs. Just keep so few of them, that they need the public support to function.
I learned long ago never to buy TJ’s own labels for wine (they aren’t obvious, you have to read the bottles). They uniformly suck, and the prices on more common offerings were never good enough to justify not driving into JC to see Clot.
Most of Trader Joes is crap. They have a few gems here and there though. They have a decent sicilian olive oil. Their Coconut oil is the best deal out of all the stores. Also, their canned tomatoes are very high quality and reasonably priced. Outside of that, I ain’t buying anything.
Besides, in Princeton, Whole Paycheck is right across the street. Their meat, cheese and seafood departments are unmatched. The rest of the store is overpriced hippy crap.
17
Amazing. I wonder what the justification was for the creation of each agency over time. Granted, I’m sure the reason was 100% bullsh-t… hearing them say it with a straight face is continually proof that there are psychopaths in power all around us.
#11 Zero.
[19] ben
I was speaking only of their wine. I express no opinion of their other labeled products.
[12] michael
Are you by chance related to Elizabeth Warren?
“What the heck is the guy on the right of the BCPD picture? bomb squad?”
That’s the Great Gazoo.
http://tinyurl.com/q44v5aa
Trader Joe’s would have to improve greatly just to reach the level of suckitude. I’d rather stay sober than ingest their swill.
Toon looking positively top 4 today. Pair that with two crushing results on the trot for gluteus’ girlymen, and I’m a happy guy.
BBQ bacchanalia tomorrow. Could be a Corky’s/Interstate twofer.
Here is a story about a Holocaust survivor’s encounter with Flabmax’ mother (as an infant) and grandmother……
He survived the savagery of the Holocaust, made it to America with barely a penny and became a world-famous tailor in Brooklyn, dressing celebrities and presidents. In his new memoir, “Measure of a Man,” Martin Greenfield tells the story of his extraordinary life. In this excerpt, he explains how the concentration camps nearly stripped him of his humanity at age 16 — and the day he got it back.
While at Buchenwald, the SS assigned me to work in the munitions factory. But early one morning after roll call, a soldier placed me on a 12-prisoner team to perform repairs outside the camp in nearby Weimar.
Working in the city was a welcome distraction from camp life. Sometimes you got lucky and spotted a potato in a field or smuggled a trinket to trade for food. Either way, it was a chance to see the sky, escape the stench of rotting corpses, and confirm that there was still a world beyond the barbed wire.
We loaded our gear and marched the few miles to Weimar. The soldiers stopped us in front of a bombed-out mansion, home to the mayor of Weimar. A big black Mercedes sat out front. The soldiers commanded us to sift the rubble, clear the debris, and begin repairs on the mansion.
I walked alone to the back of the estate to assess the damage. Dusty piles of broken bricks lay sc^ttered across the yard. Seeing the cellar door ajar, I slowly opened it. A shaft of sunlight filled the dank cellar. On one side of the space sat a wooden cage wrapped in chicken wire. I walked closer and noticed two quivering rabbits inside the cage.
“They’re still alive!” I said to myself with surprise.
Inside the cage were the remains of the rabbits’ dinner. I unlatched the cage and pulled out a wilted leaf and carrot nub. The lettuce was browning and slimy, the carrot still moist from the rabbits’ gnawing. Excited, I wolfed down the lettuce and tried to crack the chunk of carrot in half with my teeth.
THEN AND THERE I MADE A VOW TO MYSELF: IF I SURVIVED BUCHENWALD, I WOULD RETURN AND KILL THE MAYOR’S WIFE.
My luck was short-lived. “What are you doing?” a voice yelled.
I whipped my head around toward the door. A gorgeous, smartly dressed blond woman holding a baby stood silhouetted in the door frame. It was the mayor of Weimar’s wife.
“I . . . I found your rabbits!” I stammered with a cheerful nervousness. “They’re alive and safe!”
“Why in the hell are you stealing my rabbits’ food?” barked the woman. “Animals!” I stood silent and stared at the floor.
“I’m reporting this immediately!” she said, stomping away. My heart pounded in my emaciated chest. A few minutes later, an SS soldier ordered me to come out of the cellar. I knew what was coming, and the knowing made it all the worse.
“Down on the ground, you dog! Fast!” yelled the German. He gripped his baton and bludgeoned my back. I do not know whether the mayor’s wife watched the beating. Given her cruelty, why would she want to miss it? On the hike back to Buchenwald, I replayed the scene over and over in my mind.
How could a woman carrying her own child find a walking skeleton saving her pets and have him beaten for nibbling on rotten animal food? I thought.
In that moment, my numbness to death melted. In its place rose an alien blood lust, a hunger for vengeance unlike any I had ever known. The surge of adrenaline and rush of rage felt good inside my withered frame.
Then and there I made a vow to myself: If I survived Buchenwald, I would return and kill the mayor’s wife.
Physically, I was free. Emotionally, I was in chains. I’d made a promise to myself. And I intended to keep it.
I located two Jewish boys who were well enough to make the walk to Weimar. I told them what the woman did and what I was prepared to do about it. We could rummage machine guns from the mountain of German weapons seized by the inmates and Americans that lay in piles on the Appelplatz.
The streets outside camp were electric with an ominous sense of disquiet. A smattering of prisoners in striped pajamas ambled in search of noncamp food. I kept my eyes open for SS. We gripped our guns and got to Weimar as quickly as possible.
My heartbeat quickened the closer we got to the mayor’s house. Pent-up rage from all I had seen and experienced surged through me. Killing the mayor’s wife could not repay the Nazis for the
terror they had inflicted on us. But it was a start.
We walked a few miles before turning down the street the mayor’s home was on. I pointed to a house several paces down the road: “I think that’s it.” The big black Mercedes was not out front.
It took me a moment to make sure I had the right house.
“The car isn’t here. Looks like the house is empty,” I said. “The plan is we take our guns and go in through the side door. Then we hide and wait so I can kill the blonde bitch that had me beaten.”
The boys nodded.
We crept up to the side door. I slowly turned the knob. It was unlocked. I entered the house quietly, with my gun drawn. The boys fell in behind me and eased the door shut. We stepped softly to mute the sounds of our wooden clogs on the floor.
“Hello?” a voice around a corner said. “Hello?”
“YOU HAD ME BEATEN BECAUSE OF THE RABBITS. I’M HERE TO SHOOT YOU!” I SAID [TO THE MAYOR’S WIFE], SOUNDING LIKE AN SS.
Just then the beautiful blond woman turned the corner and let out a screech. She had the baby in her arms again.
“Don’t shoot!” she screamed. “Don’t shoot!”
“Remember me?!” I yelled. “Do you?!”
Her blond tresses shook violently. She hid her face behind her upraised hand as if shielding herself from the sun.
“You had me beaten because of the rabbits. I’m here to shoot you!” I said, sounding like an SS.
“No! Please!” she quavered. “The baby, please!”
I aimed the machine gun at her chest. The baby wailed. My finger hovered above the trigger.
“Shoot her!” one of the boys said. “Shoot her!” The woman’s outstretched hand trembled in the air. My heart pounded against my chest like a hammer.
“Shoot her!” the other boy yelled. “That’s what we came here for! Do it!”
I froze. I couldn’t do it. I could not pull the trigger. That was the moment I became human again. All the old teachings came rushing back. I had been raised to believe that life was a precious gift from God, that women and children must be protected.
Had I pulled the trigger, I would have been like Mengele. He, too, had faced mothers holding babies — my mother holding my baby brother — and sentenced both to gruesome deaths. My moral upbringing would not allow me to become an honorary member of the SS.
Still, extending mercy felt weak. I tried to save face in front of the boys. If I couldn’t be a hardened killer, I could at least be a car thief. “Where is the car?” I yelled.
“There is nothing,” she said.
“Where is it?!” I barked.
“It’s not here,” she said.
I lowered the gun and stomped out of the house and went around back.
“You made us come here for nothing?” one of the boys huffed.
“I couldn’t shoot her,” I said. “She had a baby!”
“How many babies did they kill?” he quipped. He had a point.
We walked to the large barn behind the house and unlatched the heavy wooden doors. There, covered with hay, sat the big black Mercedes. “That lying Nazi bitch!” one of the boys yelled. I was livid. I’d spared her life and she lied to my face.
“Wait here,” I told the boys. I marched back in the house, gun drawn, and found her. “This time, I’m really going to shoot you,” I said. “Give me the keys!” She gave me the keys. I jogged back to the boys and the car. “I got them,” I said rattling the keys in my hand.
“Who knows how to drive?” one of the boys asked.
“Don’t worry, I do,” I said. We brushed off the hay and hopped in the car.
“Hurry up! Let’s get out of here,” one of the boys said.
What a sight we must have been: three teenage Jews in striped prisoner uniforms, armed with machine guns, driving a black Mercedes in Weimar, Germany, on our way back to the Buchenwald concentration camp. We smiled, laughed, and talked tough like the men we weren’t.
“Did you see how scared she was?” one boy said excitedly. “I bet she made in her underwear!” We chuckled and drove on.
“Look!” one of the boys said pointing out the window. “Two girls!” I pulled the car to the side of the street.
We invited the German girls to take a ride. They must have been so mesmerized by the Mercedes that our raggedy uniforms failed to give them pause. To my surprise, they hopped in. This was the closest any of us had been to attractive girls in a long, long time. They rode with us a few blocks before we dropped them off.
I contemplated ditching the car. After all, we were driving the mayor of Weimar’s Mercedes. If that didn’t give us away, the license plates would. But then I thought, What the hell? When’s the next time you will get to drive a Mercedes?
So I drove the car all the way back to Buchenwald. In fact, I drove straight through the camp gates. Only this time, the irony of the slogan emblazoned across the gates — “To each what he deserves!” — made me laugh.
Prisoners stood motionless and stared as we coasted into camp. They must have assumed an important dignitary or the mayor of Weimar himself would step out of the fancy car. When they saw our striped prisoner uniforms, they rushed us. “How did you get a Mercedes?” someone asked.
Modal Trigger“Well,” I said smiling, “we just got it.”
Throughout my life I had heard that everything happens for a reason, that God’s ways were mysterious but purposeful. I believed that. But something I read decades after my showdown at the mayor of Weimar’s house proved to me that in the end, in this life or the one after, God ultimately achieves justice.
A friend shared with me an article from a 1945 issue of Life magazine about Nazi suicides following the war. Here is a portion of what it said: “In the last days of the war the overwhelming realization of utter defeat was too much for many Germans. Stripped of the bayonets and bombast which had given them power, they could not face a reckoning with either their conquerors or their consciences. These found the quickest and surest escape in what Germans call Selbstmord, self-murder . . . In Hitler’s Reich, Germans stopped killing others and began killing themselves. In Weimar, the mayor and his wife, after seeing Buchenwald atrocities, slashed their wrists.”
That day at the mayor’s home, God pricked my conscience. In so doing, He spared me the guilt and shame of killing the mayor of Weimar’s wife.
I didn’t need to kill her. She did it for me.
Excerpted with permission from “Measure of a Man: From Auschwitz Survivor to Presidents’ Tailor” (Regnery) by Martin Greenfield with Wynton Hall, out this week.
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