UPDATE:
DERELICTION OF DUTY
Not only did Sargent-of-Arms Kurt Gardiner abandon his post to have a good cry, an observer in the room last night sent GA this:
Kurt refused to sign in to make himself the 39th person for the quorum. He eventually signed in as #40, but it was very clear that their plan was to not have a quorum and not call the meeting.
When Tiffanie got the call from Kurt regarding quorum, her response was "how the hell did that happen?"
Not only was Gardiner derelict in his Executive committee duty, he appears to have been part of a backroom deal to deny the Hoboken Democratic Committee a quorum last night.
____________
First, GA would like to thank John Heinis of Hudson County View for streaming last night's Hoboken Dem Committee meeting, so non-committee members could watch the festivities in real time.
What surprised me?
The magnitude of the committee's repudiation of the Chair; for every one person that wanted Fisher to stay on, 10 voted to oust her.
The political impotence of Ruben Ramos was the elephant in the room.
Ramos put his political capital on the line by lobbying hard for Fisher. Ramos called HDC members, directing them to "stay home" to deny a quorum for the HDC to vote. GA speculates that Ramos had a hand in procuring the unsigned, anonymous legal opinion from "HCDO attorneys": After all, Ramos is close with Sacco aide Joey Muniz. Hence, it's no surprise that no one wanted to "own" this legal advice after the blowback on Nick Sacco from his ally, Jason Ryglicki providing a freebie legal opinion to Jen Giattino.
The larger competing forces last night were Bhalla (Stack) v Ramos (Sacco).
Ramos could not bring it.
"Ruben's got no juice in Hoboken", said an outside source.
Fisher hitched her political future to Ramos and DeFusco, against the increasingly popular de facto leader of the Hoboken Democratic Party, Mayor Bhalla.
A problem as I see it, is that Fisher fancies herself co-equal to the mayor. Yes, as a branch of Hoboken government, the body of the Council is co-equal with the Executive. Fisher is 1/9 of the legislative body. Yet she has chosen to confront the de facto leader of the Hoboken Democratic Party as an adversary, time and time again. Which she's entitled to do, but not without consequence, as last night proved. Fisher has brought divisiveness into a body that does not want it- the Hoboken Democratic Committee.
Ramos knows the game. He tried to use her as a wedge to split the HDC-- big FAIL.
GA got an excellent dispatch from an HDC committee person, who was in the room last night. Here it is:
"Tiffanie claimed during the meeting that her legal opinion was written by “lawyers for HCDO” but she didn’t name a firm or a specific attorney. She also claimed that If the HDC was able to “administratively remove her as chair” It would set a precedent for the county and state that would cause chaos. As her example, she suggested that “Brian Stack could use our precedent to administratively remove Vince Prieto” as chair of the HCDO. This humble democratic committee member is pretty sure that Brian Stack is savvier than that, knowing that a strong vote gives him political capital!
The former chair’s support group at tonight’s meeting included councilmember Giattino (hiding under a baseball cap), and council president Ramos, who had to be admonished by new chair Phil Cohen for noisy sidebar conversation during the meeting. In an anti-climactic turn, after the new chair was elected, the former chair announced she was leaving to attend a very important meeting about the northwest resiliency park, and left with her contingent, including the Sergeant-at-arms, who was supposed to be counting votes, and missed several subsequent vote counts."
[GA asked where the Ramos posse was sitting]
"They were up in the back center - Jenny G had a blue baseball cap pulled down low. Tiffanie was also pushing to start the meeting as soon as possible, and I overheard her on the phone, presumably to Kurt who was at the door, asking to close the door. A couple of minutes after that, she called Kurt? again and I overheard her say, “How did that happen? I thought there were only 37.”, so it seems evident she was trying her best to start when she knew there wasn’t yet a quorum.
"They were up in the back center - Jenny G had a blue baseball cap pulled down low. Tiffanie was also pushing to start the meeting as soon as possible, and I overheard her on the phone, presumably to Kurt who was at the door, asking to close the door. A couple of minutes after that, she called Kurt? again and I overheard her say, “How did that happen? I thought there were only 37.”, so it seems evident she was trying her best to start when she knew there wasn’t yet a quorum.
There was also an awkward moment after Phil was elected chair when Tiffanie realized she forgot her phone on the podium, and had to come down to collect it before she left. I do need to say that the whole thing was quite awkward, and an object lesson in why you should save face and resign once it’s clear the deck is overwhelmingly stacked against you. On a positive note, by the end of the meeting, I think a lot of people felt reenergized that the committee is finally focused on critical statewide congressional elections."
So, Sergeant-of-Arms Kurt Gardiner abandoned his post last night for a good sulk?
The self-proclaimed "Hoboken Resistance" resisted Constitutional Amendment XV- the right to vote. Maybe Fisher's pal left his post early to write another dozen anti-Bhalla screeds on HCV and the Alt-Right blog, about "Ravi-Robots, Ravi-Bollards, etc."
Jackass.
When does the alt-right blog start blaming Robert Mueller, or David Hogg for the fall of Tiff....
ReplyDeleteTiff is responsible for her own face plant. I doubt she ever becomes self-aware enough to understand this.
DeleteCongrats to Phil Cohen !!! So I got kicked out of the meeting months ago from Tiffany and now Tiffany got kicked out! Wow who would have thought we would have something in common. Well Phil I am sure will do a fine job. So does Jen stay a Democrat or go back to being a Republican? It's all very confusing.
DeleteGood point Karen. Interesting how the world works. I believe it was Tiffany who more than others via text and on the phone, and at doors, who initially told folks that Ravi was "unelectable" and so Jen should be their choice. Look who was just "unelected."
DeleteThe Democratic Committee meetings are not open to the public, or members' guests. That is why you were asked to leave, Karen, and that would be the case under the new leadership as well. If this type of work interest you, you might look into getting elected to the Republican Committee, where even there, you would not be welcome unless you were a member.
DeleteJen, like Peter and Tiffany, are DINO's, (Democrats In Name Only). It's an old game they play in order to remain electable. Of course, it's there actions are what will make them unelectable down the road.
I'm tickled by this turn of events. My prediction is that the HDC hasn't heard the last of Tiffanie. I hope this is one of the final nails in Ruben's coffin.
ReplyDeleteKurt denied that Tiffany was an obsructionist at a meeting where he was caught re-handed helping her be an obstructionist. What an ass.
ReplyDeleteKurt is a dishonorable coward. Last night he didn't have the BALLS to tell the HDC what he really thinks about them. Nope. He caved. I listened to his lame, milquetoast remarks, what a wimp. Lacks the courage of his convictions. Oh, but behind the keyboard? Behind the keyboard Kurt comes out beating his chest and roaring and blasting away. No one is safe from that giant jackass of a keyboard warrior.
DeleteWell, too late. Nobody gives a shit what Kurt thinks. He had a chance to tell the committee what he thought of them last night. He didn't. Instead he saved it for his safe place on the Alt Right blog.
They are all doing a damn fine job of making themselves look like fools. I say let them keep it up. The more they keep it up, the faster they destroy what little remains of their credibility. I'd suggest Kurt is already in the camp of "distrust and verify through three or more sources before you believe a damn thing he says".
DeleteRevisiting the other blogs after 6 weeks. It's not so much that the narratives are wrong. It's that they're simply childish. It's ridiculous for grown men to carry on that way day in day out with their Stan obsessions and their completely undocumented Russo alliance which is nevertheless present in every comment.
ReplyDeleteDeal with the fact that Fisher was unceremoniously drop-kicked at the first opportunity by almost everyone present. Try to find another meaning and explanation for the event besides what makes sense when you are brandishing your plastic swords and toy guns in an imaginary war between good and evil.
i haven't been back to crazy horseshitville in more than a year and don't intend to start now but did see the post about tiff's ouster on hudson county view, apparently the man-children are there too: three-quarters of the comments are nutty stan fantasies. it's not even opposition political spin, it's just...weird. and kinda creepy, bordering on stalking. do these guys have so little going on in their professional and personal lives that it's driven them to...this?
Deleteand tiff hitched her wagon to that blog? what sort of judgment does that exhibit? no wonder 90+ percent of demo committee voted her out, geez.
time to end all the bullshit and fantasy game playing and keep the city moving forward. jen and peter better see the writing on the wall with this vote, although i don't have much hope they will.
WTF is this obsession with Stan? Zimmer is gone. Their obsession w/ the spouse of a former mayor borders on ridiculous.
DeleteBut ridiculous is what they have been for the last year so par for the course w/ those idiots. They either need to get a life or get jobs b/c quite honestly, I am convinced watching TV and blogging all day is rotting their brains.
Me, I include hcv in the umbrella group “blogs.” Heinis has let it devolve into patch. A sad counterpoint to his fine reporting.
DeletePatch was horrible and after my experience there, I never went to HCV. Glad I avoided the place. I agree on not tolerating crazy any more. I am almost at the point where if someone wants to pretend they are an expert at something, they better indicate a level of expertise in all their commentary or I will completely discount every damn thing they say. The Suez contract proved to me the need to question the opinions of so-called experts who were obviously uninformed and willfully ignorant of the details of that contract and the potential fix - all so they could conveniently use their ignorant talking points to suit their political agendas.
DeleteOjo Rojo, feels like the Beth obsession has become a Stan obsession. The common denominator is a need for an animating obsession to give life purpose and meaning. Of course it doesn’t do that for them, but that’s what they want from it.
DeleteThey could get a J O B
DeleteAs we roll our eyes at the nonsense, we should accept our share of responsibility for enabling, even encouraging, these guys over the years because they were directing their nastiness and nuttiness toward our political opponents
ReplyDeleteThey didn't suddenly lose their maturity and their marbles. They were always this way, and many who should have known better closed their eyes to it because the vitriol and insanity was aimed elsewhere.
Going forward, we should never again embrace the nasties and crazies in our midst because they are "our" nasties and crazies.
fair point, to a degree. there's a big difference between when, for example, they were legitimately calling out russo for being caught on FBI video doing his you-do-for-me-i-do-for-you dance or garcia for all his documented shenanigans at HHA and whatever fantasy nonsense they're doing now.
DeleteHard as it is to remember/imagine, there was a time when Roman provided a critical information venue with hardnosed original reporting and high journalistic standards, going to great lengths to give fair treatment even to the most loathsome creatures in Hoboken politics. His devolution has been disappointing, though not entirely unpredictable, but we have nothing to be ashamed of in his heyday of leading the online charge against disinformation.
DeleteKurt, on the other hand, has always been an albatross.
When they go low, they go lower....ignore ignore ignore.....Let it turn into 411....i'd say boycott the advertisers, but it doesn't have any.
DeleteEventually, I hope, we also ask hard questions of ourselves, and also of decision-makers who we like, about how we vet and align with people like Roman and Kurt who in the end turned out to have a few screws loose, AND how people like Tiffanie or Jen are vetted.
ReplyDeleteYou never really know someone until you live with them, but there has to be a way to mitigate the chance you end up with a Tiffanie or Jen on the front end of a courtship process. Under pressure, having to make tough decisions (such as "what do I do now that Dawn does not think I'm the best choice for Mayor" or "what do I do now that I've lost an election handily? how do I comport myself, with whom do I align?"), both Tiffanie and Jen failed miserably and continue to dig themselves into deeper holes all while taking good governance for our town down with them in the process.
I wonder what do to guard against these scenarios on the front end as best you can. I don't accept that idea that it's impossible to do better. Any of us who have worked at a major corporation with a proper HR department has experienced some of the valuable guidance and thinking that goes into making optimal hiring decisions, what questions to ask, what to look for. I wonder how much is translatable to vetting for local politics?
Anyway, eager to be rid of the failures that are Jen, Tiffanie, and Peter. I just don't want to replace them with people who in the end also fail when the going gets tough.