The Jaffe Briefing - March 9, 2020
GLEN ROCK – If you want to get involved in local politics, don’t be the poor schlub responsible for handling political money. Just ask two local councilmen in Glen Rock, now accused of filing state finance forms late (or not at all) and looking at thousands of dollars in fines. The Record reports the two councilmen are still answering questions about their successful 2016 election campaign, in which it is alleged they did not list all required donor information and didn’t report transferring funds from one account to another. They tell the Record that they are “addressing it” and “getting this straightened out.” Lawyers are now involved, prompting the question that their wives have likely said a thousand times by now: Is this all worth it?
STATEWIDE – As the “Weather in a Word” below indicates, today will be “gorgeous.” So, let’s celebrate, enjoy, revel, etc. And let’s forget that the temperature is 20 degrees above normal, that it hasn’t snowed all winter and that global warming is now a topic of blowhard politics, not indisputable science. So, crank open that sunroof and turn up the tunes, hoping it drowns out the harsh, impending reality of big storms, life-threatening heat waves and uncontrollable flooding that are becoming common place in New Jersey. Here’s a bunch of ways that government can slow climate change,most of which are being ignored.
WOODBRIDGE – Animal rights activists suspect there’s a whodunit at a petting zoo at the Woodbridge Center mall. They told the New York Post that a furry sloth, named “Flash,” may have met an untimely demise at SeaQuest, the storefront zoo, and got secretly swapped for a similar-looking one. Activists want the state Division of Fish and Wildlife, which licenses the mall zoo, to earmark some pet detectives to investigate the alleged switcheroo. SeaQuest’s CEO would not talk to the tabloid about the accusation, but said the company is willing to cooperate with Ace Ventura or whatever other detective the state assigns. Activists have protested outside the mall on weekends since it opened last fall, eager to drum up negative attention any way they can. Perhaps they found a new storyline.
BRIEFING BREATHER: There's no Betty Rubble in The Flintstones chewable vitamins.
TRENTON – If some New Jersey lawmakers have their way, we would soon be able to register our wishes for end-of-life care at a Motor Vehicle Commission agency. Right now, we can just sign up for organ donation. Quite soon, we can opt to let health care providers know whether to resuscitate us by simply filling out paperwork at the MVC, NJ Spotlight reports. It’s fitting that end of life came to those legislators’ minds in the same thought bubble as Motor Vehicles — a purgatory where so many shuffle on line, watching the hours drift away as they dream of eventually reaching the counter and meeting a friendly St. Peter. Next!
HOWELL – Cooking up a story about fending off a gun-toting robber probably isn’t the best way to get a pay raise from your boss. But, police say that’s the whopper a 30-year-old Pizza Hut employee told, sending two dozen cops on a two-hour wild goose chase Friday for an imaginary thief. They used heat-seeking drones to search woods off Route 9 and Kent Road, and they locked down two nearby schools. The police chief tells NJ.com this half-baked hoax fell apart after detectives
IN OTHER IMPORTANT NEWS
NORTH HUNTINGDON, Pa. – The next time you complain your Big Mac tastes like it was made when Woodrow Wilson was in the White House, your McDonald’s worker can back that up. That’s because 99-year-old Ruth Shuster was alive back then, and is now spending years more golden than a French fry as a McDonald’s employee. Ruth first landed the fast food gig at the spry age of 73, and says one of her keys to old age is eating any darn thing she pleases, CBS reports. That includes a steady diet of her employer’s apple pies, proving she is a medical miracle worthy of scientific research.
THIS DAY IN HISTORY
On this day in 1964, the U.S. Supreme Court decided another landmark case. This time, it was New York Times Co. v. Sullivan, which forced politicians to concoct some better arguments to prove they’d been libeled in the press.
WORD OF THE DAY
WIT OF THE DAY
TODAY'S TRUMPISM
WEATHER IN A WORD: Gorgeous
THE NEW 60
A Jaffe Briefing Exclusive
by Andy Landorf & John Colquhoun
