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Saturday, October 29, 2011

New Jersey Belted By Early Nor’easter

New Jersey Belted By Early Nor’easter


JammieWearingFool Files A Report




By Dell Hill

I don’t mean to cause undue alarm, but the very early blizzard that’s hitting New England has raised some serious Hell in New Jersey, as well.

Here’s a report from blogger JammieWearingFool.

“I suppose blizzard conditions on October 29 leaving trees snapping all around is some antidote to so-called global warming. Having lost power today around 3:30 until recently, I'm just discovering the magnitude of the damage.
Not even nature was prepared for this.

A historic early season nor’easter clobbered New Jersey today, snapping forests worth of trees, leaving hundreds of thousands without power, causing dozens of traffic accidents and even breaking at least one snowfall record in the latest bout of the state’s recent run of wild weather.

But even with all the Garden State has been through in the past four months — record heat, a once-in-a-1,000-year rain event and an earthquake — not even the trees were primed for a major snowstorm in October.

“We went from a hurricane to earthquakes to a blizzard,” said Randy Blumenthal, 28, of Morristown. “It’s too early. I’m not ready for it yet.”

Gov. Chris Christie declared a state of emergency this evening and used the social networking site Twitter to warn state residents to stay home and keep them updated about the storm throughout the evening.

“This is more snow than we were expecting,” Christie said in a televised update just before 8 p.m. “We are ready, we are moving, salting and sanding the roads. The problem is you cannot get the trees off the road fast enough. That’s the biggest problem. We have 25 state roads that are completely closed and more than 60 that are partially closed.”

“We are out there plowing, salting sanding and trying to get power crews out there to get power restored quickly,” Christie said on radio station New Jersey 101.5. “The bottom line message, it’s dangerous, we’re in a state of emergency, so stay off the roads unless it’s absolutely necessary.”

We've got around ten inches of snow and those trees that haven't snapped are hanging very low to the ground.

The intensity of the precipitation falling today actually allowed snow to fall, despite the fact that temperatures were above freezing in many places. In a phenomenon called “dynamic cooling,” heavy rain dragged down colder air from the upper atmosphere. That allowed precipitation to freeze and fall as snow.

Those ingredients, mixed well, allowed for one of the worst October snowstorms in New Jersey history.

The science is settled. Dynamic cooling is real.”

A Peak At The Blog Stats After 26 Days

A Peak At The Blog Stats After 26 Days


Just Some Of The Stats I Get To See




By Dell Hill

A sneak peak at the stats, behind the scenes at www.DellsBottomLine.Blogspot.com.

It’s actually fun to plot all of the locations on the globe where visitors to the blog originate. I’ve seen the names of locations I’ve never heard of and most certainly couldn’t pronounce! 

The top ten list is posted below and it’s a really nice sampling of the world.  A special “hello and thanks for stopping in” to whoever is on the  vessel off the western coast of Africa.  I’ve seen you pop up on the RevolverMap globe several times and I hope you’re on our side!  I’d like to think that’s a United States Naval warship with the relative of a regular reader on board.

I don’t think anyone in Mexico is online...at least that’s the way it looks.  I’ve seen more Canadian traffic than Mexico.  And the surprising number of hits (31) from the former Soviet Union, which matches my friends from North of the border.


United States4,082


United Kingdom40


France37


Germany36


Canada31


Russia31


Norway27


Philippines16


Sweden12


Australia11


The top referral sources (the folks who sent traffic my way) offers a couple of pleasing surprises.  I knew that a lot of traffic comes from FaceBook (Thanks, Gang!), but it was a bit of a surprise to see the referrals from the now-retired Uncoverage.net web page.

Another nice surprise was the 110 hits from Doug Ross (directorblue.blogspot.com).  Doug gave me linky love for one post and it resulted in 110 hits.  Thanks, Doug!











My tribute page to Jane Jamison has attracted the most readers by far...and that pleases me.  452 times that page has been accessed in just one month!

The total number of page views (hits) continues to be encouraging (4,615 as of this writing) and the daily average has gone up for the past ten days in a row.  Those numbers are far and away higher than I imagined they would be on day one.  Reaching 5,000 hits in the first month (and we will) is quite an accomplishment, thanks to YOU. 

Barack Obama Is “Honest” & Scandal Free?

Barack Obama Is “Honest” & Scandal Free?


So Says Bloomberg Butt Kisser



“It doesn’t help that so much “news” coverage -- as opposed to commentary that is explicitly opinionated -- nowadays takes place in a partisan context.” - Pot, meet Kettle.


By Dell Hill

It took me over an hour of tears-streaming laughter to put this post together.  Sometimes, the funniest things are written totally by mistake...But, this wasn’t a mistake, it was written by a writer who is desperately seeking a position in the Obama administration (like so many others have done successfully) and I warn you to put down any liquid refreshment before reading further.

The following line, which appears at the bottom of this comedic revue, should have been posted at the top!

(Jonathan Alter, a Bloomberg View columnist, is the author of “The Promise: President Obama, Year One.” The opinions expressed are his own.)

“President Barack Obama goes into the 2012 with a weak economy that may doom his reelection. But he has one asset that hasn’t received much attention: He’s honest.

The sight of Texas Governor Rick Perry tumbling out of the clown car recently as a “birther” (or at least a birther- enabler) is a sign of weakness, not just for the Perry campaign but for the whole Republican effort to tarnish the president’s character.

Although it’s possible that the Solyndra LLC story will become a classic feeding frenzy, don’t bet on it. Providing $535 million in loan guarantees to a solar-panel maker that goes bankrupt was dumb, but so far not criminal or even unethical on the part of the administration. These kinds of stories are unlikely to derail Obama in 2012. If he loses, it will be because of the economy -- period.

Even so, the president’s Teflon is intriguing. How did we end up in such a scandal-less state? After investigating the question for a recent Washington Monthly article, I’ve been developing some theories.

For starters, the tone is always set at the top. Obama puts a premium on personal integrity, and with a few exceptions (Tim Geithner’s tax problems in 2009) his administration tends to fire first and ask questions later. The best known example is Shirley Sherrod, the Agriculture Department official who was mistakenly fired by her boss over a miscommunication that led higher-ups to believe -- wrongly -- that she had made inappropriate racially tinged remarks. In several other cases, the decision to give staffers accused of wrongdoing the boot was made within hours, taking the air out of any possible uproar.

Mixed Results


But the White House’s intense focus on scandal prevention has had mixed results. The almost proctological vetting process has ended up wounding Obama as much as prospective nominees. He gets cleaner but often less imaginative officials. The kind of swashbuckling figures from the private sector who might have, say, come up with a far more ambitious job-creation plan often don’t bother to apply for government service these days.

The vigilance about wrongdoing has worked better when it comes to oversight of the $787 billion stimulus program. The money might not always have been spent on the right things. But a rigorous process supervised by Vice President Joe Biden, and made transparent with the help of recovery.gov, has prevented widespread fraud and abuse.

A Media Problem


Unfortunately, we might not know of scandals in stimulus spending or elsewhere because of changes in the news business. For today’s media, talk is cheap and reporting is expensive. That means we get more chatter and less scrounging for official wrongdoing.

In the past, many of those scandal stories originally came from congressional investigators and others with subpoena power. But with the demise of the Office of Independent Counsel, a fount of information for reporters from the Reagan to the Clinton eras, the machinery of scandal-hunting began crumbling.

It doesn’t help that so much “news” coverage -- as opposed to commentary that is explicitly opinionated -- nowadays takes place in a partisan context. Fox News has tried to flog stories on manufactured controversies like “policy czars” in the White House (which go back to the 1970s) or whether it was wrong for Elizabeth Warren to consult with state attorneys general on their lawsuits against mortgage lenders. (It wasn’t.)

Every time Representative Darrell Issa, the Republican from California who leads a House investigative committee, calls the Obama administration “corrupt” without offering any evidence, he hurts his cause. It’s much harder to make a story register as a bona fide scandal when the political motivation is so obvious.

It’s also harder to find room for such stories when so much other news is breaking. Scandals like the Monica Lewinsky affair were almost a luxury of good times, when the nation could afford to obsess about a blue dress. Not these days.

These factors are all relevant, but the ultimate explanation can be found at the top.

According to a metric created by political scientist Brendan Nyhan, Obama set a record earlier this month for most days without a scandal of any president since 1977. The streak probably won’t last, especially if he gets a second term, where scandals are more common. But the impression of rectitude will be part of the voters’ assessment of him next year. He’ll need it.

(Jonathan Alter, a Bloomberg View columnist, is the author of “The Promise: President Obama, Year One.” The opinions expressed are his own.)

You only have to read the very first comment on this outrageous stack of lies to appreciate the fact that most of us are not fools.

5thcommjarhead
If the author truly considers Obama as scandal free, he must consider Richard Nixon as an absolute saint.  Fast and furious alone would be enough for the liberals to be screaming for any GOP president's head and execution.  So would Solyndra.  So would LightSquared.  So would bombing a soverign country without congress approval (an impeachable offense)  So would assassinating American citizens on foreign soil.  The last two have America's approval, but if it were a GOP president who had done it  . . . so looooong.  We haven't even mentioned campigning by Mr. President himself and his entire staff on the taxpayers dime.  But, he's the liberal media darling, so he can do no wrong.  No scandals indeed.

Obamacare Waivers Went To “Small Businesses” - Like The Entire State Of Maine!

Obamacare Waivers Went To “Small Businesses” - Like The Entire State Of Maine!


Pelosi Earns Ten Pinocchios For This Lie


By Dell Hill via Doug Powers at Michelle Malkin’s popular page.

“During an interview on CNBC, Nancy Pelosi claimed that the health care law was put into place to help save businesses money on health care costs. Pelosi, hopelessly unable to appreciate the irony of the need to afford certain businesses special protections from a law that was purportedly enacted to safeguard them, was asked about companies that have received a number of the 1,800 Obamacare waivers that have been issued:

“They’re small. I couldn’t speak to all 1,800 of them, but some of the lists that I have seen have been very, very small companies. They will not have a big impact on the economy of our country,” Nancy Pelosi said in an interview with CNBC.

Watch this lying sack of fecal material downplay the 1,800 Obamacare waivers that have been issued thus far - many from her own district - by clicking right here.

True… very small companies and organizations, such as McDonalds and Darden Restaurants. Heck, entire states have gotten waivers (but only very small ones).”

How can a person tell such outrageous lies and get away with it?

Rare October “Global Warming” Event Set To Slam Northeast

Rare October “Global Warming” Event Set To Slam Northeast


All You Need To Know From The Weather Channel



By Dell Hill

A significant, rare October snowstorm will plow through the Northeast Saturday through early Sunday morning.  Scroll down or use the links below to view the forecast and current conditions to guide you through the storm.

See:  Snow forecast | Power outage potential | Radar | Winds | Temps



How Much Snow?

The forecast map below shows the heaviest accumulations in the pink shadings, mainly just to the west and northwest of the I-95 corridor.  This is where at least 6 inches is expected.  Dark purple shading indicates the potential for a foot or more of snow. The heavy, wet nature of the snow will likely cause tree damage and power outages.

Some accumulations are also possible closer to the coast along the heavily-populated I-95 corridor from near Washington, D.C. to Boston. Precipitation will start as rain in these locations, but may change over to snow. How quickly this occurs and how much snow falls is dependent on the availability of enough cold air, which is difficult to forecast early in the season.

Map: Interactive winter storm alerts map
See what people are saying in your area on TWC Social

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Northeast snow forecast



Power Outage Potential

As mentioned before, this will be a heavy, wet snow.  Combine this with wind from the intensifying low-pressure system off the coast and power outages are likely in the darker blue-shaded area on the map below.  Outages are also possible in locations closer to the coast from the wind alone.  The map below shows the power outage potential across the Northeast.
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Power outage potential



Current Radar

Track the snow and rain as it spreads northward through the region using the regional view radar maps below and the links to local radar sites across the region.  Snow is depicted by the white shadings and different intensities of rain are depicted by the green, yellow and orange shadings.

See how much snow has fallen: 24-hour radar estimates

Local radar sites and the latest winter storm alerts:

Albany | Allentown | Baltimore | Bangor | Boston | D.C. | Harrisburg | Hartford | Philadelphia | Portland | New York City | Poughkeepsie | Providence | Springfield, Mass.
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Current Northeast radar | Enlarge and animate


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New England Radar Enlarge map
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Mid-Atlantic/NYC Radar Enlarge map

See what people are saying in your area on TWC Social
Current Winds

Winds will be the strongest along the immediate coast.  This is where gusts could reach 45 mph or higher.  Farther inland, gusts of 30 mph or higher are expected.  Power outages and tree damage are both possible, particularly in areas where significant snow accumulation occurs.

The map below shows current sustained winds in the blue shadings.  The specific numbers plotted are wind gusts from the current hour.

To view a wider look at current winds across the Northeast, click here.
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Current Northeast winds


Winds will intensify tonight along the coast, spreading northeast into New England, and will linger in New England much of the day Sunday. You can see where the winds will be strongest by clicking the links below. Strongest forecast winds are shaded in darker blue.
See forecast winds: Tonight | Tomorrow