October 1998 Winners & LosersSun., Oct. 25, 1998 Gov. Christie Whitman Maybe it's campaign season or just the spirit of Halloween, but the competition for arrows has been very tough this week. Normally, Fanwood Mayor, Maryanne Connelly, the Democrat who is running against Rep. Robert Franks, R-Union, would have been a sure-fire arrow winner for getting Hillary Clinton to make a radio ad for her, though we won't say which way the arrow would be pointing. Rush Holt, the Democrat who is running against Rep. Mike Pappas, R-Rocky Hill, also would have been a contender for capturing the Nobel Prize winner vote. Holt announced on Friday that so far 16 Nobel champs are on his side and have given him money. Sen. Bob Torricelli, a frequent arrow recipient, said something nice about Sen. Frank Lautenberg who scored big again with the final demise of the hated HOV lanes in northern New Jersey. But all these arrow-worthy accomplishments fail to meet the standard this week. As often happens in the Garden State, which has one of the strongest governors in the country, it is Whitman who will end up getting most of the credit for the HOV lanes and lots of other good stuff, too. Whitman fired off a letter to the Secretary of Transportation in Washington last week telling him that the days of the HOV lanes are over. Come Nov. 30, she's opening them up for everybody, not just carpoolers. She can do that because she's the governor. The Environmental Protection Agency is pretty mad about it because they are under the delusion that the carpool lanes clean up the air, but Whitman doesn't care. Her Open Space Campaign is also coming along swimmingly. The only person in the entire state who seems to be opposed to it is former Gov. Brendan Byrne. That all adds up to an up arrow, even though Whitman didn't make Mirabella Magazine's list of the 25 Smartest Women in America. Since none of the arrow pointers made the list, either, we decided it wasn't fair to deduct points from the governor. Rep. Christopher Smith, R-Trenton, gets an up arrow, too, for his courageous vote against the bloated federal budget last week. Pappas, Rep. Rodney Frelinghuysen, R-Morristown, and Rep. Marge Roukema, R-Ridgewood, were the other congresspeople who voted against it. When a pork-filled budget like this comes up at election time, most politicians buckle so they won't have to go home and be attacked by big spenders for voting against a new school for Johnny or a new senior bus for Grandma, but Smith and the others withstood that temptation. That's what up arrows are for. State Sen. Shirley Turner, D-Trenton, also gets an up arrow for her legislation to end the madness of taxpayer-funded lawyers for sexual harassers. The state tab for Richard Carley, the former state assistant attorney general who was found to have persistently engaged in lewd conduct around women in his office, will be several million dollars. Turner says the state's huge legal bills defending its employees against sexual-harassment charges are a "disgrace." We think so, too. Up arrow. State Senate Minority Leader Richard Codey, D-West Orange, also gets a positive pointer for his campaign to get New Jersey colleges to cap spending in order to reduce tuition. Codey, accompanied Whitman to a meeting of the Council of College Presidents last week, where the governor had warm words for the idea. We bet the college presidents weren't too thrilled, but Codey's on the right track with this one. But State Sen. Bill Schluter, R-Pennington, only gets a sideways arrow for getting what's being called the "Prunetti-Treffinger" Bill through the Senate last week. Schluter says he was only making the law consistent with other regulations when he wrote the change so that any future vacancies that occur among county executives will be filled by an appointee from the party of the county executive. So if Mercer County Executive Bob Prunetti or Essex County Executive Jim Treffinger decide to leave their offices to run for U.S. Senate or governor or something, local Republicans would get to pick their replacements instead of the local freeholders, which is the case now. Democrats control the freeholder boards in Mercer and Essex Counties. Schluter, whose political ethics are always above reproach, is probably right that his change makes things consistent. He argues that local parties get to appoint in the case of all other vacancies. But we don't think it's a good idea for the good ol' boys and girls on those county committees to have any more control than they already have over who gets government jobs. Not that local freeholders would do much better. Why don't they make sure every executive has an assistant who can keep the phones covered until they hold a special election? In New Jersey you can hold an election anytime. Just ask the school boards. Sun., Oct. 18, 1998 Wandering Whitmangets raves By SHERRY SYLVESTER Chief Political Writer Gov. Whitman has earned another up arrow, overriding the minority view of some arrow pointers who lobbied that the governor should lose points for spending so much time out of town. The governor continued her Big Tent Republican campaign swings into Colorado, Michigan and Illinois last week. But we're sure her people passed along the news that polls show New Jersey folks are feeling better about the state's schools than they have in years. The early numbers also indicate that voters are ready to overwhelmingly pass her open-space initiative. We know that if things weren't going so well, she'd come home. For those who have forgotten what the governor looks like, check out her absolutely smashing photo in the latest issue of Vanity Fair. The magazine listed her as one of the 200 most influential women in America. Vanity Fair described Whitman as "one of the Republicans' best presidential hopes in upcoming years." In the cutthroat battle for up arrows last week, no male politician came close to Whitman's list of accolades. But Trenton's South Ward Councilman, John Ungrady, may have raised the bar a little on what defines genuine community service. Tipped off by a friend, Ungrady staked out the house of an alleged car thief for more than two hours, and captured him in a bear hug when he came out the door. The councilman, best known up to now for his colorful use of the English language, then kept the suspect restrained until the police arrived to handcuff him and take him away. Ungrady, who will be sworn in again tomorrow, gets an up arrow, along with our hope that he will serve as a role model for other politicians who are looking for ways to help out their constituents between speeches and endless committee meetings. State Senate President Donald DiFrancesco, R-Scotch Plains, also gets an up arrow for helping out the folks back home. As acting governor last week, DiFrancesco made sure there were funds for the people who are still cleaning up from the freaky Labor Day storm that wreaked havoc in central New Jersey. DiFrancesco also launched his own spiffy ad campaign in support of the open-space initiative. The senate president, along with his wife and dog, appear in a warm and fuzzy 30-second commercial that makes a strong case for stopping development and preserving New Jersey's green space. Who can disagree with that? Meanwhile, New Jersey Sen. Bob Torricelli was in South Brunswick last week campaigning for Rush Holt, the Democrat who is trying to unseat Rocky Hill Congressman Michael Pappas. Holt has gotten hold of what may turn out to be his strongest weapon against Pappas: A copy of his latest musical ditty. This summer, Pappas, who is known for composing and performing little political songs, went into the well of the House and presented his own satirical rendition of "Twinkle, Twinkle Kenneth Starr," lauding the special prosecutor. Holt thinks Pappas' pro-Starr song may outrage the largely anti-Starr public, so he got the tape and will put it on cable radio next week. It's already running on radio. Holt's handlers say that ABC, CBS and the Jim Lehrer News Hour have already asked for copies. That big-time exposure could help Holt, who hasn't had much hope of making a dent in the powerful Pappas machine until now. At the least, the new ad, made by Message and Media in New Brunswick, earns Holt an up arrow. But Princeton Assemblyman, Reed Gusciora, gets a down arrow for his failure to take advantage of a great opportunity for bipartisanship at last week's meeting of the Assembly State Government Committee. When Assemblyman George Geist, R-Gloucester Twp., presented his Whitman-backed bill to move the New Jersey presidential primary to March, Gusciora peppered him with Perry Mason-like questions. Isn't it true, Gusciora said, that Whitman had opposed this bill in 1994 because she thought it would turn the state into a zoo. Why, the Princeton assemblyman asked, was it a bad idea then and a good idea now? Geist didn't really give Gusciora a very good answer except to suggest that having presidential primaries in New Jersey would increase the number of people who would come to the Garden State, stay in hotels and eat during the campaigns. Truth is, no one on the committee thought much of the early-primary idea. Assemblyman Michael Carroll, R-Morris, pointed out that lame-duck local officials would be in office for months if the primaries were moved ahead three months and Assemblyman Leonard Lance, R-Flemington, thinks it may depress voter turnout. With so much sentiment against the bill, which was also opposed by Torricelli and party boss state Sen. Raymond Lesniak, D-Elizabeth, why didn't Gusciora try to get any of his colleagues to vote against it? His was the only no vote. The Princeton Democrat needs to try harder. Maybe he should get some pointers from Councilman Ungrady. THE WEEK OF OCTOBER 11TH Governor Christie Whitman - Trenton Mayor Doug Palmer - New Jersey State Senate President Don DiFrancesco - Senator Frank Lautenberg - Rep. Bob Franks, R-Union - Gov. Christie Whitman's up arrows have been a little predictable lately, but the arrow
pointers First, by all reports, Whitman did a bang-up job on "Larry King Live" this
week, Then, Whitman demonstrated almost unprecedented political courage by taking on one Will the legislature demonstrate the same guts that Whitman has? No chance. She gets Trenton Mayor Doug Palmer gets an up arrow to for his gracious response to the shoddy Senate Pres. Don DiFrancesco, also gets an up arrow for avoiding an easy DiFrancesco admitted that he had, in fact, had a golfing relationship with the Speaker,
And what if Verniero wants to play golf too? The torch passes to Transportation Nobody knows why the Transportation guy is next on the power totem pole, but maybe HOV lanes slow down traffic and nothing that slows traffic is good for New Jersey. Which doesn't mean that Rep. Bob Franks, R-Union, gets any credit for nailing THE WEEK OF OCTOBER 4TH Gov. Christie Whitman - Bill Bradley - Senate Minority Leader Dick Codey - State Sen. Ray Lesniak - Rep. Mike Pappas - Assemblyman Ken Faulkner - Sen. Nick Sacco, D-Hudson -
Even though Monday was the kick-off day of the 1998 New Jersey Legislative season, most of the news in the capital city seems to be presidential. Scandal fatigue may be bogging down the nation but it has energized lots of Garden State politicians. Gov. Christie Whitman was a smash hit on CNBC's "Hardball" last week where she promoted her idea of moving the New Jersey primary election to March 7, the same day that California will hold their primaries from now on. In a stand-up challenge to the left coast, Whitman proposed that New Jersey, New York, Delaware and maybe Pennsylvania join together for an east coast election day that would force presidential wanna-be's to campaign on our side of the continent. Whitman's move prompted all the Washington pundits to ask the governor is she is going to run for president and, as usual, she said no. But that doesn't mean she doesn't want to be a player and changing the election date could get her and New Jersey back in the game. Up Arrow. Former Senator Bill Bradley gets an up arrow by default on the Whitman primary change. Nobody doubts Bradley will win the New Jersey primary, no matter when its held. But if it happens on the same day as California's primary, where he could also compete very strongly against Gore, Bradley could end up looking like the top contender on both coasts by the time the polls close. Of course, Bradley can only play in the bi-coastal primary if he can raise the money. But he's got a new a book on basketball coming out this month which will put him on the road for a national tour. If he announces he's running soon, perhaps he can start collecting campaign funds while he's signing book jackets. Senate Minority Leader, Dick Codey, D-West Orange, who is slated to help Bradley lead his Jersey charge, also wins with the primary date change. The loser is State Sen. Ray Lesniak, D-Elizabeth, who has pledged to head up Vice Pres. Al Gore's campaign in 2000. Lesniak told some big paper in Philadelphia that he didn't see any reason to change the Jersey primary "because people are used to voting in June." Puh Leese. If you live in New Jersey, you're used to voting about anytime, thanks to our local school boards. Wonder why they can't change all those election dates too? Another up arrow goes to Rep. Mike Pappas, R-Rocky Hill who seems to be lucky in his opponents. His Democratic challenger in the 12 District, Rush Holt released his inside poll this week which showed that Pappas is running 30 points ahead of him. Holt was trying to show that Pappas was vulnerable, but ended up demonstrating just the opposite. The poll also showed that Holt had lost two points in his race against Pappas since the first time they polled in June. We want to welcome Assemblyman Ken Faulker, R-Burlington, to the Legislature with a down arrow for a unabashed grandstanding. Faulkner held a press conference last week announcing that he was donating $10,000 of his legislative salary to a scholarship fund for Burlington High School seniors. But there's a hitch. The scholarship donations only go into affect if he wins his special election next month. If not, the kids get nothing. Finally, Sen. Nick Sacco, D-Hudson, gets a resounding up arrow for coming out against the $5 dollar hike in parking fees at the Newark Airport. Sacco points out that raising the daily parking fees in the cheap lots from $7 a day to $12 represents a 71 percent increase. High parking fees are usually designed to discourage people from driving. But in most of New Jersey there is no reasonable mass transit alternative to get to Newark, so this parking rate increase is just more consumer gouging by the greedy Port Authority. Sacco has asked that Whitman step in to stop the raise. We agree.
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