Assemblyman Jim Whelan, the former Mayor of Atlantic City, is challenging incumbent Sonny McCullough for a State Senate seat the GOP has held since 1982

Put a bunch of Irish politicians in the same party and what you’ve got is an old Hudson County primary, but put them in opposing parties, add gambling, boxing and war-time middle class angst to the mix, and you’ll find them down in present day Atlantic County, throwing punches long before you ever have to tell them to come out swinging.

In this case it’s Senator James "Sonny" McCullough, the longtime mayor of Egg Harbor Township and a Republican, in a district 2 standoff with Assemblyman James Whelan, the former long serving mayor of Atlantic City and a Democrat.

Sonny McCullough won a special election convention for Bill Gormley's State Senate seat last February As the suburban candidate in this race and the mayor of a town that named a golf course after him, McCullough carries the burden of trying to show how forces beyond the shore towns here - namely state government and Atlantic City’s casino industry - have overwhelmingly contributed to the towns’ struggles. And he has to do that while avoiding the danger of appearing too provincial in the face of speedily changing demographics that have already upended long-standing GOP officials in the district.

"We build a brand new school every five years," says the 65-year old McCullough. "I tell my fellow mayors, ‘Every three years I build a neighborhood bigger than your whole town.’"

Whelan, 59, the ex-mayor of a city where the county’s most notorious industry is concentrated, has to demonstrate that he can step beyond the boundaries of Atlantic City and deliver pragmatic solutions to this tax burdened and still Republican-leaning region - even as he fights the tag of being a field hand for Camden County mega-boss George Norcross.