'All politics is local'

The unlikely political tag team of state Sen. Ronald L. Rice (D-Essex) and North Ward Democratic leader Steve Adubato that felled Mayor Cory Booker’s candidate in the Central Ward on Tuesday called for Obama-spirit healing in the city in the aftermath.

“I respect him as the mayor,” Adubato said of Booker. “I predict things are going to get better. Let’s face it; this Obama victory yesterday means anything is possible. We have a lot of hope about America.

“I take that win by Obama in a country where 15 percent of America is black, and say if he can be president, why can’t we all work together? “

A victory earlier this year by Adubato confidante Dwight Brown , who’s now Central Ward Democratic Party chairman, amped up talk that Adubato was  expanding control of his political empire beyond the boundaries of the North Ward to the majority African American Central Ward.

Adubato took Obama’s victory as a good local omen.

“If Obama can be president, what’s wrong with me working in the Central Ward?” he wanted to know.

Backed by Rice and Adubato and ex-Mayor Sharpe James, former Councilman Charles Bell yesterday bested Booker’s candidate, Eddie Osborne, by a 37.76 percent to 33.68 percent margin in a 16-person race.

The next highest vote-getters were Mary Rone with 7.12 percent of the vote, Juanita Winslow with 6.20 percent and Nakia White with 3.57 percent.

The other candidates in the race accused the bulked-up Booker-Osborne alliance of tough guy tactics, including using city resources as an edge, more in the vein of old Sharpe James-style tactics than reform politics.

“Our guys are out cleaning up signs today,” said Brown.  “Something the Sanitation Department didn’t mind doing before the election but won’t do after the election.”

Rice, who lost to Booker in the 2006 mayoral election, reveled in Bell’s win on Tuesday.

“The people of Newark have had the opportunity to pay attention to local government and I think what you saw yesterday was a recognition that there is a lack of experience in City Hall,” said the senator. “If you talk to someone on the council side, they don’t know what to do. The state’s getting fed up that the administration’s giving all these contracts to people without any accountability.

“I think with Osborne, people were nervous about getting someone who needs ojt,” Rice added. “Hopefully we can start talking about policies now rather than politics.”

The senator soberly sized up Obama’s presidential win in the context of Newark.

“Coming from the racist south, I remember the history,” he said. “But if people are going to look at him as being black then we’re right back where we started. From the historical perspective, I was very proud, but from the political perspective, I was concentrating on Charlie Bell, because all politics is local.”