The deal Gov. Jon Corzine and Gov.-elect Christopher Christie struck on lame duck appointments today means that Corzine’s Chief of Staff, Edward McBride, will become a Superior Court Judge, and State Treasurer David Rousseau will get a pension-boosting seat on the Mercer County Board of Taxation.  It will also move some judgeships through, including  Kay Walcott-Henderson, Corzine's Assistant Counsel, who has been nominated for an Administrative Law judgeship.  It also means that about a half dozen Democrats serving on key state authorities and commissions will remain in place until Christie picks a replacement that is confirmed by the Senate.  Among the survivors: Carl Goldberg (New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority), Frederick Butler (Board of Public Utilities), Raymond Pocino and David Steiner (Port Authority of New York and New Jersey).  Look for Christie to replace most of them soon – provided the Democratic-controlled Senate approves his picks – and watch for Pocino to survive for a while.
The deal does not include every pending Corzine appointment, which means individual Senators can still exercise senatorial courtesy to block a confirmation vote before the Democratic Governor leaves office on January 19.  Two former Democratic State Senators, Gordon MacInnes (nominated to the Rutgers Board of Governors) and Ellen Karcher (nominated to the Public Broadcasting Authority) won't need to make it through the Morris and Monmouth delegations, respectively; former Senators can't be blocked.

 There is no deal for Corzine aide Joshua Zeitz, a former Democratic congressional candidate from Burlington County who was nominated for the College of New Jersey Board of Trustees.  There is also no deal for former Passaic County Freeholder Tahesha Way, who was nominated for an Administrative Law judgeship; GOP State Sen. Kevin O’Toole can block here, although it probably benefits Republicans to take Way, a surprise loser in her re-election bid last month, out of the political arena.  O’Toole has courtesy over Way, who lives in his district, and not over Way’s running mate, Evangeline Gomez, a Democrat from Hawthorne who was also picked for the Rutgers Board.

BOONTON - District 25 Assembly candidate Doug Cabana says the holidays shouldn’t be about politics so much as spending time with family.

But when Cabana last month sat down to Thanksgiving dinner across a table of family fellowship, the Morris County freeholder couldn’t avoid looking into the eyes of his chief political rival in District 25: Tony Bucco, Jr., husband to his only sister, Amy.

“I spent Thanksgiving at their house,” Cabana said.

"Doug and his parents have come to our house every year for Thanksgiving," said Bucco. "The way I see it, family is family and politics is politics. So when this Thanksgiving rolled around, it was no different. We had family and football."

There will likely be a few more weeks of these encounters, of tearing into gifts and food.

Then the campaigns of Bucco and Cabana will tear into each other, as most political insiders see the two men as chief combatants in the fight to succeed retiring Assemblyman Richard Merkt (R-Mendham).

Mike DuHaime is now running John McCain's political operation
New Jerseyan Mike DuHaime is the new political director for John McCain’s presidential campaign, according to published reports this morning.  DuHaime, the former Executive Director of the New Jersey Republican State Committee, will assume the management of McCain’s political operation following a management shakeup earlier this week. 

He had been campaign manager of Rudy Giuliani’s bid for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination.

Arthur Albohn, who passed away on Sunday at the age of 86, was the last person to defeat an incumbent member of the State Assembly in a Morris County general election.  He did it in 1979, when he ousted Democrat Rosemarie Totaro by 3,088 votes.  (The last person to defeat an incumbent State Senator in Morris County was Anthony Bucco, who unseated Gordon MacInnes in 1997.  MacInnes had beaten John Dorsey four years earlier. 

One difference between Leonard Lance and the other Senate Republican leaders over the last thirty years is that Lance has never run himself in a competitive general election. His predecessor, John Bennett, began his legislative career by ousting three-term Democratic Assemblyman Walter Kozloski in 1979. Donald DiFrancesco, the Senate President from 1992 to 2002, unseated Democratic Assemblywoman Betty Wilson in 1975, and won a State Senate seat against Joanne Rajoppi, now the Union County Clerk, in a politically competitive district that included Plainfield and Rahway. John Dorsey, who followed DiFrancesco as Senate Minority Leader in 1984, defeated incumbent Democrats Gordon MacInnes and Rosemarie Totaro to win an Assembly seat in 1975, and beat incumbent State Senator Stephen Wiley in 1977. And Thomas Gagliano, who was Minority Leader in the late 1970's, won a competitive race for an open Senate seat in 1977, defeating Marlboro Mayor Arthur Goldzweig in a district that elected one Republican and one Democrat to the Assembly that year.

The resignation of Gordon MacInnes as the Assistant Commissioner of Education is fueling speculation that he will challenge GOP State Senator Anthony Bucco in the 25th district. MacInnes, who served in the State Senate before losing to Bucco in 1997, has not announced his future plans.

The 65-year-old Democrat, who has spent five years administering the state's Abbott district program, was elected to the State Assembly in the 1973 Democratic landslide. He lost his bid for a second term two years later, and then went to the Senate in a major upset when he defeated Majority Leader John Dorsey in 1993. In 2003, his wife, Blair MacInnes, won 45% in her race against Bucco.

Bucco is the last Republican to unseat an incumbent Democratic State Senator. His campaign was managed by Michael DuHaime, now the Campaign Manager for Rudy Giuliani's presidential bid. His consultant, Mark Campbell, is now Giuliani's National Political Director, and his Field Director, Bill Stepien, is now Giuliani's National Field Director.

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