Jr.

BLOOMINGTON, Minn. -- Assembly Speaker Joe Roberts’s decision to kill the Clean Elections Program wasn’t met with regret by Senate Minority Leader Tom Kean, Jr.

Although Kean voted for the previous incarnations of the pilot program, he said that, even if it’s retooled for 2011, he’s not sure whether he’ll support it again.

"I never agreed that just because there was a Clean Elections program last year there had to be one this year. But clearly we have to ensure that the program is constitutional.”

At-large Councilman Luis Quintana: Politicker photo 

NEWARK - Coming off a press conference in which he stood with former Councilwoman Dana Rone, veteran Councilman Luis Quintana said he favors keeping Rone’s Central Ward council seat vacant until the public votes in a Nov. 4th special election.

"I’d be willing to introduce a resolution saying leave it alone," Quintana told PolitickerNJ.com.

Keeping the seat unoccupied makes sense from several vantage points, argued Quintana, an at-large representative who lives in the city’s North Ward.

Orange Mayor-Elect Eldridge Hawkins, Jr. endorsed Democratic incumbent Frank Lautenberg for reelection to the United States Senate today.

Hawkins, 28, said that he empathizes with Lautenberg, 84, on the age issue – even if he’s on the opposite end of the spectrum.

"In my campaign for Mayor, opponents tried to make an issue of my age, but the voters repudiated the argument, recognizing that chronological age is not a fair way to judge a candidate,” he said. Frank Lautenberg has demonstrated the wise judgment, commitment to New Jersey and robust good health to make it clear that he will serve us well in another term in the U.S. Senate.”

Robert Kennedy, Jr. in Passaic on Monday night, flanked by U.S. Rep. Bill Pascrell, left, and Assemblyman Thomas Giblin.

Arguing that his presidential candidate possesses a unique combination of toughness and persuasive power, Robert Kennedy, Jr. electrified a tent-ful of fellow Hillary Clinton supporters on Monday night at a private home in Passaic.

"I was very skeptical at first because I knew she was coming in under the same charges as my father did, which were that she was a carpetbagger," Kennedy, a Westchester, N.Y. resident, said of Clinton’s appeal to him when she first prepared to run for his father’s old Senate seat.

Kennedy said Clinton faced tremendous hostility, especially in traditionally Republican upstate New York - where a Senate candidate must win if he or she is to win the state, in Kennedy’s words.

Former U.S. Sen. Bill Bradley with state Sen. Loretta WeinbergIt was Bobby Kennedy in 1964 who inspired the young Bill Bradley to get into politics.

He would go through his hall of fame basketball career, but as Bradley writes in his latest book, "The New American Story," Kennedy ‘s leadership in the 1960s planted the seed for Bradley's life of public service following his career with the New York Knicks.

On Monday, the day before Election Day, the late Bobby Kennedy’s memory was alive as both sides - the Sen. Hillary Clinton and Sen. Barack Obama campaigns - appealed to his legacy with the help of his heirs.

Even as Sen. Ted Kennedy and Caroline Kennedy mounted the stage in the Meadowlands Monday to back up Obama, Bobby Kennedy, Jr., was preparing for a campaign appearance in Passaic on behalf of fellow New Yorker Clinton.

Rallying a small crowd in a tent at a home in Passaic on the eve of Election Day, U.S. Rep. Bill Pascrell predicts that with a big GOTV effort behind her, Sen. Hillary Clinton will produce a "rainbow victory."

Speaking at a pump-up-the-troops event in Passaic tonight, Sen. Hillary Clinton fan Robert Kennedy, Jr., whose father once quoted Aeschylus in memorializing Martin Luther King, Jr., questioned Barack Obama's day-one readiness by suggesting the candidate would substitute poetry for toughness and real political skill.

Council President/Obama delegate candidate Mildred Crump

While the other side dozed strategically in parts of New Jersey’s biggest city, the Obama campaign stood 1,000 volunteers on the pavement of Newark Saturday and mobilized through all five wards.

Two days ago, Zora Menguelti and Peter Geier worked in an otherwise empty room in Obama campaign headquarters on Broad Street, handing out the makeshift literature they had, and waiting for reinforcements and supplies. On Saturday, they stood with two dozen volunteers amid stacks of glossy new Obama fliers and signs.

Obama Campaign State Director Mark Alexander

On the day of the Iowa caucuses, the New Jersey state director of Sen. Barack Obama’s presidential campaign has one immediate strategy, win or lose: on the next morning he’s going to stand up volunteers at different locales: the George Washington Bridge in Fort Lee, Newark Penn Station, Jersey City. They will be out there waving "Obama" signs, staying visible, shouting, working.

"We were always the candidate talking about change, that message hasn’t changed," says Mark Alexander, 41, seated in his West Orange office on Thursday, composed given the stakes. Obama’s wife said if they didn’t win Iowa, the campaign would be finished.

"Fundamentally," says Alexander, "we are content that we are offering something the American people really want."

Dispelling rumors that have persisted since he came into office, West Ward Councilman Ron Rice, Jr., on Wednesday said he would not challenge 10-term U.S. Rep. Donald Payne in 2008.

"I have a great deal of respect for U.S. Rep. Payne and I think he’s an outstanding congressman," said Rice, who has served a year and a half in office on the Newark City Council.