Jr.

The YouTube of Newark Mayor Cory Booker making a controversial comment at a Summit fund-raiser in May had been in web circulation for a couple of months, according to the mayor’s staff.

This week, the issue came to the attention of the Newark City Council, and after viewing the YouTube at City Hall after Wednesday's meeting, council members Donald Payne, Ron Rice, Jr., Dana Rone, Anibal Ramos and Luis Quintana condemned the mayor’s remarks. 

After about a year and a half in the Senate, Bob Menendez is struggling to become popular with New Jersey voters.

Voters disapprove of Menendez’s performance by a margin of 39 to 31 percent, according to a Quinnipiac poll released today – the lowest rating Menendez has received in that survey.

Among the Republican State Senators that New Jersey Democrats would have a special interest in defeating after the 2011 legislative redistricting is Thomas Kean, Jr., the 2006 GOP candidate for United States Senate. And if Kean is successful in ousting Senate Minority Leader Leonard Lance in November, Democrats may have an even greater incentive to force Kean to battle for his own re-election next time.

So, just for fun, PoliticsNJ.com has drawn eight new legislative districts that could, hypothetically, place the former Governor’s son -- a resident of Westfield -- in harms way after reapportionment. For the purposes of these maps, we used the U.S. Census Bureau’s

Already through the assembly, a bill banning dual office holding passed in the state senate on Thursday, 33-2.

Upset that the bill grandfathers legislators who currently hold two or more offices, the GOP was circling in the senate chamber, taking bites at the bill when an infuriated Sen. Ron Rice let them have it.

Thomas Kean, Jr. has enough votes to oust Leonard Lance as Senate Minority Leader after the November election, according to GOP sources with knowledge of Senate internal politics.  Kean has privately announced his candidacy for the leadership post to several of his colleagues, and if the composition of the next Senate remains as expected, the '06 U.S. Senate candidate has the votes to win the contest.