Tom Moran

John Farmer, one of the Hall of Famers of New Jersey journalism, will retire from his post as the Star-Ledger's Editorial Page editor tomorrow.  The veteran reporter and columnist, who took over editorial responsibilities for the state's largest newspaper when Fran Dauth left last year, will be replaced by columnist Tom Moran.  Today is Farmer's last day.

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The Star-Ledger's editorial page becomes a little less intimidating to politicians after their candidate for governor, independent Christopher Daggett, won just 6% of the vote statewide.  The state's largest newspaper gave Daggett an early endorsement - so early that they unwittingly cost themselves the sponsorship of the gubernatorial debate.  This may be the single worst performance of any candidate to win the Star-Ledger endorsement during the newspaper's 177-year history.  This puts a burden on editorial page editor-elect Tom Moran as he prepares to take over.

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John Farmer, Sr., the legendary but aging Star-Ledger editorial page editor, told the National Journal that GOP gubernatorial candidate Christopher Christie was the front-runner for their newspaper endorsement before independent Christopher Daggett came into their editorial board and blew them away.  . "He was so good we brought him back a second time," Farmer told On Call, a National Journal publication.

Farmer said that Christie has played it safe - a reference to criticism that he has not been specific enough on his plans for taxes and budgets.  Christie's "arithmetic...didn't add up," Farmer told them, "and I think that hurt his credibility."  Calling him a "chaplain on a pirate ship," Farmer made it clear that Gov. Jon Corzine was never really in the running for an endorsement by the state's largest newspaper.

The Star-Ledger announced this week that they expect to cut another fifty full-time jobs amidst scary economic forecasts.  (There is, of course, a temptation to suggest that they ask Mark Matzen to help them become a bit more creative.) The newspaper's political team appears to be safe: the Star-Ledger has just invested in some billboards to expand the name ID of their "A Team" - Pulitzer Prize winner Josh Margolin, young rising star Claire Heininger, and Tom Moran, who rejoined the newspaper after a short stint at PSE&G.  The word is that Moran is Farmer's heir apparent.

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Joann Lee, a professor of communications at William Paterson University, will replace the Star-Ledger's Tom Moran as a panelist for Friday's gubernatorial debate.  The Star-Ledger dropped their sponsorship after their endorsement of a candidate for Governor on Sunday.  State regulations prohibit debate sponsors from endorsing any candidate until after the debate is completed.

The addition of Lee to the debate panel potentially offers an interesting dynamic to a campaign that has seen coverage of the cost of mammograms emerge as a major issue: in 2003, Lee resigned as the journalism dean at the University of Nevada, Reno after being diagnosed with breast cancer. Her cancer was discovered early during a routine mammography.  She had a partial mastectomy a month after taking her new job, and returned to the New York area eleven months later to be closer to her family following complications from the radiation treatments she undertook in Nevada .  She joined William Paterson in 2007.

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It's almost like a special election for an open seat: sponsors of this week's gubernatorial debate are mulling candidates to fill the vacancy caused by the withdrawal of Tom Moran (I-Star-Ledger).  Moran was slated to be the third panelist on Friday when Jon Corzine, Christopher Christie and Christopher Daggett in the second officially sanctioned debate.  But the Star-Ledger withdrew as a sponsor after realizing they had violated a state law that requires debate sponsors to hold off on an official endorsement until the debate is over. 

New Jersey again finds itself in need of a candidate switch.  The remaining sponsors - William Paterson University, The Record, the Herald News, Fox News, WWOR-TV (Channel 9), and WTXF-TV (Channel 29), along with the New Jersey Election Law Enforcement Commission - must decide on a replacement candidate for Moran.

A spokesman for the debate, Patrick DeDeo of WPU, would not rule out the possibility of the seat remaining unfilled.  That would leave The Record's Alfred Doblin and WTXF Fox 29 news anchor Thomas Drayton as the lone panelists.  WOR's Harry Martin will be the moderator.

Moran, who recently returned to the Star-Ledger after a brief stint with PSE&G, has been following the gubernatorial race closely and has institutional knowledge of the candidates and the key issues of the campaign.  So does Doblin, a veteran columnist and editorial editor.  Drayton is newer to the scene: he joined the Philadelphia Fox affiliate last year after spending six years as an anchorman in Sacramento.  He previously worked in Colorado, Alaska and Wyoming.

Debate organizers may look to fill the Moran seat with another reporter that has been actively covering the race for governor.

Some insiders wonder if the race for debate sponsor last summer (ELEC picked two out of three eligible candidates) might have been affected by the participation of the Star-Ledger, the state's daily newspaper.  Had the Star-Ledger not been a candidate, perhaps the winner would have been the League of Women Voters of New Jersey, who had applied with a major media sponsor: ABC-TV's New York and Philadelphia affiliates.  ABC had offered to pre-empt Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy to air the debate live on a weeknight from 7-8 PM.  That's a better time slot that Fox, which will air the debate live on their website, and rebroadcast in Philadelphia at 2PM Saturday and in New York at noon on Sunday.

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No word yet on who, if anyone, will replace the Star-Ledger's Tom Moran as a panelist at the gubernatorial debate on Friday night.

The Star-Ledger withdrew its sponsorship of the event after the paper endorsed independent gubernatorial candidate Christopher Daggett in yesterday's edition - an apparent violation of state regulations that required them to wait until after the completion of the debate to issue an endorsement.

A Star-Ledger representative called the New Jersey Election Law Enforcement Commission and William Paterson University - the debate's host venue - to withdraw, according to Patrick DeDeo, a spokesman for the university.

"The Ledger understood and they took care of it," he said.

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The Star-Ledger will not participate in Friday's gubernatorial debate after violating a state regulation that prohibits debate sponsors from endorsing candidates before the completion of the debate. The newspaper endorsed independent Christopher Daggett on Sunday.

"There were conversations yesterday with ELEC regarding the Star-Ledger endorsement," said Patrick DeDeo, the Director of External Relations for William Paterson University, one of the debate sponsors and the host.  "As such, the Star-Ledger is no longer a partner in the debate and their reporter, Tom Moran, will not participate on the panel."

The other partners in the debate, William Paterson University, The Record, the Herald News, WOR-TV, WTXF-TV, and Fox News, are discussing possible replacements for Moran.

The New Jersey Election Law Enforcement Commission (ELEC), in their published regulations on gubernatorial debate sponsorship (N.J.A.C. 19:25-15.50) states that "to be eligible for selection by the Commission to sponsor one or both of the gubernatorial general election debates, an organization... must not have endorsed any candidate in the pending general election for the office of Governor and must agree not to make any such endorsement until the completion of any debate sponsored by the organization." Read More >

There is some speculation in Star-Ledger circles that Tom Moran, the former columnist who is returning to his old job after an eighteen-month stint working corporate communications for PSE&G, is being groomed for higher office.  The word is that Moran is the crowned prince of the editorial page, and will become the Star-Ledger's soul after the aged John Farmer retires.  Farmer, a veteran reporter and columnist, began writing editorials after Fran Dauth took her buyout package last year.  Moran has some experience writing editorials, and the word is that's who editor Jim Willse wants.

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Tom Moran will return to the Star-Ledger as a political columnist eighteen months after he left the state's largest newspaper to take a communications job with PSE&G, New Jersey's largest utility company.  Moran was part of the Star-Ledger team that won the Pulitzer Prize in 2005 for their coverage of Gov. James E. McGreevey's resignation. 

Moran's comeback means that the Star-Ledger will go back to analysis pieces that have been largely absent since he left the paper in February 2008.  Only Paul Mulshine, who writes from a conservative viewpoint, has been noticeable as a political columnist.  Since Moran's departure, a trio of columnists for The Record, Charles Stile, Alfred Doblin, and Herb Jackson, have effectively dominated the political opinion pages in the New Jersey print media.

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