HACKENSACK – The Bergen reformer’s fear is someone disgraced or incarcerated will be running the party, giving orders via cellphone or BlackBerry to drones working in the service of a political patronage system that grinds forward unchanged even as the feds expose and prosecute the upper eschelons. 

But it’s also an election year – for governor, no less – and in that all important, 70-community county of Bergen, which Democrats or Republicans must win in order win it all in 2009 – tampering with the Democratic Party infrastructure and leaving it depleted or less than muscular could give the GOP that one opportunity they’re seeking. 

Indeed, even as Joe Ferriero wrote his letter of resignation as chairman of the Bergen County Democratic Organization (BCDO), former U.S. Attroney Chris Christie – the man whose office last year indicted Ferriero on federal corruption charges – filed his papers to run for governor against Democrat Jon Corzine, setting up that most dramatic contrast of party plot lines, which the GOP wants to translate into crumbling utterly the Dems’ most vulnerable fault line here in Bergen.

The announcement that U.S. Rep. Steven Rothman will spend Election Day in Chicago with Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama fuels speculation that the Congressman from Bergen County may be up for a post in the new administration.  Rothman has said he has no interest, but then again, that's what they all say just before they take the job.

Rothman has been interested in moving up to the United States Senate, and he clearly has his eye on the seat of 84-year-old Democrat Frank Lautenberg, who is expected to win re-election to a record fifth term tomorrow.  Rothman and other Democrats are already planning as if the Senate seat will open up in 2014, and the harsh reality is that many of the potential candidates get that it might not take that long.  An Obama administration post doesn't necessarily take Rothman out of contention for a U.S. Senate seat (indeed, it could actually propel him past other Democratic Congressmen), unless the seat opens up within the next year or two.  

If Rothman leaves, the front runner to replace him was supposed to be State Sen. Paul Sarlo.  But recent health issues for the 40-year-old Bergen County Democrat are considered serious, and that could take Sarlo out of the race if there is a special election early next year.

The announcement that an eclectic group of lawmakers have introduced a bill to require legislators to disclose their person income from public sources was a direct shot at Senate President Richard Codey.  The proposed law would force legislators, their spouses and their dependent children to report direct and indirect financial stakes in no-bid public contracts -- something Codey has been strongly opposed to.  The bill has the backing of Gov. Jon Corzine, South Jersey Democrats allied with party leader George Norcross, Bergen County Democrats opposed to indicted County Chairman Joseph Ferriero, and several key Republican Senators.

Gov. Jon Corzine thinks that Bergen County Democratic Chairman Joseph Ferriero should step down from his party post and his job as Counsel to the Passaic Valley Sewerage Commission after his indictment this week on federal corruption charges, according to his spokesman.

"Governor Corzine has been consistent and clear in how he feels about political figures under indictment. They should step aside," Sean Darcy, Corzine's press secretary, told PolitickerNJ.com. Last year, Corzine sought the resignation of two Democratic Assemblymen who had been arrested on corruption charges.

When Joseph Ferriero wrestled the county chairmanship from Gerald Calabrese in June 1998, Bergen County Republicans had a 7-0 majority on the Board of Freeholders, and Republicans in the offices of County Executive, County Clerk, and Sheriff.  The only countywide Democratic official was Michael Dressler, who had won election as Surrogate in 1996.  Republicans held three of the five State Senate seats, and eight of ten State Assembly seats that included parts of Bergen County.

In a campaign largely engineered through Ferriero's strategic and fundraising skills, Democrats scored an upset victory in November '98.  Joseph Ciccone ousted GOP Acting Sheriff Jay Alpert, and Dennis McNerney and Douglas Bern were elected Freeholder.  (Barbara Chadwick, a Freeholder for twenty years, was re-elected, as was County Executive William "Pat" Schuber, who defeated Assemblywoman Loretta Weinberg, and County Clerk Kathleen Donovan.)  Ciccone gave Ferriero some of the patronage he needed to build a county organization. And the Freeholder Board moved from 7-0 to 5-2.

Some Democratic insiders suggest that one casualty of yesterday's indictments of Joseph Ferriero and Dennis Oury will be Bergen County Executive Dennis McNerney, who has always been more popular with Ferriero than with local Democratic party leaders.  McNerney has two years left in his second term, and there's a good chance, sources say, that the post-Ferriero Bergen County Democratic Organization will seek a new candidate for County Executive in 2010.

Eight members of the New Jersey State Assembly are in danger of losing party support if they seek re-election in 2009:

In a press release on his new opponent in the Republican U.S. Senate primary, Murray Sabrin called Dick Zimmer a two-time loser.  Sabrin’s statement is both hypocritical and inaccurate.  Sabrin, is a two-time loser: he won 6% of the vote in his 1997 run for Governor as Libertarian, and he received 13% in his fourth-place finish in the 2000 Republican U.S. Senate primary. 

The Winner of this week’s Valerie Huttle Chutzpah Award is the Chris Smith for Congress campaign, which criticized Democratic challenger Josh Zeitz for living and voting outside the district.  Zeitz voted in New York while he was in college, and lived in Massachusetts and in England while he was a college professor at Harvard and Cambridge.  It’s interesting that Smith would even bring up residency as an issue, considering he lives in Virginia.

Which Democratic presidential candidate is the real “agent of change”? 

That was the topic of The Record’s Charles Stile’s column on Tuesday.

In his political column previewing last night’s Hillary Clinton for President fundraiser organized by Bergen County Democrat Chair Joe Ferriero, Stile questioned the legitimacy of Clinton’s reform message.