I discussed in an earlier post the jockeying for influence that goes on during the run up to the Presidential election between county organizations within a party. Following the Sussex County Republicans getting Anthony Carbonetti, a key Rudy Giuliani aide, the Bergen County Republican Organization scored a victory of their own: Rudy Giuliani himself is speaking at the BCRO's Spring Fundraiser.
It will be interesting to see if this can help springboard the BCRO from the position of weakness they've been in for the last few elections. With three Freeholder seats up for election in a year that has seen a number of large property tax revaluations in large towns like Hackensack taking effect, as well as another increase in property taxes proposed by the Democrats in charge, if the BCRO's smart they should be able to pick up a seat or two, maybe even all three. If they could get all three, they'd still be in a minority on the seven person Board, but that is better than having no check against Joe Ferriero's ability to use county taxpayer dollars to reward campaign donors with no-bid contracts.
The Republicans message last election cycle was to tear down the County government, which turned out to be a disaster. Folks would rather pay too much for services than not have them, and if the Republicans have learned from their mistake they may stand a chance. We won't be able to tell what direction the party is going until they announce their Freeholder slate in the coming weeks. However, attracting the biggest star in the Republican universe at the moment is a very good thing for the organization.
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I certainly hope so. If the BCRO ever needed a boost, it's now and I think Rudy is just the man to do it.
Despite the Democrat trend in Bergen of late, Kean had a respectable showing there last year with 46% of the vote. I'm more than confident that Rudy could make up that seven points and then some. Reason being, (and not to be a racial profiler) towns like Cliffside Park, Fairview and Nutley that have heavy Italian populations will vote for him in droves, much like hispanics in Hudson came out for Bob Menendez.
I also think Rudy could make inroads in Hudson as well. The problems is that Republicans have left Hudson County for dead for years and wrongfully so. Republicans should've be pouring money into Hudson County a long time ago like the Democrats did in the 7 CD with Linda Stender and I'm sure you would cite the 5th as a good example and I would agree with you. Sometimes it isn't about winning the seat itself as much as it's about boosting the top of the ticket which Aronsohn did. While you knew that Aronshohn was not going to beat Garrett, Democrats poured money into his race as well as Stenders(and came close with Stender) and cut significantly enough into their margin of victory to help Bob Menendez get more votes than he normally would've.
Until Republicans start thinking like that in New Jersey and stop worrying about how many votes they're going to get out of Hunterdon County, nothing is really going to change.
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