George W. Bush

WESTFIELD -- Assemblywoman Linda Stender today charged that her congressional opponent, State Sen. Leonard Lance, is less pro-choice than he lets on.

Stender held a pres conference in front of a pharmacy, telling about 10 supporters that Lance voted against a bill she authored that barred pharmacists from refusing to fill birth control prescriptions based on their religious or personal beliefs.

“My opponent was one of only six State Senators that voted against this law. You can’t be pro-choice and vote for a bill that will allow a pharmacy to not fill a birth control prescription,” she said. “That’s the essence of what this is about.”

Governor Corzine today said that, if state Sen. Leonard Lance really is so different from President Bush, he hasn’t demonstrated it enough.

“I think there are a lot of things that Leonard Lance would agree with President Bush on. I don’t think he is turning his back on the national security policies. I think, if I hear it right, he has generally been on the same side as the president with regard to regulatory policy – that would be no regulation or limited regulation,” said Corzine at a bill signing in Princeton. “There are differences, but if there were such sharp differences I think he would have changed parties. I haven’t seen that happen.”

Corzine’s comments come just days before President Bush comes to Colts Neck to raise money for Lance, who as of June 30th only had $81,000 on hand to Democrat Linda Stender’s $1.2 million, along with fellow Republican candidate Chris Myers.

Medford Mayor Chris Myers last night in Mount Holly debate: Politicker photoThe news tonight that President George W. Bush plans to headline a Colts Neck fundraiser on Monday for Republican Congressional candidates, state Sen. Leonard Lance (R-Hunterdon) and Medford Mayor Chris Myers, created an easy opening for the Democrats.

Bush has a 15 percent job approval rating in New Jersey, according to Strategic Vision.

Only too happy to exploit the president’s toxicity here, Mark Warren, spokesman for state Sen. John Adler (D-Camden), Democratic candidate in the 3rd Congressional district, criticized Republican adversary Myers for allowing Bush to come in and raise money for him.State Sen. John Adler (D-Camden) last night in the Veterans for Education debate in Mount Holly: Politicker photo

Still, he said the news didn’t catch him off guard. In the most recent fundraising reports, the Republican candidates trailed their counterparts by wide margins.

"It’s no surprise at all," said Warren. "Mayor Myers has been getting his campaign playbook from George W. Bush and Karl Rove. The principle point of Mayor Myers’s energy policy is extensive tax breaks for big oil companies.

BLOOMINGTON, Minn. -- U.S. Rep. Chris Smith said he votes differently than the Bush Administration’s policies and his own party more than any other New Jersey Republican.

But Smith takes a measured tone when reflecting on what the legacy of the Bush era will look like.

“I think there’s a tremendous amount of anger directed at him.  He gets blamed for all kinds of things,” said Smith.

BLOOMINGTON, Minn. -- Former Gov. Tom Kean, Sr. has been offered three cabinet positions by two presidents – both Democrat and Republican – during his career. He turned them down each time.

If John McCain wins the presidency, Kean said, this time will be no different.

“Obviously I’d help the president out in any way I could if there was a commission or something I could help on a temporary basis, but I’m not looking for a full time position in Washington. I never have been,” he said.

ST. PAUL, Minn. -- While many pundits say President Bush’s absence from the Republican National Convention is a political blessing, former Monmouth County Republican Chairman Adam Puharic remains hopeful that he’ll still make an appearance.

“I was born into leadership under George W. Bush.  His presidency invigorated me,” said Puharic, a 37-year-old insurance broker who describes himself as the “youngest senior stateman in Monmouth County. 

“I hope he stops by,” he said.

A New Jersey Congressman says that former White House advisor Karl Rove is going to hell: Getty Images Photo
DENVER -- Speaking in front of the New Jersey delegation this morning, U.S. Rep. Bill Pascrell (D-Paterson) said that former White House official Karl Rove – for years President Bush’s closest advisor – is going to hell.

Pascrell said that the last eight years have been full of squandered opportunities and missteps, both domestically and internationally, and pinned the blame squarely on the Bush Administration.

“We might have missed the last eight years because folks did not tell us the truth,” he said. “Dante’s Inferno laid out very specifically the very levels receding into hell. And the hottest place is reserved for those who distort the truth, who manipulate our minds, or who attempt to do it, anyway. So I don’t think Bush and Cheney will be at the hottest point in the inferno, but I sure as hell know that Karl Rove will be.”

As recently as the American boyhoods of John Kerry, John McCain and George W. Bush, it was nearly impossible to think of becoming president without going through the ritual of combat.

World War II vets threw down a gauntlet that members of the succeeding generation couldn't hope to wield unless they donned uniforms and picked up rifles. But the motif of warrior as leader goes back most vividly and foundationally to Washington.

The general on horseback myth worked so well and the country's early talent pool tested in war went so deep, few men thereafter could assume the chair of presidential power without showing battle stripes. From the country's founding all the way up to 1908, only the elections of 1800 (Adams v. Jefferson), 1844 (Polk v. Clay) and 1861 (Lincoln v. Douglas) failed to feature war hero candidacies.

Linda Stender at a 2006 rally with former President Bill Clinton and Sen. Bob MenendezWell before knowing who their candidate will be to run in place of U.S. Rep. Mike Ferguson, Republicans say they're no more worried about losing the seat than they were before Ferguson decided not to seek reelection.

Their reason: likely Democratic candidate Linda Stender's performance in her supposedly safe Assembly re-election two weeks ago, when she beat her closest Republican opponent who spent almost no money by only 3,332 votes - a difference of about 7%. That, they say, is evidence that her 2006 election against Ferguson, which she lost by a single point, was more the product of a bad Republican year than evidence of Republican vulnerabilities in the district.

"Stender's staggering underperformance in her re-election for the State Assembly is further evidence that the people of New Jersey do not agree with her tax and spend record," said National Republican Congressional Committee Spokeswoman Julie Shutley in a statement.

The 14th district State Senate candidates are girding for battle at Steinert High School tonight, and once again GOP Assemblyman Bill Baroni is heading into a Fair and Clean Elections debate with the Georg W. Bush factor fairly smothered.