Joe Vas

EDISON - Diners anchor what’s left of the train-track and warehouseEdison Mayor Jun Choi: Politicker file photo girded countryside in this sprawling town, fifth biggest in New Jersey, where Mayor Jun Choi drinks his coffee on a summer morning in one of the more recognizable roadside haunts called the Plaza Diner.

The suit and tie and modest demeanor belie a man restlessly at work, for if Choi was an enigmatic upstart when he hit the scene three years ago, he has built himself into a surging political force, three-fourths of the way into his first term.

"And I’m running again," he says with a smile.

The Edison-raised kid who came from the inner sanctum of Bill Bradley’s machine-bucking 2000 presidential campaign, former state Department of Education wonk, Choi remains the Democratic Party outsider in a party that still does not know quite what to do with him.

U.S. Rep. Rob Andrews, Assemblyman John Wisniewski, and John Rutkowski
PERTH AMBOY - A city of wrought iron fire escapes hugs the waterfront to east of the highways, where in a banquet hall behind the ZPA Cocktail Lounge on Saturday night, U.S. Rep. Rob Andrews goes from table to table with Assemblyman John Wisniewski (D-Middlesex).

The 100 people here representing the United Poles in America ZPA embrace Wisniewski as one of their own, the powerful chairman of the Assembly Transportation Committee, who grew up among them in Sayreville, and who’s represented them for over 12 years.