The Daily Newarker

Star Ledger: Newark Central Ward Councilman Charlie Bell faces re-election challenge from 8 candidates

The unlikely marriage of Mayor Cory Booker’s money and Councilman Charlie Bell’s clout is not taking any of the fight out of the 2010 Central Ward council race.

With eight other candidates having filed so far, the seat is the most widely contested in the city and two months before election day, challengers are knocking on doors, raising money, and courting district leaders in a political battle royal.

Well, that’s it. Mayor Booker was ousted handily from the race. After diligent efforts and a once-thought unstoppable campaign, it appears that the 6.1 Million Dollar Man has met his match and ought to throw in the towel and concede victory.

As the New York Times, reports, Booker was beat out by nearly 300,000 followers, Gavin Newsom, the Twitter Prince:

Samepoint, a social media search engine based in Manhattan, has named Gavin Newsom, the mayor of San Francisco, “America’s Most Social Mayor.” The start-up company accorded Mr. Newsom the title after running a formula that primarily considered the number of politicians’ followers and fans on Twitter and Facebook.

Mr. Newsom, with almost 1.4 million followers on Twitter, far outstripped the mayor in the No. 2 spot, Cory Booker of Newark, who has just shy of 1.1 million followers.

Oh, wait, what? You thought I was referring to that other race? Oh, no — that other guy is still going to lose.

Star Ledger: In Newark, political family connections play prominent role in campaigns

Names like Payne, Rice, James, and Baraka will all appear on council ballots this May, carrying a long, and sometimes pained, history of political battles. Of the 40 candidates who have filed for council races so far, 11 have strong family connections to Newark politics, and of those, seven are incumbents or considered viable by political observers.

“The famous line from Tip O’Neill is that all politics are local,” said Carl Sharif, a political advisor on decades of Newark political campaigns and former campaign manager to Mayor Cory Booker. “In Newark, all politics are personal. All politics are family.”

But in Newark, where homegrown credentials are a practical pre-requisite for office, familial ties are no guarantee of a political alliance.

Newark is at an intersection of small-town politics and big-city opportunities: politicians who embed themselves into the political system have substantial resources to wield and few challengers to unseat them — Sharpe being the obvious example.

If we want to build sustainability that outlives our current leadership, we need to become intentional and focused on developing the leaders of tomorrow.