Ras Baraka is Elected Mayor of Newark

The New York Times reports that:

Councilman Ras Baraka, the fiery scion of a militant poet, was elected mayor of Newark on Tuesday, signaling a likely shift in the direction that New Jersey’s largest city had embarked upon for most of the last decade.

Mr. Baraka rebuffed a spirited late surge from a political newcomer, Shavar Jeffries, a law professor with an improbable Horatio Alger-like life story, in a bitter contest marred by incendiary rhetoric, arrests and charges of vandalism. With 96 percent of the precincts reporting, Mr. Baraka was leading with about 54 percent of the vote, compared with 46 percent for Mr. Jeffries, according to unofficial results.

“We are the mayor!” Mr. Baraka shouted at his victory party, as a six-piece funk band played an original song with the refrain, “Who did we vote for? Raaaaas Baraka.” Mr. Baraka added, “The people of Newark are not for sale.”

The race between the two Democrats was expected to be Newark’s most expensive election ever. Mr. Jeffries enjoyed a sizable financial advantage thanks to outside groups, while Mr. Baraka relied on his family’s name and fervent union support, and he tapped into misgivings about the previous mayor.

That mayor, of course, was Cory A. Booker, who won the first of two terms in 2006 as a fresh reformer. Yet while Mr. Booker unquestionably raised the profile of his adopted city, attracting hundreds of millions of dollars, he never could erase lingering suspicions among some of Newark’s power brokers that he was an outsider.

Mr. Booker left office last year after winning election to the United States Senate. When an interim mayor, Luis A. Quintana, indicated that he was not running for office, the dynamics were set for what some viewed as a referendum on Mr. Booker, as well as a watershed moment for the future.

“Baraka’s win suggests that the Booker years didn’t vanquish the old guard,” said Andra Gillespie, a professor at Emory University and author of “The New Black Politician: Cory Booker, Newark and Post-Racial America.”

When the masses are united and organized, we can and will prevail over the power elite. Baraka's election is a reminder that the progressives can fight the power and seize power. Elections matter, people. Congratulations, Mayor Elect Ras Baraka!

Today is A Beautiful Day!

Good morning, family. Today is a beautiful day. Yesterday, New Jersey elected its first African American U.S. Senator and the federal government is open for business. As reported in the Star Ledger,

Cory Booker’s star-quality and his skill at surviving the roughhouse politics of New Jersey’s biggest city took him from the mayor’s office to the U.S. Senate today in a hard-fought victory over Republican iconoclast Steve Lonegan.   

With his special-election win, Booker will become the first African-American to represent New Jersey in the U.S. Senate, and is the first Newark mayor to win higher office in more than a century. He also extended the Democratic Party’s U.S. Senate race winning streak to 14 elections in New Jersey, dating back to 1976.   

The Newark mayor will serve the remaining 15 months of the late Sen. Frank Lautenberg’s term after a two-month campaign marked by bizarre turns, wild accusations, erratic polling numbers and blistering attacks.   

Booker won by double digits, but it wasn’t the landslide many had predicted at the beginning of the campaign. With 94 percent of the precincts reporting, he had about 55 percent of the vote to Lonegan’s 44 percent.  

From the outset, the 44-year-old, two-term mayor had one advantage his conservative firebrand opponent could never hope to match: name recognition. From city hall to the morning talk shows, Booker’s good looks, big smile and his championing of his beleaguered city won him plenty of big name fans — and evidently the approval of Jersey voters who elected him in a rare October election with light turnout.

Hopefully, Cory Booker's election is a sign that new possibilities are on the horizon for African Americans. I hope that the people are not simply pacified by the power of symbolism. We must be agenda focused and results oriented. As black politicians rise, we must ensure that our agenda and interests are not marginalized.

Speaking of being marginalized, President Obama and the Democrats soundly defeated the idiotic Tea Party fanatics in the U.S. House of Representatives, at least for now. As reported in the Washington Post,

Federal agencies, parks, museums and monuments began to reopen Thursday morning, after a chastened Congress ended a bitter funding standoff that triggered a 16-day government closure and drove the nation toward the brink of default.   

The agreement struck by Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) funds agencies through mid-January, calls hundreds of thousands of civil servants back to work and raises the $16.7 trillion debt limit...   

The bill passed late Wednesday ended a stalemate created last month, when hard-line conservatives pushed Republican leaders to use the threat of shutdown to block a landmark expansion of federally funded health coverage.   

That campaign, however, succeeded mainly in undermining popular support for the Republican Party. By the end, dozens of anxious GOP lawmakers were ready to give Obama almost exactly what he requested months ago: a bill to fund the government and increase the Treasury Department’s borrowing power with no strings attached.   

The Senate overwhelmingly ratified the deal Wednesday evening, 81 to 18, with more than half of Senate Republicans voting yes. A few hours later, the House followed suit, approving the measure 285 to 144. Eighty-seven Republicans joined a united Democratic caucus in approving the measure, allowing Congress to meet a critical Treasury Department deadline with one day to spare.    

Obama signed the measure into law shortly after midnight,reopening parks and monuments across the nation, restoring government services and putting furloughed federal employees back on the job, many of them in the Washington region.  

The measure guarantees those workers back pay for time spent at home, aid flood-ravaged Colorado and provide extra cash for fighting wildfires out West. And it would grant the D.C. government, which relies on Congress to approve its budget, authority to manage its own affairs through the 2014 fiscal year.

I commend the President and the Democrats for standing up to those no good, hostage takers. President Obama must continue to stand strong. No surrender on entitlements!

The President Explains Why Bain Matters

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Yesterday, President Obama explained to reporters why Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney's record at Bain matters. Later, Newark Mayor Cory Booker backtracked on his comments opposing the Obama campaign's attack on Romney's record at Bain. Now that Mr. Booker has apologized, you all can stop crucifying him.


 

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