PATERSON – Since North Ward Democratic leader Steve Adubato brought New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson to the Flamboyan on the weekend after the Democratic National Convention, major Latino leaders have to this point hardly shown overwhelming energy in their endorsement of Sen. Barack Obama (D-Il.). Hillary Clinton beat Obama in the Democratic Primary by almost ten percent or roughly the equivalent of the Latino vote, which is heavily Democratic in New Jersey and which was energized for Feb. 5th by Sen. Robert Menendez (D-Hoboken), Adubato and U.S. Rep. Albio Sires (D-West New York). Now heading for the general election in three weeks and mindful – but not fearful – of that primary falloff in Latino voter numbers for Obama, party leaders held a Spanish and Spanglish-heavy rally here today, in a city that’s over 50 percent Latino, in a county where Latinos number 44,849, or well over a fifth of all registered voters in Passaic. Co-anchored by Mayor Jose “Joey” Torres and Assemblywoman Elease Evans (D-Paterson), and packaged as a “color blind event,” mostly urban elected officials stood on the front steps of Paterson City Hall under a red, white and blue banner that read “Si, se puede.” The speakers included Passaic Democratic Chairman John Currie, U.S. Rep. Bill Pascrell (D-Paterson), U.S. Rep. Steve Rothman (D-Fair Lawn), Newark Mayor Cory Booker, Jersey City Mayor Jerramiah Healy Assemblywoman Nellie Pou (D-Paterson), Evans, and Torres. Engaged in a Columbus Day march, a formerly committed Gov. Jon Corzine backed out of the rally. “Vamos a ganar,” shouted Obama senior policy advisor Mark Alexander. “Vamos a cambiar el mundo para todos!” Obama supporters and bystanders packed the square, listening to the speeches and milling around a voter registration table set up at the foot of the Garret Hobart statue. “We are fighting a war in Iraq,” Torres cried to the crowd, “while here we are fighting a war of homelessness and joblessness!’ The people clapped as the mayor exhorted them -in English, then in Spanish – to back Obama. On stage with Torres stood African American Councilman Jeffrey Jones and Dominican American Councilman Rigo Rodriguez, one of whom or both of whom may challenge the Puerto Rican American mayor in 2010. The CW out of Paterson is that Torres could be vulnerable, especially to Jones if Jones can keep other strong African Americans out of the race and if Rodriguez gets in the race and splits the Latino vote. But that’s two years from now. With less than a month to go before Election Day 2008, the men showed “charged up, fired to go” unity behind Obama’s presidential candidacy. “Every five to six decades, a special person is born,” cried Torres, who backed Clinton in the primary. “We have a true visionary in a leader and that visionary is Sen. Barack Obama. The social problems of our world are color blind.” Still big in Newark’s Latino-dominant North Ward, if the crowd’s reaction to his words at the Richardson rally last month is any indication – Booker reminded Patersonians that the Spanish word for choice is “eleccion,” and led a Cesar Chavez chant of “Yes, we can! Yes, we can!” before riffing on the Silk City’s particular place in New Jersey history. “The people of Paterson built engines that united this country,” said the mayor. “There is a train coming. Don’t be late, because on Nov. 4th, it’s leaving New Jersey.” Pascrell likewise riled the crowd, at first seeming to channel Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) by addressing his audience as “my friends,” only to denounce the Republican presidential nominee’s campaign trail tactics and his “William Ayres/domestic terrorism”-suggestive rallies. “When you hear the other candidate – do you think I’d be calm, cool and collected like Barack Obama in the face of that?” Pascrell wanted to know. “Do you think you’d be calm, cool, and collected? He is, and that’s what we like about him. Isn’t that the kind of president we need?” Introduced by Alexander as the only congressman from New Jersey who stood with Obama in the primary, Rothman reminded the crowd that Bush’s foreign policy has contributed to 4,100 dead American soldiers in Iraq, and drained the country of $1 trillion in an action that has lasted longer than WWII. “All of our enemies know we’re bogged down in Iraq,” said Rothman, and Healy in his remarks referred to Bush and his GOP allies as “the most disastrous administration in the history of the United States.”
