(Cross-posted at BlueJersey.com)

Starting his 2006 campaign for U.S. Senate as the young, well-coifed namesake of New Jersey's most popular former Governor, many across the state had high hopes in Tom Kean jr. They saw in him the promise of a truly clean, moderate, barely-partisan Republican who could fill his father's impressive shoes. It wasn't long before he showed his true colors. The apple, sadly, had fallen far from the tree. Hurling relentlessly muddy attack upon attack, New Jersey voters began to see Tom Kean jr not as the second coming of his father, but rather a practitioner of the same old tired politics of smear and sleaze.

How obvious can they be? Mere days after a poll was released on the New Jersey Senate race indicating that Iraq was pulling down his poll numbers, Republican Senate candidate Tom Kean Jr has called for the resignation of Donald Rumsfeld. Even more laughable, he did it mere hours after Senator Menendez suggested that he should, sitting down with David Chen of the New York Times for an interview "just shy of midnight on Friday". (Hard for him to make the case for his own leadership abilities when he's doing what his opponent tells him to.)

This weekend, I relayed the story of GOP Senate wannabe Tom Kean, jr. running away from reporters after rightfully being criticized by Senator Bob Menendez (whose campaign many of you know I'm working for). Kean, jr couldn't take the heat and, in the face of reporters' questions, did nothing but repeat canned talking points. At one point, he even tried to cut the questioning off by ducking into an elevator. To prove that this was simply an attempted reporter dodge and not an actual trip to another floor, the elevator never left the sixth floor.

Many of you have been clamoring to see the sight for yourself.  Many have lamented, "if only there was a video of this escapade." Well... lament no longer. Tom Kean, jr not only runs from the issues -- he runs from the reporters. Watch for yourself! (And please by all means, feel free to pass this along to your friends.)

All of us here at the Menendez campaign have been pretty fed up with the petty attacks against the Senator, from NJ GOP chairman Tom Wilson's Ann Coulter-isms to Kean, Jr.'s own vague and unfounded personal attacks. Now, there are a few options for responding to this kind of Rove-style campaign. You can ignore it. You can send out surrogates to protest. Or you can confront the tactics, head on. Senator Menendez insisted on the latter.

Friday morning in Atlantic City, at a meeting of the New Jersey Association of Counties, Senator Menendez had some choice words for Tom Kean, Jr..

My record is clear, and I will not stand by another minute and let my opponent malign me or my service to the people I have represented throughout my career.  Tom, you may be playing with George Bush's campaign playbook, but you're on the field with a different kind of Democrat....

This is an incredibly exciting week for all of us here at the Menendez campaign. While we've been hard at work for some time now, we're just starting to work at the new headquarters in New Brunswick and are "officially" launching the campaign today with two events in North and South Jersey. Even though New Jersey's considered a "blue" state and Senator Menendez has something of an incumbency advantage, this race is far from over. The rightists have been crowing, for example, over poll numbers that indicate a tight race, or even a lead for Kean Jr.

However, the polls they've been citing have largely been from partisan Republican firms like Strategic Vision and Rasmussen. In fact, the GOP's clamoring for bona fide good news in this race has even caught the attention of Media Matters, which has repeatedly criticized the partisan Republican Beltway media for pushing absurdly pro-Kean Jr talking points. Meanwhile, truly independent polling forms like Quinnipiac have shown Senator Menendez in the lead.

In my first official post as a Menendez for Senate staffer, I'm really excited to announce the launch of StandUpToBigOil.com. As many of you have probably heard by now, Senator Menendez is fighting back against Big Oil and their allies in the Republican Congress. The Menendez plan will force Big Oil to foot the bill for a 60-day suspension of the federal gas tax to ease the burden of outrageous prices at the pump. Senator Reid and the DSCC have been touting the Menendez plan for a few weeks now, and it really seems to be gaining traction.

When I heard this story this morning, I immediately thought about the fundraising power the blogosphere displayed this election cycle...

To be honest, I'm stunned at the lack of scrutiny Kerik's resume has come under.  He's about to become one of the most important figures in American national security and very few people are thinking critically about this appointment.

There's a good deal of information to suggest, however, that we should think again about Kerik's fitness to serve in such an important role.

I posted to my site a few reasons why Bernard Kerik is not fit to serve as Secretary of Homeland Security...

Alas, it's merely a parody from Axis of Logic.  It is a convincingly written one if that's any excuse.  It shouldn't be too long now before Drudge and the rest of the right-wing media assault team pick this one up and boil over with shock and outrage at the liberal bias of the news aggregating bots at Google.

It's sort of a little thank you for everyone who's going out to vote Kerry and a little extra incentive to do so (as if you need one...).

The lyrics might help explain why I requested this song in particular...