The political education of James E. McGreevey
Former governor and mayor discusses raw side of politics in book

SCOTT PILLING staff Former Gov. and Woodbridge Mayor James E. McGreevey receives a warm welcome as he makes his way through the crowd gathered at the Woodbridge Community Center Sept. 19 to get an autographed copy of his memoir, "The Confession."

Former Gov. and longtime Woodbridge Mayor James E. McGreevey's newly released book "The Confession" isn't just about the sex thing.

McGreevey offers a rare insider's view into the tough, sometimes ugly world of Middlesex County and New Jersey politics, a world he describes as "a circus."

He learned the ways of the political world early. No word had come from the Middlesex County Prosecutor's Office after he submitted a star-studded résumé that would have attracted private-sector companies in a heartbeat. It wasn't until his father saw an unnamed local politician and asked him to "help Jimmy out" that he got a response. Within 36 hours, he had an appointment to see the county prosecutor.

He began his political career as a party crasher. He started attending political gatherings of Democratic Party bigwigs while he was still a Middlesex County assistant prosecutor.

His fly-on-the-wall approach taught him a few things. The politicians with the most clout in the county were the mayors, not the state senators or congressmen. And their power came from the P word: patronage.

One step higher on the political power ladder were the party bosses, who determine which candidates will have the party line and best spot on the ballot. They dole out and spend the most cash for campaigns.

"This was the circus of New Jersey politics, and I'd just stumbled into the center ring," McGreevey wrote.

There were three "warlords" who stood out among the party bosses. They divided the state into thirds, he wrote.

They were South Jersey boss George Norcross III from Camden, state Sen. John Lynch from Middlesex County, and North Jersey boss Raymond Lesniak from Union County.

Lynch was the most powerful political boss in the state and "without a doubt the smartest man in the state, maybe the nation," at the time, McGreevey wrote.

Lynch pulled New Brunswick out of its doldrums and championed smart growth and urban revitalization, he said.

But as the years went by, Lynch formed a consulting company that helped developers win government approval for their projects, "a peculiar form of checkbook government," McGreevey said.

His big political break came at a rubber-chicken dinner, when he met then Assembly Speaker Alan Karcher. After a few minutes of small talk, Karcher offered McGreevey a job in the Assembly Majority office.

He took it, and found the job exhilarating. But by 1985, he was disillusioned with how long it took to get anything done in the state Legislature. When he was offered a job as the executive director of the state Parole Board, he took it.

He credits former state Sen. Jack Fay as the most important political influence on his life. They decided he should focus on running for Karcher's old Assembly seat. That meant winning the support of each of the five mayors in the district, along with the five local Democratic chairmen.

"I loved every minute of it, from strategizing to knocking on doors," he wrote. "I began by making lists of all the people whose rings I needed to kiss."

One of those rings belonged to Woodbridge Mayor Joseph A. "JoJo" DeMarino, who considered himself the "Kojak" of local politics and kept an autographed photo of Telly Savalas on his office wall. McGreevey had worked on various issues with DeMarino before, and "JoJo" agreed to support him.

McGreevey won the Assembly race on Nov. 7, 1989. He said his relationship with DeMarino began to sour a year later, when DeMarino announced he was about to be indicted for bribing a Carteret official for a vote on a city contract. But the end came when DeMarino decided not to support him after McGreevey's legislative district was redrawn. McGreevey was stunned.

He decided to run against "JoJo" for mayor of Woodbridge. McGreevey's unofficial theme was "The Unindicted Democratic Ticket." DeMarino was found not guilty of the bribery charge in October 1991. McGreevey won anyway.

"I have to say, JoJo DeMarino did me a huge favor," McGreevey wrote. "No job was ever better suited to me than being mayor of Woodbridge."

DeMarino, McGreevey claims in the book, left "the place a wreck - the bookkeeping was a shambles."

"Woodbridge's government was an utter disaster," he wrote.

DeMarino said last week he has no plans to read McGreevey's book.

"When the time comes, I will sit down with a reporter," he said. "I'm going to put down corrections to 'The Confession.'

"If I left the town in the condition McGreevey says, do you think they would have let me sign a bond for $14 million?" DeMarino said. "I left the town with a $600,000 surplus. It's on the record. It don't wash. Figures don't lie."

His goal was to make sure "everybody was happy" while he was mayor, McGreevey wrote.

"I wanted to become everything anybody in Woodbridge wanted me to be," he said. "I taught myself seven words in every language spoken in my district... I wanted to make [Woodbridge] the best little town in America."

By 1995, state Democratic officials were urging McGreevey to run against Gov. Christine Todd Whitman. He met with his Middlesex brain trust of Faye, Lesniak, Gary Taffet, John McCormac, Kevin McCabe and now state Sen. Joseph Vitale.

In November 1996, he announced he would run for governor. He had Lesniak's blessing in Union County and Lynch's in Middlesex. By the time he reached the governor's office, his relationship with the two men began to change. A rift was growing between Lynch and Lesniak. Lynch was fond of telling the press he was McGreevey's closest adviser.

"I found all this intramural feuding unseemly ... and I blamed Lynch, whose constitutional unhappiness was becoming a poison eating at my administration," McGreevey wrote.

Things have changed since McGreevey announced he would resign from the governor's office in August 2004. Ray Lesniak is still a trusted friend. McGreevey is on tour promoting his book.

Former state Senate President John Lynch, the kingpin of Middlesex County politics for so many years, pleaded guilty to one count of mail fraud and one count of tax evasion in federal court in Newark earlier this month. He could face between 33 and 41 months in federal prison.