Posted on Fri, Sep. 5, 2008
Rob Andrews lied. Plain and simple.
When the South Jersey congressman made his last-minute - and unsuccessful bid - to wrest the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate from incumbent Frank Lautenberg, he promised he would not seek reelection to the House of Representatives. Win or lose.
Yesterday, though, Andrews had the audacity to say he had changed his mind "because my heart told me it was the right thing to do."
His heart must speak with a forked tongue, or from a well of ambition so deep it would allow him to stand before the people of New Jersey and declare that he could not be taken at his word.
Politicians are entitled to changes of heart. But Andrews' very specific vow was the linchpin to a dubious scheme that party bosses devised to make sure they wouldn't be bound by the wishes of voters as expressed in the June 3 Democratic primary.
Voters in Andrews' district chose his wife, Camille, to run for the seat, even though she said she would step aside if the party decided someone else would be a more viable candidate. Andrews promised that the fix wasn't in so he could run for reelection if he lost to Lautenberg. But that's exactly what is happening.
The South Jersey Democratic machine, headed in every way but name by George Norcross, is saying to heck with democracy. The machine doesn't care whom voters chose to be on the November ballot. Camille Andrews, a former Rutgers Law School associate dean, is well qualified, but the machine wants Rob.
Voters in the heavily Democratic First Congressional District had to suspect this would happen; Camille Andrews had always said she would follow the party bosses' orders. But just because voters were forewarned doesn't make this right.
The machine did mention other experienced politicians that it said it was also considering. Among them were State Sen. Dana Redd, Assemblyman John Burzichelli, Burlington County Democratic Chairman Richard Perr, and Camden County party co-chair Donald Norcross, brother of the power broker.
The seat is one of the safest for Democrats in the nation, so any of these other contenders would likely have been a successful candidate.
But in the end, it all came back to Rob Andrews, who had promised to step aside. This sorry episode forever tarnishes the reputation of an able legislator who in his 18 years in Congress has earned deserved praise by this newspaper.
Those trying to rationalize this mess by crying that South Jersey shouldn't lose the clout of a 10-term congressman make a valid point. But it's not strong enough to excuse Andrews' subterfuge. Clout loses to integrity every time when voters are calculating who would best represent their interests.
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