NJ-3: Shelley Adler for Congress

by: Rosi Efthim

Sun Jan 29, 2012 at 08:07:16 PM EST

Per PolitickerNJ, the widow of former congressman John Adler is set to announce she plans to take from Jon Runyan the NJ-3 congressional seat that Runyan took from John Adler. It would be good to see another Adler sweep to victory in the 3rd District, like John Adler was swept in back in 2008.  It's good symmetry.

It's useful to remember that though former Eagle Jon Runyan may have won in 2010, he got the chance to challenge Adler in his first re-election as an incumbent (Shelley Adler gets that chance now with Runyan) when he may never again be as vulnerable. Plus, the district had been Republican before Adler came in on the Obama wave, and perhaps most memorably, the Adler campaign floated a fake Tea Party candidate they tried for a long time to deny. That was apparently too disreputable even for New Jersey politics. (Adler, you'll remember, died of complications of a staph infection just weeks later). Note: in an earlier version of this post I posted the wrong numbers for Runyan's victory. Hat tip ken bank for the correction.

This is a good time to take Runyan out, though Adler will haYve to move into the District to do it. Her hometown Cherry Hill was redistricted out of NJ-3 this time around. And it's useful to remember, whatever the unpleasant history of the late Congressman Adler's last campaign, as a man and as a candidate, he way outclassed Runyan. Shelley Adler, like her late husband, is an attorney. Whatever his fame on the field, Runyan was spectacularly unqualified for office when he ran (and won). It's impossible not to wish Adler well (or for that matter, any Democrat that takes Runyan on in a viable campaign). After all, Runyan's still this guy: