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lune 15. 2005
in
page C3
Il,r^¡Jortlartì» ODbaeruer
‘Street Fight’ Delivers Political Heat
Award winning
documentary on PBS
with corporate, downtown-centered
development, including a new Per
forming Arts Center and minor-
league baseball stadium.
But Booker questions the value
o f the mayor’s policies to the city ’ s
poorer neighborhoods and resi
dents. He cites Newark’s sky-high
murder rate, a poverty - level over 30
percent, and an astounding h ig h
school dropout rate
of 60 percent. Booker Councilman Cory Booker cam paigns for m ayor against incum bent Sharpe Jam es.
ing to N ew ark, setting up house ity stunts. He turns B ooker’s have benefited from the mayor’s
su g g e sts th a t i t ’s
time for a new gen in the Brick T ow ers high-rise “golden boy” image to his own patronage.
projects, and starting a nonprofit favor, contrasting with great effect
The race turns uglier and more
e ra tio n to bring
to fight slum lords. He also got his own background as a native son cut-throatovertim e.exam iningthe
Newark ’ s downtown
him self elected to the city council whopulledhimselfupfromthecity’s ugly underbelly ot politics,
“renaissance” to all
when no one gave him m uch meanest streets. He has achieve-
“In the James-Booker mayoral
the city’s residents.
chance He undertook unortho- ments to point to and support from race, we saw a story very different
A son o f civil-
dox actions, such as living in an state Democrats. More to the point, from the one found in other recent
rights activists who
RV parked at notorious drug cor- the mayor has solid support among campaign film s,’Curry said. This
integrated a w hite
ners to drive away the dealers.
poor blacks and Latinos - the very wasn’t a story of mass-media poli-
n e ig h b o rh o o d in
Sharpe James, Newark’s mayor constituency Booker claims to be tics; it w asn't about spin doctors
northern New Jersey,
for 16 years, promptly labels Booker standing up fo r-w h o identify with and photo ops, but a story about
Booker is a poster
VlayorSharpeJam es sh a k e s hands with voters. chikl for
m ove. a carpetbagger engaged in public- Jam es’ rags-to-riches story or who politics in the city streets.’
There’s a saying that democ
racy is a contact sport.
The award-winning documen
tary “Street Fight" gives you a ring
side seat. This insider’s chronicle
of the 2002 race for mayor in New
ark, N J. is riveting, delivering a
dramatic account of youthful en
ergy and •........’
ideals running
....... C- - headlong
into old-guard machine politics and
acial demagoguery. These oppos-
ment. Excelling in high school where
he was an all-American football
player, he went on to Stanford, to
Oxford where he was a Rhodes
Scholar, and then graduated from
Yale Law School. Upon graduat
ing, B ookerdidn’t seek high-paid
law work, but instead em braced
his p arents’ activist ideals, mov-
ing forces are, of course, nothing
new in American elections. But, in
Newark in 2002, a black mayor was
using these tactics against a black
challenger.
Director Marshall Curry’s film,
winner of the 2005 Audience Award
at the Tribeca Film Festival and at
Hot Docs, has its na
tional broadcast pre
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10 p.m., as part of the
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At first, the 32-year
old Booker, a recently
elected councilman for
the city’s poor Central
Ward, mounts a rather
respectful challenge to
the incumbent. Booker
re c o g n iz e s th a t the
mayor, representing a
A sk a b o u t o ur s to c k rim w ith p u rch as ed .
first generation of black
Limited to stock on hard.
politicians whocame up
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raised Newark’s stature
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