Trenton

Mayor Doug Palmer of Trenton, a loyal Hillary Clinton supporter, doesn’t think much of the dust-up over Clinton's comments about how exit polls in Indiana and North Carolina showed Barack Obama's "support among working, hardworking Americans, white Americans, is weakening again, and how whites in both states who had not completed college were supporting me."

Palmer, one of Clinton’s highest-profile black supporters in New Jersey, refused any suggestion that she was trying to be manipulative, and said that she was only pointing out a fact that a whole host of pundits and analysts had already observed.

"She doesn't have to say that because people already see it and know it. And her saying it is not going to make it more important," he said, adding. "People need to step back and take a breath."

"She just has gotten a bad rap on this," he added. "You have 92 percent of African American voters going for him. And people said that he has black support."

He argued Obama's "bitter" comments were worse because they were made in a San Francisco fund-raiser. By contrast, with Clinton, he said, "It was not like she was saying something behind closed doors. She said it to the media."  read more »

10 a.m. Consumer Affairs Commissioner Jonathan Mintz will announce a settlement that will return more than $600,000 to homeowners scammed by a home improvement contractor at the NYC Department of Consumer Affairs, 42 Broadway, between Exchange Place and Beaver Street.

10 a.m. State Sen. Wayne Bryant and R. Michael Gallagher, a former dean at the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey's School of Osteopathic Medicine in Stratford, will make an initial appearance after being indicted on corruption charges at the federal courthouse in Trenton, New Jersey.  read more »

11 a.m. Citizens Committee for New York City and Council Member John Liu will announce a tax free preparation campaign targeting low-income New Yorkers at the Chinese American Planning Council, 136-18 39 Avenue, in Flushing, Queens.

Say what you will about New Jersey, but Trenton is a model of democracy next to Albany. This website actually has a running count of Democratic legislators in the New Jersey Assembly who are defecting from their leadership in the ongoing budget standoff with Governor Jon Corzine. The score so far: Assembly Speaker Joe Roberts 26, Jon Corzine 22.

When's the last time we heard about an rollicking, intra-party argument among the majority Democrats in New York?

Oh, that's right.

-- Josh Benson

What befell Kieran Mahoney/Mercury Public Affairs when they tried to jump puddles to Trenton? Check out PoliticsNJ today.

Mahoney got hired to do work for the Republicans in the NJ state assembly, but also wound up working for the guy who hired him on his own campaign for governor.

Now, the current assembly Republicans are holding up Kieran's payment of $30,000 and are suing this former assemblyman, Paul DiGaetano, for misappropriating the funds.

- Tom McGeveran

1776, by David McCullough. Simon and Schuster, 386 pages, $32.  read more »

What a difference a war makes. My only dealings with the Army War College in Carlisle, Pa.  read more »