Street Fight: Cory Booker's Struggle

“Hi I’m Cory Booker and I am running for Mayor of Newark.” These are the words heard repeatedly as mayoral candidate Cory Booker goes door to door, with a big, welcoming smile on his face, as he goes out into the neighborhoods campaigning for himself. As the title of the film so aptly puts it, he is participating in a Street Fight. Street Fight is a 2005 documentary film by Marshall Curry as he presents an enlightening view of Cory Booker’s side of this election race. In this film we see the 2002 Mayoral race between challenger Cory Booker and the city of Newark’s Mayor for the previous sixteen years Sharpe James, in a political fight of the ages. Politics, especially New Jersey politics can be a dirty business, certainly different from other
He was raised with a powerful sense of both pride and duty, of and to his people, his family, his mind, and his own destiny, all of which demanded he make good on the promise of his greatness. He attended Ivy League schools upon graduating high school; received a bachelor's degree from Stanford (even played football there), was a Rhodes Scholar and earned a law degree from Yale. His sense of duty, however, to the people of New Jersey demanded he choose a path of public service. Those duties led him first to the city council and then eventually to the Democratic race for mayor against the long-standing Democratic incumbent Sharpe James the Black mayor of Newark for sixteen years. On the other hand, James’ life is vastly different; he grew up on the streets, in a poor, black neighborhood and did not have the luxuries growing up as Booker did. James is the epitome of the American dream. He pulled himself up by his bootstraps and had been the Mayor of Newark for sixteen years. He plays off this “bootstrap” notion a lot to win over the affections of his constituents and prove he is the dedicated person they need to watch over them, not the “pretty boy”
experience" battle. The 2002 mayoral race in Newark cut through American Democracy to reveal the negatives of free-market capitalism and its effect on the health of the entire nation. When the propaganda of the incumbent mayor meet the growing street smarts, idealism and naïve optimism of the young challenger, obsessions about integrity, money, race and class kept alive and distract the people from the real issues. The mayoral race involved all the people: children, local police, local business owners, even celebrities such as Al Sharpton, Cornel West and Bill Clinton become involved in this election. Choosing sides and gathering votes for their respective candidates. The soul of the Democratic Party and the soul of the African-American community are put on display. Throughout the playing out of the drama, only one side wants to discuss the actual issues affecting the people of Newark: crime; homelessness; job loss; a rundown educational system; poor health care; illegal drugs; severe inequality; and the near ownership of the city by slumlords and greedy