I want to take a moment to congratulate fellow columnist Harry Hurley for transforming radio station 1450 AM from an ESPN radio station to an all talk format (WPG radio). It seems that when it comes to talk radio, Harry is like the Energizer Bunny, always on the move to bigger and better things, and never letting setbacks get in the way.

The new format for WPG radio, combined with the existing talk formats for WOND 1400 and WIBG 1020, makes this rather small radio market, the Atlantic City area, an interesting experiment on whether the market can support so much talk radio, and whether the radio audience prefers "live and local" (WOND 1400), or "Harry Hurley plus syndicated right wing nuts" (WPG 1450).

Harry has already signed up the Glenn Beck and Hannity radio shows. Beck is way out there and Sean Hannity is a typical far-right, hate Obama host.

Still no talk radio for us socialist-commie-liberal-progressives, except for those rare occasions that Norman Draper substitutes for Barbara Altman on WOND.

Enough radio waves. On to the election.

The deadline for our columns is before the critical second debate on Tuesday night between President Obama and Mitt Romney. It’s a "must win" for Obama, who hopes to follow up Joe Biden's thrashing of Paul Ryan in the vice presidential debate last week. I have no crystal ball, though I assume that Obama's performance can only improve from the first debate.

The race remains very tight, especially in the key “battleground” states such as Ohio, New Mexico, and Virginia, because even with all of the side shows and distractions, the economy, which does appear to be coming back to life, and jobs, remain the important issues for most voters.

The recent improvement in jobs, indicated by a lowered unemployment rate of 7.8 percent, is an indication that things continue to slowly get better. And Harry, that report was not faked by Obama's campaign. Jack Welch, former CEO of the Hudson River PCB polluter General Electric, who started those accusations with a tweet, admitted to Chris Matthews on “Hardball” that he had no evidence that the report was fixed by the White House.

The sluggish economy and recovery is the only reason, except for bigots and haters, that Mitt Romney is still as close as he is. Romney is a terrible candidate. Yes, he is probably a better choice than say, Herman Cain or Rick Perry. But the massive amounts of money flowing into the super PACs can allow almost any candidate to stay viable.

Based on his campaign and debate performances, I can see where Romney has become a good businessman. He says whatever needs to be said to close the deal, even if he's contradicting what he said the day before. He rarely gives any details for his proposals, leaving the audience to fill in the blanks.

What I find most irritating about Mitt is his arrogance (though some of that is probably needed in a candidate for national office) and how he has whined and complained about almost everything Obama has done.

For Obama, for the first two years of his administration, much of his proposals were held up by the 41 do-nothing Republican Senators whose only aim was to defeat Obama in 2012.  In the Senate, you need 60 votes for cloture, to end a filibuster. I've often thought that Obama's campaign would have been better off doing a “Truman” and running against the “do-nothing Congress.”

New Jersey seems to be a safe state for President Obama and for the re-election of Sen. Bob Menendez. South Jersey seems to be safe for Congressman (debate, what's a debate?) LoBiondo.

The Democrats in Atlantic County, with the exception of when Jim Whalen runs, are running their usual no cash campaign. Yard signs finally went up last week for freeholder candidates, but name recognition is very low. The local Democrats need a plan to rebuild the local and county party if they are ever going to win a freeholder seat outside of Atlantic City.

Norm Cohen is executive director of the Coalition for Peace and Justice and a coordinator for the UNPLUG Salem Campaign. Learn more at www.coalitionforpeaceandjustice.org and www.unplugsalem.org.  He can be reached at This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it or (609) 335-8176. Comment at www.shorenewstoday.com.