BY ELAINE VAN DEVELDE
Staff Writer
What started out as a public apology ended up being a debate challenge.
Edison Democratic mayoral hopeful Jun Choi, a Korean-American, got an apology from New Jersey 101.5 FM radio personalities Craig Carton and Ray Rossi last week for comments they made during an April 25 broadcast that slighted the Asian-American community.
Choi got his apology first. Then the three broke bread, had a drink, and made plans for a debate between the two mayoral candidates.
Mayor George A. Spadoro appeared the next day, also with a six-pack and “a taste of Edison,” as he called it, or samples of food representing all ethnic backgrounds in Edison. He accepted the invitation to debate Choi on the station.
“I accepted, sure,” Spadoro said after the broadcast when he accepted on air. “Choi’s gotta vent. I’ve gotta vent. So we’ll debate right before the election and get what’s on our minds out in the open.”
The talk show hosts referred to Asian-Americans during the April 25 broadcast as “damn Orientals and Indians.”
“I don’t care if the Chinese population in Edison has quadrupled in the last year, the Chinese should never dictate the outcome of an election, Americans should,” Carton said during the broadcast. “In Edison, this is just another example of us losing our own country. Ray and I represent the average guy in New Jersey, blue-collar white people.”
Choi, a Korean-American, came back to the show on May 25 to get the apology and promote his platform before the June 7 primary election in which he has set his sights on beating three-term incumbent Democratic Mayor George A. Spadoro.
Choi showed up at the station May 25 for his apology and a chance to talk about his political platform. He brought with him a six-pack of beer and some Korean soju, a liquor similar to vodka.
Carton said that “the few politicians that had a legitimate gripe with us always come in with booze.”
Not long after the beer talk, Carton started in with the apology.
“All right, a lot of what we do — the majority of what we do — is satire,” Carton said. “We poke fun at ourselves. We poke fun at a lot of people, and the intent of that is to never hurt any one specific person or a specific group. So I will tell you man to man, if you were personally offended by the comments we made a month ago today, man to man I’m sorry, and you have my apology for that, because the intent was to never to specifically hurt you personally, or hurt your political campaign in the upcoming mayoral election.”
Choi accepted the apology and gave advice that the Korean soju liquor goes really well with Korean barbecued beef.
Another apology appeared on the radio station’s Web site after the appearance.
“Some of the humor from our show is satire and parody which, by its very nature, is occasionally cutting edge,” it said. “It is intended to entertain the listener. It is not — and never will be at this station — intended to play to our baser nature or to encourage or feed prejudices.”
After reading and hearing both, Choi said, “We broke bread, shared a drink and I accepted the apology, but I made it clear that the comments they made were very un-Jersey and un-American. Even for entertainment purposes, they really were unacceptable.”
Spadoro, an Italian-American, who was raised in Jersey City before moving to Edison, brought a taste of his own cultural background to the Jersey Guys.
As a testament to Edison’s diverse cultures, he shared his meatball recipe, noting that “bread was never wasted,” so scraps of stale bread were kept in a bag to use as bread crumbs in meatballs.
And don’t ever soak Wonder bread in milk for the meatballs, Spadoro said.
That would be a no-no. Another trick, he said, is to make sure there is plenty of fresh garlic, some Parmesan cheese, parsley and chopped veal as well as beef.
Cultural tidbits and recipe-swapping aside, the two mayoral candidates ended up with another debate to schedule before the June 7 primary.
The date for the 101.5 debate was not scheduled as of press time on Tuesday.
While Choi’s real desire is to debate Spadoro on the township’s cable television station Channel 22, the radio debate will give him a chance to debate Spadoro on a widely publicized radio station.
“It’s not quite Channel 22, but we’re moving in the right direction,” said Choi. “The Jersey Guys proposed it, and now both of us have accepted.”
As of press time, the two were still slated to debate earlier this week on WCTC 1450 AM.