Daily News Endorses Dicker; Inky Profiles Johnny Doc; Courier Times Traces Obama Remark to Levittown

The Daily News today endorsed Anne Dicker in the 1st Senate District, praising her "long experience as a neighborhood and anti-casino organizer" and "impressive grasp of issues well beyond casinos."

The Inquirer has launched a three-part series of profiles on candidates in the 1st Senate District Democratic primary. Today Joseph Gambardello looks at John Dougherty. Tomorrow, it's Dicker. Thursday, Larry Farnese. The Johnny Doc piece chronicles his rise to frontrunner in the race, explores his local roots, and highlights the wide spectrum of opinion about him.

Both the Daily News and Inquirer have reports on an anti-Michael Nutter flyer that circulated last year before the mayoral primary, equating Nutter's stop-and-frisk plan with harassment of the Black Panthers of the 1970s. An ethics board is investigating whether the flyer was produced by Dougherty's union. Nutter and Dougherty both ran for mayor.

J.D. Mullane in the Bucks Couty Courier Times goes back to the Levittown tavern where it seems Barack Obama's "bitter" comment originated. Mike Sokolove, for his New York Times Magazine piece a couple of weeks ago, had gone back to his old Levittown neighborhood and talked to working-class patrons of Gleason's on Mill Creek Road about their concerns. Obama apparently read that article, and it went from there.