What a difference two years makes. Sure, that’s a loaded question given the fact we’re in the middle of a pandemic, but still ….

Two years ago, a nasty battle ensued for chair of the Morris County Republican Committee. In the end, Ronald DeFilippis of Roxbury bested Rob Zwigard of East Hanover by four votes. As the margin reflects, this was a battle that divided the GOP in what traditionally has been a very Republican county.

DeFilippis gave up the chairmanship for health reasons a few months ago and was replaced on an interim basis by Laura Ali, the vice-chair.

Now we’re in 2020 and on Tuesday night, Ali won her own term – unanimously.

This took place at a virtual convention and those following on Zoom heard the new chair talk about three goals – raise money, increase GOP registration and master the art of voting-by-mail.

Everybody wants more voters and to raise money. It’s the vote-by-mail component that probably is the most challenging. For reasons that may not be totally clear, Democrats do a much better job voting-by-mail than Republicans do. Clearly, Ali wants to change that.

All elections tend to be important, but that’s especially true this year in Morris, given the fact the county is now represented in the House by two Democrats, Mikie Sherrill and Tom Malinowski. Beating them, or in Morris GOP talk, “reclaiming” the seats, is the highest priority.

To that end, the campaign of Tom Kean Jr., who is running against Malinowski in CD-7, said today that it raised $400,000 during the second quarter and now has $1.3 million on hand.

And in a rather peculiar comparison, the campaign contrasted the value of a “poster board copy” (that’s supposed to be Malinowski) and the genuine Mona Lisa. This is meant to portray Malinowski as a “carbon copy” of what the Kean team calls the “Democrat party bosses in Washington.”

It also suggests Kean is like the Mona Lisa. Who knew?

Speaking of jokes, Assembly Minority Leader Jon Bramnick, who does stand-up, attended an outdoor gathering for Ali in Parsippany after the convention.

“Laura is what we need,” Bramnick said as he praised Ali for her charisma and warmth.

Then he tried a joke.

He said that campaigning door-to-door, he was greeted at one house by a 13-year-old boy who was smoking a cigar, drinking a beer and holding a copy of Playboy Magazine.

Candidate Bramnick says he asked the kid if his father was at home.

“What the hell do you think?” was the reply.

There were no laughs. Ouch.