To begin, the campaign environment is totally different:

On the earned media front, for example, Lonegan will have a much harder time generating news coverage than did Schundler.

New Jersey is one of the few states that doesn’t have its own television market; consequently, the percentage of New Jerseyans who rely on newspapers is much higher than is found in other states. But newspapers in New Jersey are no different than newspapers anywhere else — they’ve all been going through tough times and many have had to cut back coverage. For instance, the New York Times (which broke several key stories in the middle of the 2001 primary campaign) no longer will play the role it once did in covering even New Jersey gubernatorial politics.

With less coverage from earned media, Lonegan will have to rely more on paid media. But for Lonegan , who has decided to accept public financing of his bid, spending will be capped at the same level as Christie.

Moreover, Schundler had the advantage of running against an incumbent with a long record of voting out of step with his party, and who was, shall we say, ethically challenged – as newspapers finally began to report, once he became the Acting Governor.

Lonegan, by contrast, doesn’t have the benefit of running against an ethically vhallenged incumbent.

In fact, he faces precisely the OPPOSITE task: Christie is best known as the corruption-busting U.S. Attorney.

How does Lonegan successfully contrast himself with THAT?

The only obvious contrast with the guy who put crooked pols in jail is to promise to let crooked pols go free. Contrast? Yes. Successful contrast? Umm, no.

So the media environment is different, and the strategic dynamics of the campaign are different.

By the time Bret Schundler announced his candidacy for Governor, he had, at that point, already spent eight years as mayor of the second-largest city in the state – a city, by the way, that had a voter registration of roughly 70 percent Democrat against just 6 percent Republican.

He also had a serious record of governmental success to tout: crime cut by a third, property taxes cut, jobs created.

He had a decade’s worth of fawning editorials in the Wall Street Journal, and a national fundraising base earned from a decade of helping Republicans across the country.

One could watch him work a room and envision him as a governor.

Steve Lonegan, by contrast, served as mayor of a tiny town of 8,000.

No one mistakes him for the governor candidate sent over by Central Casting, and his voice – now being heard on radio stations in New Jersey – sounds like something Mel Blanc discarded while trying to create the voice for Daffy Duck.

But perhaps the most significant difference between Schundler in 2001 and Lonegan in 2009 is this: In 2001, Lonegan supporters WERE Schundler supporters.

They were part of the Schundler Army.

But in 2005, the two faced off against each other in the GOP gubernatorial primary. Lonegan took a paltry eight percent of the vote – just enough to deny Schundler the victory, and throw it instead to moderate Doug Forrester. Schundler’s core supporters haven’t forgotten.

Will they be on a tear, determined to deny Lonegan the GOP gubernatorial nomination he denied Schundler four years ago?

Maybe, maybe not.

But they’re certainly not going to go out of their way to do him any favors, that’s for sure.

Bill Pascoe is CEO of The Foundation for American Freedom, a conservative think tank headquartered in Alexandria, Virginia. He managed Bret Schundler’s 2001 campaign for governor of New Jersey.