There’s one parable that explains nearly everything there is to understand about human begins, the parable of the scorpion and the frog. People do what is in their nature. If it’s in someone’s to screw around, that someone will keep screwing around when they’re president (not that there’s anything wrong with that). If it’s in someone’s nature to be a fratty fuck-up, that someone will be a fratty fuck-up when they’re president (there is something wrong with that, IMHO).
Maybe more importantly, whatever shitty thing you know for sure someone did once, that someone has done it a hundred times. You can take that to the bank.
If it’s in someone’s nature to be dangerously vindictive, that someone will continue to be dangerously vindictive while running for president, and moreover, the examples of that person being dangerously vindictive will not be isolated. So I think Chris Christie won’t make it through the Republican primary:
It was merely a mistake, he said, or rather, “a mistake got made.” The article that said he had called Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo of New York to complain that the controversy was getting too much attention? “The story was wrong.” The resignation yesterday, by the man at the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which controls the bridge? “This was a change I was going to make anyway,” Mr. Christie said.
But to explain that it was not such a big deal, the governor spent more than an hour of his time. And he said he had watched “most of” the hearing this week that laid out the details of the closings — a hearing that had stretched for more than six hours.
Mr. Christie said, “I’ve heard more about this than I ever wanted to,” and said he had better ways of spending Friday mornings than talking for an hour about traffic studies and road closings. Still, at the end of the news conference, in which he named a former prosecutor and close aide of his, Deborah Gramiccioni, to Mr. Baroni’s post, Mr. Christie suggested it might be worth examining why Fort Lee should have local access lanes.
Notice that he ends with more vindictive threats.
Yes, we’re living in an era of complete conservative domination of the media. Normally Christie’s sorry ass would be deader than fucking fried chicken by now, but he happened to pull this shit while we’re in a transitional period.
But there will be dozens of other stories like this, and together they will be enough to sink Christie, just as the Romney people thought when they vetted him for VP.
Baud
And we still have two more years before the election season begins.
JPL
It would be nice if he lasted long enough for a few ads to be made though. The dems could label the ads compassionate conservatism at its worst.
also, too.. Is Christie a compassionate conservative.. there are just so many possibilities.
BGinCHI
He will never hold his temper through the 67 primaries. Hell, I wouldn’t blame him for going off on those idiots he’s associated with in his party.
Problem for the media is that they only take crazy from idiots. When you are considered smart or at least sensible they cannot stand that you make a mistake or say something nuts.
It’s the most fucked up double standard in American politics.
hitchhiker
It’s been entertaining as hell to watch Rachel thrash this story all week.
Christie has enemies, as you’d expect someone with his gut-punch instincts would. If they all get emboldened at the same time, there will definitely be lots of stories.
Did the Romney people ever leak anything about what they found that turned them off him?
drkrick
I’ll bet a lot of people in Fort Lee had better ways of spending that day than sitting for hours in traffic so your appointee could get a good dick swing in, too. Funny how that works.
Thoughtful David
Christie’s personality in general–the bullying, the rudeness–is not one that will play well on the national stage. No one can really take him for very long.
Baud
@BGinCHI:
Yep, can you imagine the media outrage if Obama or any other Democrat were that dismissive.
Violet
@hitchhiker:
Not so far. If they pick a team for next time, and some of them will, expect those stories to leak.
shelly
Yes, his heart bleeds. When NJ legalized medical marijuana he stone-walled it for years. Always saying it ‘needed more study” While patients were suffering. And obviously just to make it look like he’s not ‘soft on drungs.’
maya
And then there’s that whole Snooki debacle.
somethingblue
I’d have thought being dangerously vindictive was a positive advantage. If he were also an overt racist and dumb they wouldn’t even need to hold a primary. They could just nominate him by acclamation.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
There’s some great popcorn potential in Cruz and Christie being on the same stage going after the same prize, both are incredibly arrogant, but I bet Prime-Ivies Cruz looks down on Christie (University of Delaware, Seton Hall), and it won’t take Christie long to sense that and get really mad. But I thought McCain and Giulani would tear each others limbs off in the crab pot of ’08, so what do I know?
Redshift
Actually, I tend to hold with the theory that once is possible, since anyone can skip up once, but I’d there are two instances, it’s a pattern. I first heard this clearly expressed during the Weiner debacle, something like “There are never just two women. There can be one, but if there are two, it means there are a lot more.”
Litlebritdiftrnt
As far as I am concerned being a vindictive asshole is a feature not a bug for republican candidates They are ALL vindictive assholes, and their slathering tea party followers love their vindictiveness because they are just the same. The tea party assholes are IGMFU vindictive and all for pulling up the fucking ladder after them. I know a bunch of retired military/civil service guys who are just like that. Spent their entire lives sucking off the government teat (many of them who retired after 20 from the marine corps then went into civil service and then retired after 20 so they are double dipping when it comes to pensions), and they bitch and moan about being “taxed enough already” while totally forgetting that it’s the tax payers who are paying their pensions. Assholes. Every Last One Of Them.
Tommy
@hitchhiker: My mom and dad are Republicans. Heck my brother and his wife are Republicans. They are confused by what is going on in their party. You could not pay them to watch Glenn Beck or listen to Rush. They mock folks that do. But they are Republicans. I often say to them, hey we got this other party over here.* I am to the far left of my party, seems what you think is what my party does …… but alas it falls on deaf ears.
* My mom for the first time in 40+ years voted for Obama. Not cause she liked Obama, but she is a strong women. Felt Palin was shit all stupid (that is a quote, and my mom cusses like once a decade).
DougJ
@Redshift:
With some things, you need two examples, but with others, one is enough.
schrodinger's cat
DougJ@top
No longer a mullah I see, changed your religious affiliation just before Christmas? BTW did you see Bobo’s column yesterday where he was fantasizing about a dictatorship?
Hill Dweller
Republicans are actively trying to prevent people from getting life saving insurance, but the Village is more worried about a lack of access to the President’s dogs.
The Village(“left” and right) is trying to destroy the Obama’s presidency, because he doesn’t show them the deference they think they deserve.
They don’t give a shit about the rest of the country. If the money wants Christie, and it appears they do, the Village will do everything to cover his ample ass.
geg6
Yeah, the Romney stories make me less afraid of this mug than I would be otherwise. The media may be in love with him, but I don’t think he’s the awesome daddy they all want and think we also do. There are going to be tons of this shit coming out, especially if DeMint gets his teeth into him. De Mint looks to be running the GOP these days, despite what the money boys thing, and I’m thinking DeMint is going to take him down.
Violet
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Cruz, Christie, Rand Paul and Rubio on the same stage. There isn’t a room big enough in the world to house all those egos. Who else could be added for extra fireworks?
schrodinger's cat
@Hill Dweller: The diapers MSM provides may not be adequate.
BGinCHI
@Violet: If the NRA hosts a debate, why can’t they all be armed?
Violet
@Hill Dweller: The Village can only cover so long. If stories leak and people decide they care about those stories and/or there’s something about a candidate they just don’t like or trust, the candidate is done.
Money may have liked Rick Perry last go-round, but he proved himself to be the dimwit Texans had been telling everyone he was for years. All the money in the world couldn’t salvage his candidacy.
Baud
@Violet:
Santorum’s going to run. Huckabee’s making noises. Considering the money that will be thrown at the GOP in 2016, every grifter in the Republican Party will have dollar signs in their eyes.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@DougJ: Are you specifically talking about this kind of vindictive abuse of power, or the petty corruption of an arrogant MOU? Cause there are already lots of public examples of the latter: using the state police (IIRC) helicopter to get him to his son’s LL game because he was late, because he was meeting with a bunch of Koch types who were trying to convince him to run for president, Rachel Maddow I think had the story of him involved in a traffic accident and (successfully) using the “Do you know who I am?” bit with the police while he was NJ- US Atty, and of course the $24 million of state funds he spent to give himself a wide margin of victory over Buono– hell, even Rove’s crotch bulge mission accomplished footage only cost he country a million.
Violet
@BGinCHI:
Ooh, yes! All the Republican candidates need to show up armed and show and discuss their weapons. Even better, the audience gets to show up armed too.
Tommy
I used to live in DC. I don’t think most folks that don’t live in a large metro area understand this topic. Shutting down of a major bridge.
I did what at the time was called the “reverse commute.” I lived in DC and went to work in NOVA (northern Virginia). 33 miles. Often it took me an hour or more each way. Often two hours. I was often in my car for four hours a day. Why I left there, cause the quality of life for me was shitty.
I am willing to bet NY/NJ is worse, and this will be a HUGE issue.
dmsilev
I’m pretty sure “we’re going to turn the page now” really means “oh shit, they’re on to us, throw up a cloud of ink and try to escape while the issue is still confused”.
Jim, Foolish Literalist
@Violet: Would be worth watching as Rubio slowly realizes that everyone, including Brian Williams and David Gregory, has forgotten he’s there.
Violet
@Baud: Huckabee’s ending (ended?) his radio show. Sure sign he’s going to run. Wonder how fat he is these days. He gained weight after his “weight loss through diet and exercise”.
liberal
@Tommy: I think that wink shit pissed a lot of women off.
Pogonip
@BGinCHI: What about all those voters who are mad at the world? Might they not decide this abrasive jerk is their guy?
J R in WV
I was going to say I don’t understand how a narrow-minded, hostile, vindictive, SOB like Christy can succeed in seeking elective office… but then you guys answered that question~!
The R’s are all vindictive bastards, that’s how.
NotMax
The FFC franchise never did catch on.
“(fill in the blank) lickin’ good!”
Corner Stone
DougJ, you’re just being a partisan asshole trying to poison the well against a Christie run. I’m not sure what about this you refuse to get?
Christie is a pol we can work with. That’s what we’ve been looking for all this time. Boehner has finally started to emerge as someone in this vein with his, “Are you kidding me?” press event.
Well, Christie has been this kind of blunt, tell it like it is, straight talker this whole time. His policies may need to be looked at a little more closely, but he has clearly emerged as a guy we can work with, and someone we know where he stands. We should celebrate this kind of bipartisanship, not denigrate him.
Violet
@Jim, Foolish Literalist: Is Rubio going to be the TPaw or Huntsman of 2016?
Amir Khalid
The only word I can think of for this kind of behaviour from Chris Creosote is “hoodlum”.
@schrodinger’s cat:
I’m kind of disappointed that DougJ quit being a mullah before I got around to seeking his religious guidance.
dmsilev
@Tommy: Yeah, it’s a pretty big deal for anyone who used that bridge, anyone who lived near that bridge, anyone who’s commute involved passing anywhere in the general vicinity of that bridge.
All for what seems to be for a petty little grudge (“how dare that Democratic mayor not endorse me, a Republican, for Governor!”).
Also, too, “it’s not the crime it’s the cover-up” appears to be operative at the moment.
scav
Utterly taken care of and a complete non-issue, vetted by the man who should know best, Christie himself, right!? Mistakes sudden appeared in the rear-view mirror as if by magic, look-constituancy-no-hands! but he utterly planned all things that poll well in that same rear-view mirror.
Speaking of Not The Mirror, Rebekah Brooks attempted a similar feat of vetting. John Finnemore Classic!
mdblanche
I’m sure there are plenty more stories where this came from. I’ve already heard rumors that some of Christie’s supposed house troops from his most recent assault on his enemies were secretly imperial Sardaukar in disguise.
Captain C
@Baud: More likely less than one. These days it seems to start about a minute after the off-year congressional elections are finished.
Tommy
@liberal: I am the fifth generation single male. Not a lot of women in my family. But we marry well IMHO. Smart, strong women. My mother is the smartest person I know and it really, really pissed her off.
NotMax
Maddow has aired a longish segment on the bridge story pretty much every day this past week.
Violet
Does the bridge story have a name yet? You know, like Snowdrift Snooki’s “Bridge to Nowhere”? Bridge-gate is so dull and predictable. Needs something catchy.
Corner Stone
@Tommy:
How does your lineage keep continuing?
Keith P
I fully expect CC to appear on The Daily Show in the next week or two to talk Bruce Springsteen in order to polish his image a bit.
SiubhanDuinne
Wait, it’s fried now?
scav
@Violet: You know I’ve been through New Jersey on the Bridge with No Lanes . . .
ETA @SiubhanDuinne: constant friction with all that lubricating oil? sad but inevitable . . .
Tommy
@Corner Stone: Well women marry us.
Davis X. Machina
@hitchhiker:Bad choice for Christie. Isn’t MSNBC, like, in Ft. Lee?
Bob In Portland
I grew up in NJ and I recognize a bully when I see one. Not only bad press, but I believe he’s due for some indictments coming down the pike soon.
Violet
@Keith P: Just checked the Daily Show schedule and next week’s guest spots are already announced. Then they go on break, probably for two weeks. Unless Christie shows up in a non-guest bit, there won’t be a spot for him to do that.
NotMax
@Violet
Coning-gate has a nice ring to it.
schrodinger's cat
@Violet: BridgeGate or Christie’s Katrina (or Sandy)?
Violet
@scav: The Bridge with No Lanes. Like that. Since it’s the George Washington bridge, is there a way to riff on the “cannot tell a lie” story?
schrodinger's cat
@Amir Khalid: You just have to wait till he becomes a mullah once again.
schrodinger's cat
@Corner Stone: Marriage is not necessary for procreation.
Ellen
It really is amazing what Christie has been able to get away with. I thought this would finish him:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/17/nyregion/in-new-jersey-halfway-houses-escapees-stream-out-as-a-penal-business-thrives.html?ref=unlocked&_r=0
but the story got no national play at all.
maya
@Violet:
The Blather of Our Country
Violet
@Ellen: That’s the kind of thing that will come out when a tipping point is reached and people start digging for dirt on Christie. He’s been in a complete honeymoon phase with the press, but if he’s fucked with their commute, that’s unacceptable.
The bridge story is the one that will make anyone who has to use that bridge angry–and that includes members of the media. Once they’re angry they’ll start looking at other stories with a very different eye. In 2012 he did something with halfway houses? Yawn. In 2014 it’s time to expose Christie’s corrupt relationship with the halfway house company.
Corner Stone
@schrodinger’s cat: That is a little insensitive, if you ask me.
Ellen
@Violet: It’s just breathtaking when you think of all the Willie Horton nonsense, but IOKIYAR, I guess.
SiubhanDuinne
@Violet:
Saw that and immediately flashed on “A Horse with No Name.” Curse you, Violet.
#earwormmadness
Yatsuno
@Tommy: It’s the 21st Century. Even that step is not mandatory.
Ripley
Fat Guy Goes Nutzoid.
Violet
@SiubhanDuinne: don’t blame me, blame scav.
FlipYrWhig
@Violet: They should call it “No Exit.”
dmsilev
@Violet: Not that I think Christie will actually show up on TDS this week, but they have changed guest schedules at the last minute before.
scav
@Violet: That’s the problem: it’s easily caught and passed along — seemingly inevitable — as I had the same spasm as @SiubhanDuinne, only with a keyboard handy. Latent Ebola-meme.
A Humble Lurker
@Corner Stone:
So he’s sort of like Clinton that way.
Halteclere
WTF? Ft. Lee is already jacked up in terms of getting onto and off of the major highways. Also, this being a “traffic study” is pure bogus. The Port Authority knows how many cars travel through those three lanes based on the traffic statistics through the associated toll plaza lanes.
I’m waiting to see how this all plays out. My company will be doing work there in 2015, and we’ll have 2 of the 3 lanes closed for about a month!
Amir Khalid
@efgoldman:
What is national prestige, but a fancy name for richard-measuring?
dmsilev
@efgoldman: I think the point is to prove that they can. I believe that up until now, only the US and Russia have soft-landed anything on the Moon, so that’s a fairly exclusive club to belong to.
BGinCHI
@Pogonip: Yep. All 27% of them.
Cermet
If only Christie’s University President had said to him “Christie, being fat and stupid is no way to go through life.”
JPL
@Violet: Fort Lee shutdown. Most of the wackos would think he closed a military base.
Chris
@Litlebritdiftrnt:
This.
Frankly I think if there’s anything that can rally the GOP base to him, that’s it. They want someone who’s an abrasive bully and who’s going to get in the face of [black people, unions, students, public servants, wev] and tell them “you people are subhuman unpersons, we don’t like you, you’re not welcome in our country, and the minute I’m in the White House, we’re going to fuck you up.” Even the Southerners and Midwesterners who might prefer more toned-down kinds of assholes in their personal lives, aren’t going to hold it against him when it’s being done to the Democratic candidate (and by extension all of his/her constituencies) on national television. They’ll just cheer wildly.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
Intresting, I though they decided Chirsty did have the Teatard appeal, never occurred to me that Mit Romney decided Christy was to strange for the big leagues.
It was pretty obvious Christy would likely lose against say Hilary Clinton with his anger. Never occurred to me he was petty enough to attack voters.
Culture of Truth
I have been one who said Christie *could* get through the primaries, but, (1) that was for the same reason I pushed back against those who said primary voters would never vote for a Mormon — that is — his mere apparant centrism would not be a deal breaker, and two, his assholishness could actually help him. Also, I didn’t think he would get caught, and if he did, the media would ever care. The latter has yet to be shown, but I note NPR is actively shilling for Chris Christie. But I would also observe I early on this Fort Lee scandal, since I knew it was BS from the start. We must destroy CC, it’s a good idea and he’s still a real threat in 2016.
woodyNYC
DougJ-
I’m a bit confused by the penultimate paragraph- can you elucidate on the nature of the “transitional period” you refer to?
Ken
Because not everyone can whistle up a police helicopter to take them to baseball games.
Phil Perspective
Normally Christie’s sorry ass would be deader than fucking fried chicken by now, but he happened to pull this shit while we’re in a transitional period.
Can’t you get this right? It’s ” … deader than Fannie’s fried chicken”!!
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Chris:
Except they want someone to bully the poors and the others, not the REAL Americans(tm) (as in white, male, Republicans) This Fort Lee thing along with Christy associating with a known black national leader shows Christy doesn’t know who are the proper people to bully.
RepubAnon
@Baud: Chris Christie’s new nickname: Bluto. Perhaps cans of spinach for his rivals would be appropriate.
And I can’t think he’d deal well with folks dressed as Olive Oyl or Popeye following him around.
mclaren
Another winner. Doug J. nails it again. Also Enhanced Voting Technique hits the mark with:
Republicans crave brutality, like all Americans — especially the brutalization of the weak and helpless. As we all know, nothing brings your typical Americano to hi/r feet spontaneously reciting the pledge of allegiance like the sight of a strapping 250-pound he-man beating up a small crippled child, because America is the land of bully worshipers par excllence. So Republicans yearn to see a rich powerful pol afflicting the afflicted and comforting the comfortable…preferably someone who has toadies and lickspittles to hold down the helpless victims while he does it.
But Christie just isn’t sending the right messages. Christie needs to tell middle-class Americans “get a job” in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. He has to start referring to homeowners who’re underwater as “lazy welfare queens who want a handout.” He needs to start calling not only for the repeal of the ACA, but the actual deaths of uninsured sick people — and if the uninsured sick people don’t die fast enough, he should call for summary execution with Zyklon B.
This is what the next Republican presidential candidate needs to say right quick. And he’d better show the Republican primary voters that he’s willing to slice out an innocent victim’s beating heart with his own hands, otherwise he ain’t gonna be the high priest.
Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN)
This is coming from DougJ, whose finger is so firmly on the pulse of the Republican Party that he said it was an absolute guaranteed lock that they would force a debt limit default.
steverino
@Tommy:
Maybe you should meet some more smart women…
karen
A good deal of the GOP blames Christie for Romney’s loss….and Obama’s second term.
Christie actually said good things about Obama.
Christie dared to chastise the GOP for taking so long to provide aid for Sandy victims.
Christie isn’t accepting the ACA but is trying to expand Medicaid anyway.
He hasn’t doubled down on the anti Sharia talk.
He’s from a liberal state where the real reason they didn’t want to give NY and NJ any aid for Sandy is because there are actually other religions besides Christianity in NY and NJ. Especially Jews and Muslims.
What? You didn’t know that NY is code for JEW? You figured out Sharia is code for MUSLIM.
All those things will count against him and he won’t survive the first month of the primaries. If he even survives the first week.
Rand Paul or Ted Cruz will be the GOP candidate. Mark my words. All the libertarians just LOVE Rand Paul. And if he promises them that he’ll legalize pot and gut all anti-harrassment laws against women? He’s so in.
Bjacques
@Ripley: straight outta Tromaville NJ!
Tyro
@Chris: Even the Southerners and Midwesterners who might prefer more toned-down kinds of assholes in their personal lives, aren’t going to hold it against him when it’s being done to the Democratic candidate (and by extension all of his/her
The case of Rudy Giuliani would seem to argue against this assertion. Giuliani and Christie are both people who play well in the northeast. But when they get outside of there, even republicans seem oddly put off by them for what I think are really strange reasons (eg, primary voters seemed really put off by Giuliani’s Marilyn Monroe crossdressing, which New Yorkers regarded as just some good fun on the part of their mayor).
All the early primary states are place where Christie’s “charm”, such as it is, does not hold appeal for GOP voters.
g
Mr. Christie said, “I’ve heard more about this than I ever wanted to,” and said he had better ways of spending Friday mornings than talking for an hour about traffic studies and road closings.
I’m sure the residents of Fort Lee had better ways of spending their morning than getting stuck in politically motivated traffic jams, for more time than that.
fuckwit
It’s a clear line of succession: George W. Bush –> Sarah Palin –> Chris Christie. Can you see the pattern?
Petty, vindictive, spiteful, nasty, self-centered bullies.