Maybe that should read “open season”. Report at NYMag:
… The day after it emerged that one of his subpoenaed aides had resigned, More news emerged about another person in Christie’s orbit who ran into trouble: Trooper William Carvouni, a member of Christie’s security detail, was arrested on January 8 for shoplifting from a Cabela’s sporting-goods store. He allegedly stole $267 worth of gun accessories and a hat by putting them in his cargo pants pockets and on his head, respectively. Then the 35-year-old Carvouni allegedly asked police to go easy on him on account of his job with the governor…
You’d think, somewhere during his police training, someone would’ve used the well-known legal aphorism: Never steal something worth less than the penalty you risk if you’re caught. Or else the nuns at my parochial school were right — hanging around with bad companions will sap your moral fibre!
ETA: Can’t resist putting in a recommendation for the ongoing series from veteran NJ-Port-Authority-watcher Scott Raab at Esquire:
… From the moment Chris Christie spent his 2-hour press conference feeling sad and betrayed by the same people he empowered and relied on, one overarching truth was made plain: For Christie to survive his second term as Governor, many people — all with careers, families, and dreams of their own — would have to fall on their own swords. Such people may, in theory, exist. None of ’em worked for Chris Christie.
Trollhattan
Douche governor hires and fires endless string of douchy friends. And the Great Circle of Douche is thus, completed. Joe Scar will assure us it’s only a(nother) flesh wound.
Completely OT: my favorite (so far) Superb Owl Tweet:
“At halftime, Ted Nugent is going to shoot Joe Namath’s coat.”
–Albert Brooks.
Amir Khalid
I like that he tried to use his state trooper job as a get-out-of-jail card. That he’s a law enforcement officer, and in an elite job at that, actually makes his offence worse.
cminus
He allegedly stole $267 worth of gun accessories and a hat by putting them in his cargo pants pockets and on his head, respectively.
Woulda been funnier the other way around.
Higgs Boson's Mate
Is there no one in Christie’s orbit who doesn’t regard public office as a means of plunder?
Violet
Since this is an open thread, Sochi officials have ordered stray dogs killed ahead of the games.
Animal activists are protesting it, but it doesn’t sound like they’re getting very far.
Amir Khalid
@Trollhattan:
Does the governor of New Jersey handpick his security detail, or is that done by the CO of the state troopers?
Anne Laurie
@Amir Khalid: Schmuck risked his self-assessed “$140,000 a year” job for $267 in “gun accessories and a hat” — trinkets! When I was growing up in New York, we’d have called that “so Jersey” — you are probably aware that New Yorkers do not always have a very high estimate of NJ residents’ intelligence standards… I almost said “ethical standards”, but then, Donald Trump. (Of course, IIRC Trump was raised in New Jersey!)
JoyceH
Open thread? Any fans of Regency here? I’m close to publication of my upcoming Regency romance A Feather To Fly With and have blogged-posted the cover and blurb –
http://joyceharmon.wordpress.com/2014/02/02/getting-excited-cover-art-and-blurb-preview/
Patricia Kayden
@Violet: Awful. But with all the millions of unwanted dogs killed right here in the good old USA, not really all that surprising.
Patricia Kayden
@Anne Laurie: Or there could be something wrong mentally with him. Back in the late 90s, a coworker, who had a good paying job, went around stealing credit cards and buying whack (cheap/gaudy) items. We couldn’t understand why she’d risk her job and her reputation. We gathered that she had some kind of compulsion which led to the stealing.
Violet
@Patricia Kayden: It sounds like there are a lot of dogs roaming about. Also from the article:
Apparently a dog wandered into the stadium during a rehearsal, I guess for the opening ceremony. I can imagine having that many dogs around would be a problem.
FlyingToaster
Pitiful.
When I was a lowly clerk at MonkeyWards, we got the whole “most theft is by employees” talk from the security drones. I informed them that if I ever bothered to steal something, I’d walk out of the store with a refrigerator.
If you’re going to rob Cabelas (I mean, dude, seriously?), walk out with something worth getting arrested for.
ranchandsyrup
@Anne Laurie: Maybe he’s used the “I work for the governor” card successfully before and thought it would always work?
Suffern ACE
@FlyingToaster: Like the stuffed polar bear or pronghorned antelope? There’s usually quite a display of taxidermy there.
scav
Criminalizing the Thin Blue Line Discount card and Loyalty Program!
jl
I look forward to the hysterical PR release from the NJ governors office accusing the officer of ‘moving in unproductive directions’, hanging around donut shops trying to cage free stuff, and pissing his pants repeatedly in nursery school.
Ash Can
If this incident had happened in isolation, it would have been no big deal, really — one of the guys in Christie’s security detail turns out to be a bad apple, too bad, he gets replaced and prosecuted, end of story. Christie remains untouched by it. Given the context, however, it’s seen as just another example of rot at the top, and people can’t help but think of it in light of all the other crap that’s come out. At this point, I wouldn’t be surprised if the next stories to come out were about Christie’s secretaries filching office supplies and interns photocopying their asses.
Corner Stone
@FlyingToaster: These guys don’t care what the swag is actually worth. It all belongs to them.
WereBear
@JoyceH: Congrats!
WereBear
@Violet: The shelters there all seem to be run by private individuals.
But I’m sure no thought was given; the streets are always full of strays, I understand. This was the plan all along. No alternatives were entertained, because they don’t treat humans all that well.
Suffern ACE
@Ash Can: I don’t know. This seems like the type of stuff cops caught doing crimes would try to pull. It isn’t really much if a scandal unless tge guy’s supervisor started interfering. Or if he had actually gotten off.
I think if I were Chris Christie, I’d enjoy having the conversation be about this low level stooge.
ultraviolet thunder
As much as I’d like to gawk at this latest fender bender in the glorious motorcade pileup of Christie’s career, it’s probably a minor issue. I’m saving my schadenfreude* for the day the big guy takes the stand. Wingnut tears delayed are all the sweeter.
*I accidentally spelled that right on the first try with two beers in me. Time to play the L0tt0
Goblue72
Frankly I’m more disturbed by the recently revisited Woody Allen pedophilia allegations.
Bill E Pilgrim
@cminus:
Sort of like “open carry” meets Ascot Opening Day.
“Ascot Open Carry Day”?
scav
@Suffern ACE: I too imagine this is pretty much SOP for such insidents. Mention your a Cop or a Fireman or a Doctor when pulled over for speeding. Make vague mention of the “people” you know. I wouldn’t be so bold as to predict the media or public final impact of this, beyond both positions will be trumpeted and the already convinced won’t change their minds. The bulk of the undecided might nit even notice it on the passing radar.
Amir Khalid
@ultraviolet thunder:
You forgot the initial cap required for all nouns per the rules of German orthography, so there’s that.
Violet
@scav: A doctor I used to know would keep his white coat hung over the back of the driver’s seat in his car and if he was pulled over for speeding he’d say he was on the way to the hospital for some emergency. He drove a fancy sports car and really thought he was hot stuff. He said he’d used the lie before and it worked.
Bill E Pilgrim
@ultraviolet thunder:
I remember them. Mersey Beat pop duo out of Vienna, right?
MomSense
In non douchebag news, my son got a letter from the university president today awarding him a scholarship for academic performance. It’s worth 1/2 his tuition for 8 semesters. He is at a rehearsal tonight but there will be lots of hugs when he gets home.
JPL
@MomSense: Congrats and hugs to you also.
Violet
@MomSense: Congrats to your son! That’s excellent!
Splitting Image
Is anybody else looking at Christie and gaining appreciation for Sarah Palin for having the sense to quit her governorship and jump aboard the gravy train before her own avalanche of shit really started to come out?
I share the opinion of some others voiced here that Christie’s career isn’t completely over, but I think that he has definitively moved over onto the Palin track as far as a Presidential run is concerned. He’ll be guaranteed a sinecure at Fox and a lot of “will he, won’t he” speculation for a couple of years.
MomSense
@JPL: @Violet:
Thank you!!
geg6
@MomSense:
That’s awesome! Congrats to the young scholar!
LanceThruster
“It’s just a flesh wound!”
Violet
@Splitting Image: No appreciation for Sarah Palin whatsoever for quitting. She didn’t quit because she was smart; she quit because she’s greedy. She saw the wingnut welfare gravy train and the reality show star possibilities and she jumped.
Christie has always been a politician–even in high school he was class president. Sarah Palin was a beauty pageant contestant. Christie wants power. Sarah Palin wants fame and adoration. They are two completely different types.
If Christie thought he could be more powerful by quitting, he’d have done so a long time ago. He can’t so he hasn’t.
? Martin
That’s the real problem when you play politics as a contact sport. You only hire people with long knives, and you always trust that they won’t be used on you. Once they see you you can no longer pull them up to higher status, they’re going to turn on you to show the next asshole that the knives are real and will be used, in hopes that they’ll hire them on.
? Martin
@MomSense: Congrats to your son. Glad to see he’s being rewarded for hard work. Need more of that in this world. Good job with him.
Gex
@MomSense: Fantastic! Happy for you both!
MomSense
@geg6:
Thank you! He took some time off after high school to travel and study music and I think he really needed that time.
Just Some Fuckhead, Thought Leader
I can’t be the only one worry-eating for Christie.
ultraviolet thunder
In other open thread political news:
Announcing the First White House Maker Faire
Once you exclude everything that burns, explodes, flies, shocks or goes bang I figure I have a decent shot at inclusion.
WaterGirl
@MomSense: What a great honor for your son and what a relief for your son and family that half the tuition is paid for. I’m sure you’re over the moon about this. Well deserved.
Kylroy
@Splitting Image: I don’t think he has a future at Fox, personally. He never had the level of wing nut hindbrain appeal that Palin did, and he dashed whatever amount he did have by palling around with the President.
He *could* try to win wingnut hearts by reversing course and embracing his bullying past with a “yeah, so?” reaction to the current investigation, but that would represent a 180 from how he’s reacted to the scandal so far and would come off as blisteringly fake. I don’t see the Fox News crowd biting even if he tried it.
I think he’ll end up being a Morning Joe et alia fixture as a “centrist” for years to come, but that crowd *assumes* money, they don’t fork it over. Not in anything like the amounts that Wingnut Welfare pays, at any rate.
lamh36
It’s amazing what a little diversity in hiring can do for a company!
SNL Skit: 28 Reasons (Celebrate Black History Month)
LOL, at reasons 2-28!
MomSense
Thank you so much everyone!!
WaterGirl
@Kylroy: I’m thinking that if Christie does crash and burn, as it seems he likely will, that the right will want to pretend he doesn’t exist, and never did.
Violet
@lamh36: I saw this on SNL on Sunday (taped it, watched it then). Loved it. My jaw kind of dropped, though. It seems pretty edgy for SNL these days. I really thought it was great. Seems like maybe the country has come far enough to allow that sort of thing on a mainstream show.
Love the new addition, Sasheer (don’t know her last name). I also am enjoying how having three African American cast members. Seems like it’s allowing all three to have more air time somehow.
Higgs Boson's Mate
@WaterGirl:
George W. Who????
Violet
@WaterGirl: I agree. I think he might appear on Morning Joe a bit, but Christie is all about power. I don’t see him being content being a pundit-for-hire. He’s going to end up working for/with his brother and bullying people via whatever that job/role is rather than via politics.
Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN)
Last week I applied for a job that I really thought I might get, in part because someone who already works there said that they are constantly hiring and will take anyone with a pulse. There are several things I wasn’t really crazy about, especially the schedule which would have meant being on call 24/7 for at least the first four months. So it would have meant having no life whatsoever. But it pays well so I was prepared to bite that bullet.
It turns out that they won’t hire anyone with a pulse, as I’ve had doctors inform me that I have one. They said I failed the online assessment test. That had three parts, the first two of which were reading a passage and then saying which of four answers must be true based upon the material. The problem with those is that there was more than one answer that could be true based upon what assumptions you made. (The instructions told you not to make any assumptions and go just by what was written but that can only mean that they have a grossly overestimated the clarity of their own prose.)
It might have been the last part which asked questions about your background and what you’d do in certain hypothetical situations. Some of the question asked were like, “What is the average length you’ve been at each job over the last five years?” Given that all I’ve had is a couple of temp jobs the only honest answer to that was, “Less than six months.” There were a number of other ones that I couldn’t answer honestly except in the way that indicated that I wouldn’t be a good hire. (On the other hand, I could honestly say that I haven’t been late to work once in the last five years, but that probably sets off a bullshit detector.)
So once again there’s no way out of long-term unemployment.
lamh36
@Violet: I think when you hire a diverse group of people especially in comedy, you def get a different comic sensibility.
But when you think about it, when SNL had Garrett Morgan, Eddie Murphy, and Chris Rock and when Pryor hosted, they never seemed to shy away from edgy. As SNL got less and less diverse, it was on the backs of just a single person to do any “ethnic” roles, except when you just painted Billy Crystal in Black face to play Sammy Davis Jr (something I’m thinking SNL would think twice about doing today)
moops
perhaps MSNBC needs another conservative for “balance” ?
Violet
@lamh36: Yeah, I agree. There have been eras throughout SNLs tenure where they’ve been more or less edgy. Recently it’s been very white, although during the last decade or so they’ve had some great female cast members that gave the the show a different feel. So, not different race, but at least strong women.
In any case, I’m enjoying the three African American cast members. It’s definitely given the show a different feel in terms of the skits that make the cut and like this video piece.
Robert Sneddon
@Violet: A friend’s father was once clocked by the police radar doing 120 though the middle of town in his E-type Jag (the seriously over-the-top 5.3litre V12 version, not the hairdresser’s 3.6litre straight-six). It was OK since he had phoned them up earlier and told them he’d be in a bit of a hurry, oh and can you close the road for me?
He got to the local airport in time at about 3 in the morning, his crew had prepped the plane and he was able to get some transplant organs (kidneys I think) from a local hospital to the main airport to catch the first scheduled airline flight to Holland where a recipient was waiting.
Violet
@Robert Sneddon: I’m sure there are plenty of legitimate reasons for doctors to speed. This doctor that I was referring to boasted about using his white coat as a “get out of a speeding ticket” card. He’d never put the coat on the back seat where it might not be seen. It would always be hanging so the cop couldn’t miss it.
Roc
I’m sure this is the fault of union dues eating his paycheck, union contracts that make it impossible to fire bad apples and/or job-killing regulations that limit competition for police-work.
Villago Delenda Est
@MomSense:
That is awesome! Congratulations to your son! Also, obviously, way to go mom and dad you did SOMETHING right in raising him!
Villago Delenda Est
@WaterGirl:
He’s already crashed, and he’s already burning. The only question left is if the NJ legislature will decided to impeach him, then convict him and remove him from office.
Ruckus
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN):
Small companies where the owner actually works there and does all the hiring. It becomes a personal thing then, not some online BS test, written either by some HR flack or a consultant who probably knows nothing about the actual job and thinks it takes a phd in physics or be under 19 to flip burgers.
I tried big companies with and without dates on my resume. With, I’m over qualified(and too old), without not enough info. Walked into a small co and talked directly with owner and boom got a job, resume not even needed.
Good luck.
Ruckus
@MomSense:
Congrats.
Nice to hear that effort and skill pays off.
SiubhanDuinne
@MomSense:
What happy news! Congratulations to your son — and his parents!!
lamh36
And oldie but goodie. This kid reminds me so much of my nephew Tre when he was younger. He’s 14 now.
An Open Letter To Moms from Kid President.
WaterGirl
@Violet: That was edgy. Edgy-awesome!
“Keep your hands up if your ancestors owned us.”
I would pay good money to watch a republican focus group watching that skit. Seriously.
Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN)
@Ruckus:
I’ve tried that, too. No luck.
Not to pick on you but there are a hell of a lot of people out there who are SURE that they know the secret to getting a job. 95% or more of the time it’s something that I’ve tried. Half of the time it directly contradicts some other secret to getting hired that other people have told me.
WaterGirl
@Ruckus: That’s so awesome that you got a job! I must have missed the whole thing. YAY!
WaterGirl
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN): I can only imagine how discouraging this is. If there’s anything I can say to make this suck less, consider it said.
lamh36
lamh36
Violet
@WaterGirl: Yep. It’s way edgier than the Coke commercial that’s getting all the attention.
WaterGirl
@Violet: Well, it is SNL. I can’t imagine conservative republicans watching SNL.
Mnemosyne
@WaterGirl:
Can I keep just one hand up? One side of the family came over on the boat from Italy in 1902, but the other side’s been here since the Pilgrims, so odds are there was some slave-owning at some point.
Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN)
@WaterGirl: You said you’ll hire me?
WaterGirl
@Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN): I laughed. At least you still have your sense of humor!
Seriously, though, I wish I was in a position to help.
mclaren
It’s all great ‘n stuff for Democrats to jump up and down on Christie, but in the meantime we need to ask: when the inevitable demographic tide brings up an all-Democratic congress and an all-Democratic Supreme Court, what kind of Democrats will we be electing?
Democrats who believe in endless unwinnable wars, like Joe Biden? Democrats who advocate an unending War on Drugs, like Barack Obama? Democrats who refuse to prosecute or even contemplate prosecuting high officials for gross corruption and war crimes and criminal felonies, like Nancy Pelosi?
Democrats who deep-throat the corporate criminals who are destroying America? Democrats who have no problem with the president ordering the murder of U.S. citizens without a trial or criminal charges? Democrats who think it’s perfectly okay to deploy military weaponry against nonviolent protesters? Democrats who assert without proof that “Snowden is a paid Chinese agent” and “Greenwald is a traitor”? Democrats who love the idea of universal panopticon surveillance and a stasi-style police state?
These are not Democrats. 60 years ago, they wore deaths-head insignias on their black uniforms.
TenguPhule
@mclaren: Worry about the Republicans at the front before the Democrats in the back.