As Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey explores a 2016 presidential campaign, he is under growing pressure from his State Legislature to rejoin a regional cap-and-trade program that would limit New Jersey’s carbon emissions — and likely hurt his chances for the Republican nomination.
Mr. Christie, who withdrew from the program in 2011 as he first considered running for president in 2012, remains adamant that New Jersey not participate in the nine-state Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, even though the majority of state legislators say it would be in New Jersey’s economic and legal interests. Business groups remain divided on the plan.
“No, I would not think of rejoining it,” Mr. Christie told reporters during a recent trip to Mexico. “I think it’s a completely useless plan.”
The New Jersey Superior Court ruled this year that Mr. Christie failed to follow proper legal procedure when he withdrew his state from the program because his administration did not hold public hearings on the move. To comply with the law, Mr. Christie’s administration held a public hearing last month, but has made it clear that the governor still has no plans to rejoin the program. The New Jersey Legislature has voted twice to rejoin, but Mr. Christie vetoed both bills.
Some political analysts say Mr. Christie‘s motive in staying out of the plan is to placate powerful conservative groups, including Americans for Prosperity, which are highly influential in Republican primaries and consider cap-and-trade programs energy taxes that hurt business and eliminate jobs. Mr. Christie will be the main speaker at an Americans for Prosperity donor meeting in New York on Friday.
This would be good for his citizens, good for their economy, good for the country, and good for the world. Likewise, it is the will of the people as expressed by their elected representatives at the state level. But he’s going to nuke it to advance his own political ambitions. Just like he did the the ARC tunnel, which would have been an economic boon and would have helped relieved congested traffic. Just like he threw billions of dollars to Wall Street for the NJ pension fund. And on and on.
These aren’t decisions based on facts and sound advice and with improving his citizenry’s lives. They’re winks and nods and pay-offs to those who might help propel him to higher office.
Just disgusting.
Felanius Kootea
And yet the people of New Jersey voted for him twice.
raven
Anoniminous
@raven:
WTF?
Corner Stone
At least the people of NJ know where he stands on things, and he’s someone they can work with.
raven
@Anoniminous:
Corner Stone
@Felanius Kootea: And Democratic pols in NJ were more than willing to throw him their endorsement.
Buono is an awful politician but she didn’t deserve the treatment they put on her.
lamh36
@raven:
Anoniminous
@raven:
WT-F’ity-F-ing-F!?!
Frankensteinbeck
And the conservative base consider them hippie programs that should be spat on to prove that they’ve been right all along nuh uh so there and damn it all this liberal shit has got to stop because they don’t recognize America anymore for some reason they mysteriously can’t be specific about. These people WANT to be screwed.
HinTN
@raven: and John +0 @top, this discontinuity between elected “leaders” and real life is a fever dream in the last throes of the exceptional empire.
raven
@HinTN: Dang, I wish I had said that.
Dog On Porch
I subscribe to the NY Times, but jeezuz sometimes the paper’s east coast conceit really grates.
How many people west of the Hudson River does the Times calculate as being prepared to support Christie’s presidential pipe dream? How many from east, south, or north of the Hudson do they tally as die hard supporters?
Don’t get me started on Cuomo.
Being a political big shot back there counts for squat across the country.
Corner Stone
@Dog On Porch:
What about Cuomo?
Corner Stone
Moderation? WTF WP?
Cacti
@Dog On Porch:
Chris Christie is the plus-size Rudy Giuliani. Adored by the eastern media establishment and no one else.
Violet
@raven: Are there links for those articles?
Davis X. Machina
@Felanius Kootea:
Spite is strong.
Corner Stone
I am loving this guy from Scotland on Chris Hayes show. That is one awesome accent.
ETA, I have guys in Beijing and Hong Kong who speak “English” more clearly than this person from Scotland.
raven
@Violet:
http://www.mynews13.com/content/news/cfnews13/news/article.html/content/news/articles/bn9/2014/9/18/shooting_bell_county.html
and a million others in the google
Mnemosyne
@Cacti:
Yep. Every time someone claims that Christie will play nationally, I love to remind them how “America’s Mayor” was going to win the 2008 nomination in a walk, except that it turned out that everyone outside of the tri-state area hated him. Some people only play regionally, and I really think Christie is one of them.
Violet
@raven: Thanks. I didn’t know if you’d found a local source.
I’m guessing this is a Private Family Matter and A Tragedy and has nothing to do with guns because White Guy, right?
Howard Beale IV
@Cacti: The worst part is that Federal Prosecutors are rarely brought to task for prosecutorial misconduct and outright fraudulent prosecution.
lamh36
@Violet:
Fuck…The victims range in age from 3 months to 10 years old.
A fuckin’ 3 month old? I mean who would shoot anyone let alone children, but a fuckin 3 month old!!!
Christ!
Richard Grant
Here’s hoping that the Oval Orifice does not ever get to sit in the Oval Office.
Mnemosyne
@raven:
Anyone want to take a bet now that he’s one of the ex-felons who had their gun rights restored to them?
Ruckus
That’s his lowness, on every conceivable level.
Pogonip
@raven: That Zimmerman fellow gets around.
rikyrah
A 3 month old????
HOW????
Howard Beale IV
Now for some good news: Kansas Democart Withdrawl from Senate Race is Upheld
Violet
@lamh36: I don’t see why it’s surprising. The guy wants to kill the entire family. Doesn’t matter how old they are. He wants none of them left. The age of the baby is incidental to him.
gbear
@lamh36: The best comment over at LGF was asking why murder-suicide shooters don’t just start with themselves. How the fuck could someone kill six grandkids under the age of 10?
Villago Delenda Est
@raven: Yet another “responsible gun owner” demonstrates just how “responsible” he is.
Ruckus
@rikyrah:
There is no understanding of such a reprehensible act.
Villago Delenda Est
@gbear: He was acting to save them all from living in a society in which blah people are treated just like white people.
The horrors.
Violet
@Cacti:
Isn’t it Big ‘n Tall or Husky for men?
Villago Delenda Est
@Richard Grant: It’s not likely. I’m surprised the Outlaw Joisey Whale hasn’t figured out that his crusts have not only burnt, they’re moving into the “ready to be processed into briquettes” stage.
Pogonip
Reminds me of that woman who drowned her five children, the youngest 6 months old. Just awful.
scav
The usual answer/justification is often somewhere along the lines of they’re in control, they know best, it’s done out of love for them (the victims) often with a dash of this will hurt me more than it does you, you couldn’t live without me, blah blah.
Little Boots
oh, Governors who have to govern in such a way that every moron in Alabama likes them.
we wouldn’t know anything about that in Wisconsin.
elmo
@Villago Delenda Est: I can’t tell if you’re being snarky, in which case – ugh – or if you have info not in the linked article. Was that for real?
Felanius Kootea
@Mnemosyne: Looks like he killed a son accidentally years ago (if it’s the same person). Very very strange.
Anne Laurie
@Pogonip:
I think we can safely rule out postpartum depression in today’s incident.
Villago Delenda Est
@elmo: Being snarky, but sometimes these murder/suicide types have motives like that…to save the children from a world that the murderer abhors. In the murderer’s mind, as others have implied above, it’s an act of mercy to kill them.
WaterGirl
@Felanius Kootea: I thought they had different first names?
raven
@Felanius Kootea: I posted that in comment #5 but that name was Don C. Spirit. The could be Charles.
Roger Moore
@Little Boots:
I was under the impression that your governor was only interested in pleasing two people.
gbear
@Little Boots: And MN went thru it’s little round of that crap when Pawlenty thought he could be the golden boy. It gets around.
raven
Mike in NC
Bloated toad Chris Christie was near here a couple of days ago, promoting the scumbag Senate candidate Thom Tillis, the asshole who cut $500M from NC public education. The MSM will indefinitely continue to promote Christie as the Great White Hope for 2016.
Anne Laurie
@Mnemosyne: If the 2003 Orlando Sentinel story about his son’s death is correct, Spirit’s original “felony” was for marijuana possession.
It’s not 100% certain that this is the same ‘Don Charles Spirit’, of course. But the backstory would make today’s actions a little more… not logical, but understandable, in a Faulknerian sense.
Anne Laurie
@Villago Delenda Est: Last name like ‘Spirit’, I’d be careful about that particular line of snark. But that’s just me.
Felanius Kootea
@raven: It may very well be the same person. This tweet says that Charles Spirit and Don Charles Spirit are one and the same. Maybe he spiraled into depression after his son’s death.
Little Boots
@Roger Moore:
he does have a special love for those two, but he’s still gotta get SOME votes, somewhere.
Felanius Kootea
@raven: Oops – just saw that you already confirmed it was the same person.
jl
Wellll, I dislike me Republican politicians as much as anyone, but presidential politics can have similar effects among some Democrats.
However, the pure in-your-face FU brick-wall obstinance, lack of any willingness to compromise, for no other apparent reason than to pander to the insane GOP base, that does have a uniquely GOP ring to it.
But, from Christie’s point of view, what has happened to every GOPer politician, from Ahnold to Specter to who knows how many others who have bucked the crazies in any way? All had to sleep with the fishes politically as soon as they acted non-insane, even while still in office, or they had to leave the GOP.
But, yeah, Chrisite is nasty, and like all the rest of the GOPers who still survive, and this is another example.
Little Boots
@gbear:
that is true, forgot about him. i don’t think walker is going anywhere, but the fact he thinks he is is going to suck.
raven
@Felanius Kootea: And maybe he was fucking nuts and killed the first kid on purpose too.
Mnemosyne
@raven:
Well, that answers my question above about if he’d had his gun rights restored.
But, of course, it raises another — how does a felon who’s not supposed to be allowed to own guns repeatedly end up owning guns and killing people with them?
raven
@Mnemosyne: By buying them, it ain’t that hard.
JCT
@raven: You beat me to it.
Little Boots
and where the hell did steeplejack go?
Howard Beale IV
@Cacti:
Doesn’t look like his weight-loss surgery is working so well.
Mnemosyne
@raven:
Butbutbut the NRA tells me it’s impossible for felons to buy guns and it’s only law-abiding citizens who are impacted by stronger gun laws! Or is the new NRA line that felons will get guns no matter what, so there’s no point in restricting gun sales to anyone, even felons? I can’t keep up sometimes.
beergoggles
Well I hope Jersey-ites who voted for him get it good and hard, like they deserve.
Tissue Thin Pseudonym (JMN)
@raven: It doesn’t say whether he’d had them restored between 2003 and now, just that he hadn’t had them restored at the time he shot his son. I’d HOPE that they hadn’t been restored, but Florida.
pluege
that is pig christie in a nutshell, in every way imaginable: as a person, as a pol, as a thoroughly indecent sorry-as* excuse of a human being.
Anne Laurie
@Mnemosyne: I’d like to see better restrictions on gun ownership too, but screaming that someone who was busted for marijuana possession should be banned from owning guns doesn’t seem like an attractive argument from any political perspective. Can we stick with “why aren’t people with spiraling mental-health problems able to find resources that don’t involve murder-suicide sprees”, at least until we know a little more about the back story here?
Little Boots
I need the night team
jl
@jl: And I forgot to mention the sheer contempt for law Christie shows in ignoring judiciary. That is GOP SOP these days too. I was too easy on the jerk in my earlier comment. My apologies to all right thinking people.
magurakurin
@beergoggles:
well, I certainly don’t hope that happens but it does appear that it has already happened to them in Atlantic city. If the Taj Mahal goes it will be 5 csanios closed in a year and the Revel has Christie’s fingerprints all over it.
disclosure: my family has had a home in Absecon Island since 1960 when my grandparents moved there to retire….really sad how AC turned out.
magurakurin
note to self, if you want to comment about Gov. Christie you can’t use any words to describe the main business in one very distressed Jersey Shore town
Little Boots
needs more omnes.
danielx
If there’s one thing I’ve learned since January 20, 2009, it’s that Republicans don’t give a flying fuck about any of those things. Christie just makes it more obvious.
danielx
@raven:
If the guy wanted to drive to Miami he could probably buy antitank weapons, never mind handguns.
Mike E
@Howard Beale IV: That stomach-stapled douchepotamus came here to stump for Thom Tillis…I wonder how the transplanted Jerseyites feel about it, we certainly have more than a few of ’em here.
Mnemosyne
@Anne Laurie:
You mean other than the backstory of him shooting and killing one of his sons 10 years ago with another illegal gun?
It sounds like there were multiple reasons it was a bad idea for this guy to have a gun at all, and the felony conviction was just a red flag.
Violet
@magurakurin:
What has Christie done that has shut down Atlantic City? I thought he was all “rebuild Atlantic City” after the hurricane.
Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)
@Little Boots: I am watching the Tony Bourdain mini-marathon on the Travel Channel. I caught the Amsterdam one – now it’s New Orleans. Two of my favorite cities.
catclub
@Pogonip: Reminds me of the man who killed all his kids just a week ago.
Because he thought they were going to kill him.
bt890
Hi. You know, two summers ago when it looked like Chris Christie might snag the GOP nomination, I signed up for twitter handles, including GOPChristie2016, ChristieGOP2016, and GOPPres2016.
With the intention of pontificating incessantly on the beauty and significance of random bowel movements while posting random shots of those grabbed around the internet. Perhaps commenting on daily events, then steering the twitter conversations to these apparent bowel movements and how important they are in the grand scheme of things.
I’d just fixate on, well, shit, and hope to attract and trap media attention on this bizarre tendency and just embarrass Christie if I could. Then his campaign imploded with Bridgegate. But you know what, I really want to make sure he can never run no matter what.
I’d like to do the twitter version of googling Santorum, with Christie now.
What does everyone here think?
Suzanne
@Mike E:
WIN.
I can’t read about this case. Who the fuck murders children?! It makes me bones hurt to even try to understand it.
danielx
@catclub:
Uh-huh….people always talk about “senseless crimes”, but they miss how they make perfect sense to the freak who commits them.
Cervantes
@Corner Stone:
!
Cervantes
Not Nixon, nor Reagan, nor Bush the Younger cared about any of these things. Why should Christie?
Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)
@Cervantes: Come on, Bush said over and over again that he was a compassionate conservative.*
*Probably the last true compassionate conservative was Churchill during his radical years.
Cervantes
@Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name):
Such a kidder.
Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)
@Cervantes: You say kidder, I say bald faced liar. Let’s call the whole thing off.
El Caganer
@Violet: Christie dumped an assload of money into Revel even though industry analysts had started warning that AC had too many casinos already.
Joey Maloney
@raven: You will, Oscar, you will.
Omnes Omnibus (the first of his name)
@Joey Maloney: You are like a stream of bat’s piss.
Sherparick
@Davis X. Machina: He got lucky with his timing and his opponents. But he does have a deep base of support white middle class to upper class households who believe he is keeping their taxes low while keeping his foot on the neck of “those people” (minorities and public employee unions) who they like to believe suck up all their “hard earned” tax money (schools, roads, sewage, police, and fire departments, e.g. all structure and order of civilization I guess appear due to magic unicorns). His poll numbers are still flat and way below his peak. http://www.nj.com/politics/index.ssf/2014/09/christies_approval_rating_inches_up_from_bridge_scandal_low_poll_finds.html
MaxUtil
@Corner Stone: Well, technically, they speak “American” more clearly than this guy.