Gov. Chris Christie in hot water over Bridge Scandal

[dmcowen674]

One small-town Democrat mayor endorsement more or less surely wouldn't make or break him.

Fort Lee is not a small town.

Given the population density is probably close to all of the state of Tennessee.

 

[werepossum]

Fort Lee is not a small town.

Given the population density is probably close to all of the state of Tennessee.

The article said 35,000. City-data.com says 35,732. Tennessee isn't the most densely populated of states, but I'm reasonably sure we can edge out Fort Lee no matter how they crowd together. Hell, 35,000 is a decent Grateful Dead concert.

http://www.city-data.com/city/Fort-Lee-New-Jersey.html

Fort Lee, New Jersey
Bergen County

Population in 2012: 35,732 (100% urban, 0% rural). Population change since 2000: +0.8%

Males: 16,610 (46.5%)
Females: 19,122 (53.5%)

Median resident age: 44.7 years
New Jersey median age: 0.0 years
Zip code: 07024

Estimated median household income in 2011: $66,416 (it was $58,161 in 2000)
Fort Lee: $66,416
New Jersey: $67,458
Estimated per capita income in 2011: $43,696

Fort Lee borough income, earnings, and wages data

Estimated median house or condo value in 2011: $337,729 (it was $190,100 in 2000)
Fort Lee: $337,729
New Jersey: $324,900
Mean prices in 2011: All housing units: $409,125; Detached houses: $570,869; Townhouses or other attached units: $606,116; In 2-unit structures: $616,899; In 3-to-4-unit structures: $335,659; In 5-or-more-unit structures: $311,284; Occupied boats, RVs, vans, etc.: $164,325

Median gross rent in 2011: $1,501.

Just to put this into perspective, last year's Bonaroo Music Festival in Manchester, Tennessee drew more than four times Fort Lee's population.

 

[KK]

I dont know how anyone could like that fat ass. Leave it to stupid ass nj to elect that whale. I dont see what he brings to the table that benefits anyone.

 

[nageov3t]

I dont know how anyone could like that fat ass. Leave it to stupid ass nj to elect that whale. I dont see what he brings to the table that benefits anyone.

what does his size matter? 😵

I wouldn't vote for him for a national office, but I voted for him for Gov twice and would do so again. we've had a generation of governors from both parties who basically kowtowed to the unions and gave them whatever concessions they wanted in exchange for their votes, even when the state couldn't afford it.

getting the state's fiscal house in order rates higher on my priority list than a politics-as-usual scandal.

 

[pauldun170]

what does his size matter? 😵

I wouldn't vote for him for a national office, but I voted for him for Gov twice and would do so again. we've had a generation of governors from both parties who basically kowtowed to the unions and gave them whatever concessions they wanted in exchange for their votes, even when the state couldn't afford it.

getting the state's fiscal house in order rates higher on my priority list than a politics-as-usual scandal.

Christie wouldn't win on the national level because traditional North East Republicans don't fit well with southern politics, pretty much what drives the GOP and the republican base.

If you are happy with the job he is doing and are willing to accept the bad and the good then screw it. I don't blame you.
At the very least he will take this as a learning experience (hopefully)

 

[pauldun170]

The article said 35,000. City-data.com says 35,732. Tennessee isn't the most densely populated of states, but I'm reasonably sure we can edge out Fort Lee no matter how they crowd together. Hell, 35,000 is a decent Grateful Dead concert.

http://www.city-data.com/city/Fort-Lee-New-Jersey.html

Just to put this into perspective, last year's Bonaroo Music Festival in Manchester, Tennessee drew more than four times Fort Lee's population.

Fort lee has 35,000 people in 2.8 square miles.
It borders Cliffside park with 24,000 people in 2.5 square miles
Englewood 27,000 people in 5 square miles.

If you look at the map you can see the impact that the lane closings have as traffic gets rerouted. Millions of people are impacted as they head towards NYC.

 

[Jimzz]

Christie wouldn't win on the national level because traditional North East Republicans don't fit well with southern politics, pretty much what drives the GOP and the republican base.

If you are happy with the job he is doing and are willing to accept the bad and the good then screw it. I don't blame you.
At the very least he will take this as a learning experience (hopefully)

My thing is there have been rumors of him (his people?) bullying others for a long time. I think this just backs up those claims now. Many of those coming from other republicans not just dems.

Imagine him, and his people, in control of the NSA, Military, and FBI. Seems like a current day J. Edgar Hoover waiting to happen.

 

[fskimospy]

what does his size matter? 😵

I wouldn't vote for him for a national office, but I voted for him for Gov twice and would do so again. we've had a generation of governors from both parties who basically kowtowed to the unions and gave them whatever concessions they wanted in exchange for their votes, even when the state couldn't afford it.

getting the state's fiscal house in order rates higher on my priority list than a politics-as-usual scandal.

Sadly, Christie has not done that good a job of getting NJ's fiscal house in order. One of the biggest drivers of deficits going forward is the state's underfunded pension system. To his credit, Christie passed some legislation to bring the state's contributions back into line. To his discredit, he backloaded the payments to mostly fall when he had left office.

 

[Doc Savage Fan]

Sadly, Christie has not done that good a job of getting NJ's fiscal house in order. One of the biggest drivers of deficits going forward is the state's underfunded pension system. To his credit, Christie passed some legislation to bring the state's contributions back into line. To his discredit, he backloaded the payments to mostly fall when he had left office.

Do you think he should have made deeper budget cuts and/or higher tax increases so pension payments didn't need to be backloaded?

 

[fskimospy]

Do you think he should have made deeper budget cuts and/or higher tax increases so pension payments didn't need to be backloaded?

I actually don't, but I think that you can't simultaneously take credit for a balanced budget while explicitly choosing to put a large burden on your successor.

If he's going to do that for economic reasons I'm all for it, but he should own it. Can't have your cake and eat it too.

 

[nageov3t]

I actually don't, but I think that you can't simultaneously take credit for a balanced budget while explicitly choosing to put a large burden on your successor.

If he's going to do that for economic reasons I'm all for it, but he should own it. Can't have your cake and eat it too.

that's awful. wtf is the point of cake if you can't eat it? :'(

 

[Phokus]

Wow, i had no idea Christie purposefully has an aide film his confrontations with people who don't like him, no wonder the tea party/conservatives loved him (until the Obama/Hurricane Sandy thing), that's just sociopathic behavior:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs...ies-problem-is-that-hes-really-truly-a-bully/

The release of e-mails suggesting that Gov. Chris Christie's top aides choked off transportation to a small town as political retribution against the town's mayor are a huge deal. I wouldn't go so far as Jonathan Chait, who says "they will probably destroy Christie’s chances in 2016." But they make it much likelier that something will emerge to destroy Christie's chances in 2016.
Gov. Chris Christie-CHRIS USHER / The Associated Press

Gov. Chris Christie (Chris Usher/Associated Press)

Christie inhabits a rare space in American politics: He's a bully. He's followed around by an aide with a camcorder watching for moments in which Christie, mustering the might and prestige of his office, annihilates some citizen who dares question him.

Almost everywhere Christie goes, he is filmed by an aide whose job is to capture these “moments,” as the governor’s staff has come to call them. When one occurs, Christie’s press shop splices the video and uploads it to YouTube; from there, conservatives throughout the country share Christie clips the way tween girls circulate Justin Bieber videos. “The YouTube stuff is golden,” says Rich Lowry, the editor of National Review. “I can’t tell you how many people forward them to me.” One video on Christie’s YouTube channel — a drubbing he delivered to another aggrieved public-school teacher at a town hall in September — has racked up over 750,000 views.

Now in Moorestown, Christie was hoping to create another such moment. After some introductory remarks, he opened the floor to questions. “For those of you who have seen some of my appearances on YouTube,” he cautioned, peeling off his suit jacket as he spoke, “this is when it normally happens.”

It's not an accident that Christie emerged in a period when the Republican Party is out of power. His videos make them feel powerful at a moment when they're weak.

The reason Chris Christie is so good at this is that Chris Christie is actually a bully. That doesn't mean he's not also a nice guy who cares deeply about his family and his constituents and his country. It doesn't mean he's not an unusually honest politician who's refreshingly free of cant and willing to question his party. There's a lot about Christie that's deeply appealing. But there's one big thing that's not: He's someone who uses his office to intimidate people and punish or humiliate perceived enemies.

Watch this video of him screaming at a guy on the New Jersey Boardwalk. Watch him stalk toward the man, flanked by security and aides. Listen to what he actually says. "Keep walking. Keep walking."

.

That's not typical behavior for an adult. It's definitely not typical behavior for a national politician. But it's typical behavior for a bully. In fact, it's not even very creative bullying. Anyone who's ever been a boy in an American middle school has heard "keep walking!"

What makes Christie unusual is that he's a bully with power. That can be a dangerous combination.

There have been previous hints that Christie's proclivity to publicly humiliate his opponents is matched by a tendency to privately punish them, too. On Dec. 24, the New York Times ran an article titled "Stories Add Up As Bully Image Trails Christie." It began with an anecdote of a New Jersey assemblyman who got a nasty note from Christie after making some relatively innocuous radio comments.

The gesture would come to seem genteel compared with the fate suffered by others in disagreements with Mr. Christie: a former governor who was stripped of police security at public events; a Rutgers professor who lost state financing for cherished programs; a state senator whose candidate for a judgeship suddenly stalled; another senator who was disinvited from an event with the governor in his own district.

In almost every case, Mr. Christie waved off any suggestion that he had meted out retribution. But to many, the incidents have left that impression, and it has been just as powerful in scaring off others who might dare to cross him.

The bridge e-mails show that it's not just Christie. His aides are in on it, too. Christie staffer Bridget Anne Kelly e-mails David Wildstein, a Christie appointee on the Port Authority, saying, “Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee.” He's a bully with a staff of bullies.

It's entirely possible that Christie didn't know very much about the bridge episode. It might just be the product of the culture he's created, or permitted, to arise around him. What's dangerous for Christie, though, is that now every political reporter in the country will begin believing rumors of his punishments and hunting down evidence of his retaliation. And things Christie was able to do before to wide applause — like berate a schoolteacher and then have his staff upload it to YouTube — will begin feeding a very different kind of narrative.

Chris Christie rose because he's a bully. It might be why he falls, too.

What a douchebag

 

[cyclohexane]

If a politician dicked around to intentional cause me to sit in traffic for a whole day - can't imagine what I'd do with all that rage.

 

[Doc Savage Fan]

I actually don't, but I think that you can't simultaneously take credit for a balanced budget while explicitly choosing to put a large burden on your successor.

If he's going to do that for economic reasons I'm all for it, but he should own it. Can't have your cake and eat it too.

I think he's doing a good job given the severity of problem handed to him when he took office. You just can't wave a magic wand and fix it all in 4 years. Corzine made progress during his term, but to expect him to have fixed everything in his 4 year term is unrealistic as well. Your expectations for Christie are unrealistic...and you, of all people, should understand this in my opinion.

 

[kage69]

With all the accusations and outrage of Obama supposedly conducting himself like this, I'd have thought this news about Christie would have garnered more attention from those so incensed by this kind of capricious, bullying behavior.

Funny how that works.

 

[Phokus]

LOL, what a liar

 

[Matt1970]

With all the accusations and outrage of Obama supposedly conducting himself like this, I'd have thought this news about Christie would have garnered more attention from those so incensed by this kind of capricious, bullying behavior.

Funny how that works.

We would, but we were repeatedly informed incidents like this are Faux Scandals.

 

[Phokus]

We would, but we were repeatedly informed incidents like this are Faux Scandals.

Actual scandals typically require smoking guns, like the emails here, and the opposition not doing coverups (i.e. Darrell Issa) to only present one side of the story but you're too stupid to understand that.

 

[fskimospy]

I think he's doing a good job given the severity of problem handed to him when he took office. You just can't wave a magic wand and fix it all in 4 years. Corzine made progress during his term, but to expect him to have fixed everything in his 4 year term is unrealistic as well. Your expectations for Christie are unrealistic...and you, of all people, should understand this in my opinion.

I agree with you that he wasn't going to fix everything in four years. He has done a number of good things for the state and overall I think he has been a good governor. The only large mistake he made was canceling the Hudson tunnel, which was incredibly irresponsible of him.

My only point there was that he frequently trumpets how he has fixed the state's finances, but he has done so by pushing huge payments into his successor. He isn't being honest about the fiscal issues he has pushed into the near future and it is important information when assessing his statements now.

 

[Phokus]

Which is funny because his staff is made up of cronies who went to high school with him and really reflect his personal style (being a shithead bully)

Edit: Also, American Bridge PAC, LOLOLOLOLOLOL

 

[Doc Savage Fan]

I agree with you that he wasn't going to fix everything in four years. He has done a number of good things for the state and overall I think he has been a good governor. The only large mistake he made was canceling the Hudson tunnel, which was incredibly irresponsible of him.

My only point there was that he frequently trumpets how he has fixed the state's finances, but he has done so by pushing huge payments into his successor. He isn't being honest about the fiscal issues he has pushed into the near future and it is important information when assessing his statements now.

Politicians spin to put themselves in the best possible light...they all do it. I don't see this spinning as being anything close to significant. I know he's been very focused the last 4 years on fixing the problem...has he actually boasted that it's all fixed now? If so, please link quote.

 

[Londo_Jowo]

Hmmmm looks like phokus is scared that Christie will become his next President.

 

[Matt1970]

Actual scandals typically require smoking guns, like the emails here, and the opposition not doing coverups (i.e. Darrell Issa) to only present one side of the story but you're too stupid to understand that.

And so now the insult machine directs his rage towards me.

 

[theeedude]

Now that the threat of Christie retribution is effectively removed, we'll see who else will come out of the woodwork with other stories of abuse of power. These kind of stories are never one offs.

 

[Nebor]

Hmmmm looks like phokus is scared that Christie will become his next President.

That will literally never happen. The Inquirer could publish front page photos of Hillary going to town on her chief of staff with a chin dildo and she'd still beat Christie.