CHRIS CHRISTIE GETS “IT”; CAN HE GET THE NOMINATION?

1/5/16

In a speech yesterday at St. Anselm College in Manchester, New Hampshire, Chris Christie said

“I don’t believe (Trump, Cruz, and Carson voters) are merely blinded by a cult of personality, or that they have embraced values outside the mainstream.   Many of their criticisms of recent U.S. policy are legitimate, and should be taken more seriously.”

First, my smaller point:  Since when is it such a bad thing to be “outside the mainstream”?   Given where the mainstream has been leading for at least the last thirty or so years, why would one want to be caught up in that current to mediocrity, degeneracy, or worse?

Second, my larger point:  Mr. Christie clearly, to use a term so trite it could only have come sailing in on the mainstream, gets it.   That majority of Republican primary voters who are supporting the unconventional trio of Trump, Cruz, and Rubio are not delusional, benighted idiots caught up in a tide of gormless sycophancy.   (See my 12/26/15 post WHY TRUMP IS SO POPULAR WITH THE MIDDLE CLASS for further illumination on this point.)   Such voters have seen the results of policies generated by conventional politicians and their hangers-on in the think tank class and are appalled, disgusted, and fed up.   If government has worked at all for the last several decades, it hasn’t worked for them.   And these folks both vote and pay taxes.  Rather than being scorned or patronized (I’m giving Mr. Christie the benefit of the doubt in assuming that’s not what he is doing here; perhaps I do so to my regret, but I digress.), their concerns should be heeded.

So Chris Christie appears to understand what has escaped the cocoon crowd in Washington, D.C.; he “gets it.”  But can he get the GOP nomination?   Hear me out here.

First, the mainstream, conventional Republicans needs a champion.   Who are the mainstream’s choices at this juncture?

·         Jeb Bush, who can best be described as pathetic, at least as a campaigner.   Even if what we hear about Mr. Bush’s tenure in Florida being so terrific is true, he has absolutely no chance of winning the general election.  He is as exciting as oatmeal (Sorry, oatmeal.) and as seemingly as engaged as a Kardashian at a symposium on the 11^th Amendment. 

One more thing on Mr. Bush…How much have he and his minions spent on this campaign?   Is it $20 million?  Is it several times that if we consider the nominally independent PACs who have been backing this 21^st Century version of the Lusitania?   And how much support has Mr. Bush garnered?   And this guy sells himself as a dynamic manager of all things fiscal?   If this is how firm a handle Mr. Bush has on money management, his brother would have another serious challenger for the top spot in the “worst president in U.S. history” rankings were Jeb to somehow come to occupy the White House.

·         Marco Rubio, an inexperienced first term senator whose resume outside the confines of the public payroll consists of an adjunct professorship and two years heading a newly founded law firm while awaiting the next public sinecure for which he could run and who looks like he is 25 years old.  This makes him the perfect standard-bearer for a Party who complains that the current President was an inexperienced first term senator whose experience outside the confines of the public payroll consisted of an adjunct professorship and being a community organizer while awaiting the next public sinecure for which he could run and who looked like he was maybe in his late 20s before acquiring the presidential graying pate.

Given that cornucopia of choices, wouldn’t someone like Mr. Christie, who is most often criticized, rightly or wrongly, by the true believers for being too mainstream and conventional, appeal to the mainstream and conventional wing of the GOP?   The man has some experience running a state government and figuratively chasing down terrorists.   The man does not bear the burden of a toxic last name.   The man looks like a man in his early 50s.  The man has actually done a few things besides preen for the cameras.

What makes Mr. Christie especially appealing to the other wing of the party is that he was Donald Trump the candidate before there was Donald Trump the candidate.   It was Mr. Christie who was considered outspoken to a fault, who rarely if ever genuflected to the gods of political correctness, who called it as he saw it even if doing so would cause the paragons of propriety in the press to castigate him as rude or (Horrors!) insensitive.    In short, Mr. Christie was the guy who was perceived to do what he thought was right and didn’t give a damn if the “better people” didn’t like it.  If Mr. Trump had never entered this contest, it would be Mr. Christie who would be taking flak for being a boor in the minds of the keepers of the flame of political correctness.   If these traits of Donald Trump appeal to people, why wouldn’t these traits, long present in Mr. Christie, appeal to them as well?   And if voters who are supporting Mr. Trump finally tire of his more malodorous qualities, wouldn’t Mr. Christie be the logical guy to whom to gravitate?   One could argue that Ted Cruz is closer to Mr. Trump in policy, but do you honestly think that people support Mr. Trump because of his policies?   What policies?

So the mainstream, conventional Republicans could easily support Mr. Christie because, after all, he is one of them and their alternatives are presenting pretty slim pickings at this juncture.   Those who admire Mr. Trump for his brashness and his complete disregard for the political correctness that has so poisoned our society and its discourse could easily find the same qualities in Mr. Christie.   Doesn’t that make Mr. Christie a potent force in the race for the nomination?

Before you dismiss this argument by citing poll numbers, consider that we haven’t run one caucus or primary yet.   A strong position in the polls at this stage of earlier nominating contests meant little more than nothing.   A Trump loss in Iowa (See my 12/23/15 post TRUMP, THE“REVERSE BRADLEY EFFECT,” AND THE MAN’S UPCOMING LOSS IN IOWA for further insight into this point.), a stronger than expected showing by Mr. Christie in New Hampshire, a few more poorly thought out Trump comments, and the concession of Mr. Bush to the obvious could change things quickly.

I’m not predicting a Christie nomination.   I have placed bets on only three things politically so far….

·         A beef sandwich on Carly Fiorina being on the GOP ticket,

·         $1 to $10 on Mr. Trump becoming our next president, and, most recently,

·         a cheeseburger (I have to clarify the place; this could get too expensive for my tastes.) on Rahm Emanuel’s still occupying the Fifth Floor of Chicago’s City Hall on 12/31/16.

Those are more predictions than I would normally make and more than I would normally bet.  I am merely putting something out there for you to consider before the fun is killed way too prematurely by the fatuous, or at least ill-timed, decision that this will be a Trump/Clinton race in which Mrs. Clinton will easily prevail.