Debateable Impressions: You Talkin’ To Me?
By Mitch Berg
Up next: Chris Christie.
What the conservative pundocracy says: Solid performance – but not enough to vault him onto the short list.
What I say: By all rights, Christie shouldn’t have gotten this far. He’s not the darling of the establishment, and conservatives fear him because he’s a “northeast” conservative; strong on business and security, adequate on entitlement and fiscal policy (and hampered by both a Democrat power stranglehold and a fairly inept New Jersey GOP), weak on civil liberties. Heck – I go back and forth on Christie.
Verdict: I think the party needs him on the short list, just to keep the short-listers on their toes.
October 29th, 2015 at 12:22 pm
I give Christie credit for the funniest line of the night – to the moderators:
“Even in New Jersey what you’re doing is called rude”
October 29th, 2015 at 12:52 pm
Christie is lousy on 2nd Amendment policy.
October 29th, 2015 at 1:13 pm
He’s lousy – in a state that’s much worse.
October 29th, 2015 at 2:17 pm
Show me one thing, other then widely publicized spat with teacher’s union, where Christie has a conservative lean, especially on 2nd amendment. For cripes sake, him hugging and making out with 0bumbler probably got that idiot over the finish line!
October 29th, 2015 at 2:18 pm
He’s lousy – in a state that’s much worse.
He is the GOVERNOR! He has the power to fix it.
October 29th, 2015 at 2:26 pm
JPA,
Didn’t say I was gonna support him. “Northeastern Conservatives” (think Giuliani, Pataki, Romney, even GHW Bush) tend to be weak on Second Amendment issues at best. It goes with most Republicans from the northeast. The Minnesota GOP used to share that trait.
He is the GOVERNOR! He has the power to fix it.
Governor. Not dictator.
And that’s if he were inclined to fix things, which he’s not especially.
October 29th, 2015 at 3:40 pm
Cannoli Boy’s 2A weakness worries me 100% more than Carson’s.
Carson may not be a strong supporter, but I don’t look for him to go fishing for more regulations. Cannoli Boy is a believer.
October 29th, 2015 at 7:25 pm
Cannoli Boy’s 2A weakness worries me 100% more than Carson’s.
Check this out: Christie at the Iowa State Fair. A “fairgoer” – Chris Dorr, of scam gun-rights group “Iowa Gun Owners” and “Minnesota Gun Rights” (pardon the redundancy), tried to throw Christie a gotcha. Christie pretty well tore him a new one. He vetoed some of the Jersey Dems’ worst possible excesses – which in a state like Jersey may be the best you can hope for.
So there’s a little more to Christie than meets the eye.
But let’s be realistic; it’s all academic. He’s not going to get nominated, for better or worse; if he somehow starts polling in the top three before convention-time, he’s going to have a come-to-Don-Corleone moment on the 2nd Amendment to have a shot at the nomination anyway.
Not a major worry, let’s just say.