"Chris Christie's Entire Career Reeks - "It's not just the bridge

[applegrove]

Chris Christie's Entire Career Reeks - It's not just the bridge

BY ALEC MACGILLIS at the New Republic

http://www.newrepublic.com/article/116601/chris-christies-rise-and-fall

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And yet, even post-Bridgegate, the prevailing interpretations of Christie fundamentally miss the mark. He has been so singularly successful at constructing his own mythology—as a reformer, a crusader, a bipartisan problem-solver—that people have never really seen him clearly. Over the past three months, I talked to more than 50 people who have crossed paths with Christie throughout his career—legislators, officials, Democrats, Republicans, lawyers, longtime New Jersey politicos. (Christie himself didn’t respond to a detailed request for comment.) The problem with Christie isn’t merely that he is a bully. It’s that his political career is built on a rotten foundation. Christie owes his rise to some of the most toxic forces in his state—powerful bosses who ensure that his vow to clean up New Jersey will never come to pass. He has allowed them to escape scrutiny, rewarded them for their support, and punished their enemies. All along, even as it looked like Christie was attacking the machine, he was really just mastering it.


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But even as Christie was running against Jersey’s political culture, he was willing to borrow some of its uglier tactics. One afternoon, Ed Tamm Jr., a Republican he was challenging, got a call from a friend who asked if he’d seen a Christie ad that had just aired during the Devils game, alleging that Tamm and his fellow board members were under investigation. Alarmed, Tamm called the county prosecutor, who reassured him it wasn’t true. It was the final weekend before the Republican primary, leaving no time to respond, and Christie finished first, tossing Tamm and another Republican off the board. They sued him successfully for defamation, but years later, Tamm is still dumbfounded. “Politicians get hammered all the time, but there’s got to be an element of truth to it,” he told me.


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