“Chris Christie Spares No Legal Expense”: Short-Changing The State’s Pension Fund Is Another Story
Anyone who slogged through the 344-page report on Bridgegate from New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie’s lawyers in March understood that this old fashioned whitewash would be extremely expensive.The governor hired one of the nation’s big time law firms, Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher, which dutifully declared that Gov. Christie was not to blame for the massive traffic jams last year. Those problems were the work of others, the report insisted. The governor’s hands were clean.
Now taxpayers are starting to see what that one-sided report is really costing them. The latest invoices show that the state has been billed over $3 million in legal fees for work on behalf of the governor’s office. The governor’s legal team billed the state $1.1 million for work in January and another $2.6 million for February. Since the report came out in late March, there will undoubtedly be a few more eye-popping invoices to come. Moreover, other administration employees will require legal help as the investigations continue.
The governor and his staff deserve legal help, of course, and it’s customary for the public to pay for it. But at a time when Mr. Christie is squeezing every extra penny out of his state budget and short-changing the state’s pension fund, the governor has spared no expense on his lawyers.
Taxpayers should question whether the gold-plated report is, at best, another form of public relations for the governor. Despite all the interviews, the Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher team failed to talk with many of the major players, including Bridget Kelly, the deputy chief of staff who was fired by Mr. Christie, and David Wildstein, a former Christie ally at the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey. The report blamed Ms. Kelly and Mr. Wildstein for the scandal, adding disparaging comments about both.
Mayor Dawn Zimmer of Hoboken, N.J., who charged that the administration threatened to cut her Hurricane Sandy funds if she failed to support a development promoted by the governor’s allies, also refused to talk to the governor’s lawyers.. Without her side of the story, the report mocked her for yawning at a public event (thereby showing that she had not been upset about threats) and concluded that her charges “do not match objective reality.” The public is supposed to fork over millions of dollars for that?
The acting state attorney general, John Hoffman, should take a hard look at some of these bills and decide whether the taxpayers of New Jersey are being over-charged.
By: Eleanor Randolph, Taking Note, Editorial Page Editors Blog, The New York Times, June 11, 2014
“Christie-Brand Leadership”: Always Blame Everyone Else
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) was among the many special guests to appear at the dedication ceremony this morning for the Sept. 11 museum, and according to the Associated Press, the original program called for Christie’s remarks at the event to be followed by Idina Menzel’s performance of “Bridge Over Troubled Water.”
“A last-minute change prevented what could have been an uncomfortable moment,” the AP reported.
Perhaps, though at this point, it would have been the least of the governor’s troubles.
For example, Christie was a featured guest yesterday at an event on fiscal responsibility, despite the fact that since he became governor, New Jersey’s debt has been downgraded a record six times and the state is currently facing a serious shortfall. As the New York Times reported, “The event’s timing was awkward for both Mr. Christie and his hosts at the Peter G. Peterson Foundation, which invited him on the program for his experience ‘balancing difficult fiscal choices.’”
Dana Milbank discovered that the governor is taking responsibility in his preferred way – by finding someone else to take the blame.
CBS News’s Bob Schieffer … laid out the bad news: $807 million budget shortfall; downgrades by credit-rating agencies; worry that the state can’t pay its pension obligations; and slow job growth. “Not so long ago, people were talking about the New Jersey miracle,” the genial newsman said. “Now suddenly the news is not so good about New Jersey.”
Christie did what any strong leader would do when presented with such facts: He blamed the economists. “They overestimated our revenue,” he said.
This is marginally better than Christie’s original line – the governor initially tried to blame President Obama – but the fact remains that David Rosen, the chief budget officer for the last 30 years for New Jersey’s Office of Legislative Services, specifically warned state officials that the governor’s projections simply weren’t reliable. Instead of listening to Rosen, Christie mocked and bullied him.
Asked about the state struggling to pay for its pension, the governor went on to blame New Jersey’s four previous governors.
Christie added that his bridge scandal – which, coincidentally, he also blamed on everyone else – would be little more than a “footnote” in his political legacy. “My future is going to be based upon the record” of his fiscal management, the governor concluded.
After six debt downgrades and a massive budget shortfall, Christie probably ought to hope he’s mistaken.
As for the still-lingering bridge scandal, Bill Stepien, Christie’s former campaign manager, is more than a little upset about the widely-panned Mastro report – generally seen as taxpayer-financed propaganda intended to clear the governor. Yesterday, Stepien’s lawyer insisted that Christie’s lawyers retract the “false and misleading statements” they published about Stepien or they’ll sue.
And speaking of Stepien, the editorial board of the Star-Ledger, New Jersey’s largest newspaper, added today:
According to Tuesday’s testimony from Michael Drewniak, the governor’s pugilistic press secretary, Christie wondered aloud during a Dec. 5 meeting whether Stepien was deceiving him by hiding what he knew of the lane closures.
“I always wondered if Stepien knew more about this,” the governor said, according to Drewniak.
That revelation is potentially damaging to the governor. For one, he claimed unequivocally during a Dec. 13 press conference that no one in his inner circle knew about the lane closures. Drewniak’s testimony indicates that the governor had his suspicions, but decided to keep them secret. It is also revealing, and a bit revolting, to note that Drewniak watched the governor make this misleading statement without making a peep.
So how can the governor explain this one away? Another convenient memory lapse. Asked about it on his 101.5 FM radio show Tuesday night, the governor said he has “very little recollection of that conversation.”
The “footnote” rhetoric is clearly an example of wishful thinking, not a reliable prediction.
By: Steve Benen, The Maddow Blog, May 15, 2014
“Chris Christie Ain’t Got It”: He Isn’t Aware Of What He Doesn’t Know
There’s a scene in the comedy film “High Anxiety” in which a driver meets Mel Brooks at the airport and offers to pick up his cumbersome trunk. “I got it, I got it, I got it,” the driver insists as he struggles to lift the luggage before gasping, “I ain’t got it!” It lands with a thud.
The sequence came to mind recently as I thought about why I’m so skeptical of New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie’s presidential prospects — and it doesn’t concern the scandal surrounding the George Washington Bridge lane closures.
Having observed Christie on the national scene for a number of years now, I’ve been left with the impression that he isn’t aware of what he doesn’t know. He’s in love with his image as a tough-talking pragmatic governor and thinks he can go before just about any audience and rock em’ and sock em’ with his New Jersey humor and war stories about budget battles. I imagine that he goes before new audiences thinking to himself, “I’ve got this,” without doing the homework necessary to really understand the nuances of national or international politics.
This struck me for the first time when I saw Christie speak at the annual dinner of the Cato Institute in May 2012, in which he rattled the libertarian audience at the outset by referring to them as “a small group of committed conservatives.”
Anybody who has a basic understanding of the intellectual traditions of the limited-government movement would know that libertarians take great pains to differentiate themselves ideologically from conservatives. Referring to a Cato Institute audience as “committed conservatives” is kind of like speaking at a jazz conference and mixing up John Coltrane and Kenny G.
I was reminded of this incident when controversy ensued following Christie’s appearance at the Republican Jewish Coalition conference in Las Vegas in late March. After failing to mention Israel at all during his opening remarks, he was asked to offer his reflections on his 2012 visit there.
“I took a helicopter ride from the occupied territories across and just felt personally how extraordinary that was to understand the military risk that Israel faces every day,” Christie said during his remarks.
Christie’s overall intention, of course, was to tell the pro-Israel audience that he’s with them in steadfastly supporting the traditional U.S. ally. And yet he sloppily used the terminology “occupied territories.” Not only is the term inaccurate (as even the internationally accepted definition of occupation requires that the area in dispute is part of another sovereign nation), but the term endorses the Palestinian narrative that says any Jewish presence in the area is illegitimate.
According to a source who works within the pro-Israel community, Christie has repeatedly declined offers from those friendly to the idea of his candidacy to receive more advice and briefing on the issue. So it’s no surprise that the savvier RJC audience members were left with the impression that whatever his sympathies, he had little understanding of the dynamics of the Middle East.
To be clear, neither of these dustups are likely to be remembered much by the time the 2016 Republican primaries heat up. I’m not predicting a series of attack ads centered around his “occupied territories” remark. But Christie’s candidacy will be killed in its crib if he thinks he can rely on razzmatazz to impress Republican audiences — especially ones who are already suspicious of him.
His ego may have been inflated by the rousing reception he would receive when campaigning for Mitt Romney in Iowa, New Hampshire and other key states. But there’s a huge difference between being the warm-up act and undergoing the scrutiny of a candidate himself, where every slip-up gets magnified.
If he continues to take his “everything I need to know I learned in New Jersey” approach to national politics, Christie’s presidential candidacy is likely to end with a thud.
By: Philip Klein, Columnist, The Washington Times, April 10, 2014
“A Deepening Criminal Probe”: Christie’s Simmering Scandals Grow More Serious In NJ
Two weeks ago, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie’s (R) handpicked legal team issued a report – it was more taxpayer-financed propaganda than legal analysis – clearing their client of wrongdoing. As part of the public-relations push surrounding the stunt, Fox News’ Megyn Kelly asked the governor, “So this report has just come out, it exonerates you completely. Do you feel exonerated?”
Christie responded, “Yes, I do. But I also always knew that this is where it would end.”
Except, literally nothing about the governor’s ongoing scandals has “ended.” On the contrary, as Rachel noted on the show on Friday night, the probe is growing more serious, not less.
A federal grand jury has begun hearing testimony in the criminal investigation of the George Washington Bridge lane closing scandal, and Gov. Chris Christie’s chief spokesman is among those who have testified, his lawyer said Friday.
The grand jury action is considered a major development in the ongoing controversy that has enveloped the Christie administration for months. What began as a preliminary inquiry into whether federal laws might have been “implicated” has morphed into a deepening criminal probe to determine whether federal laws have actually been broken.
And really, that’s just the tip of the iceberg. Since these revelations on Friday, the developments have grown even more alarming.
David Wildstein, the former Port Authority official at the center of the George Washington Bridge lane-closings scandal, spent several days meeting with federal prosecutors in Newark last week, according to a report posted online by a Washington-based publication that says it covers “insider news” about the U.S. Department of Justice.
The publication, called “Main Justice,” is also reporting that Charlie McKenna, former chief legal counsel to Gov. Chris Christie, met secretly in mid-January with investigators in the office of New Jersey U.S. Attorney Paul Fishman.
Esquire’s Scott Raab had a related report on Wildstein cooperating with federal prosecutor’s office, which has reportedly added to the number of attorneys working on this case.
If Christie thinks his own lawyers freeing him of responsibility “ended” the scandal, he’s going to be awfully disappointed. Look for more on this on tonight’s show.
By: Steve Benen, The Maddow Blog, April 7, 2014
Share This Blog
Unknown Feed- An error has occurred; the feed is probably down. Try again later.
mykeystrokes.com 