Alan: Unlike every American politician before him, Gov. Chris Christie has not even hinted that he "accepts full responsibility" or that "the buck stops here." I am a retired public school high school teacher and have long been pissed at Christie for his infamous and self-promoting abuse of two public school teachers who had the temerity to ask questions during The Bully's "Q and A's." If Christie enters the 2016 presidential race, he will confront the same questions re-stated Endlessly: "Governor Christie, Why did your administration's petty vindictiveness devise life-threatening -- if not deadly --bridge delays? And why did you not publicly acknowledge full responsibility for this criminal mischief? Why did you not clarify -- in certain terms -- that "the buck stops with me?" And when these interrogators videotape your blithering attempts to respond --and then upload your humiliation to YouTube -- will you feel as abused as the hard-working New Jersey teachers you treated like parasites, leeches and scum?
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You know a politician is having a bad day when he has to stand before a news conference and plead, “I am who I am, but I am not a bully.”
Frankly, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie was unconvincing on that score Thursday as he attempted to contain a widening abuse-of-power scandal. Moreover, Christie displayed a degree of egocentrism that can only be described as stunning. His apologies would have sounded more sincere if he hadn’t portrayed himself as the real victim.
Eugene Robinson
Writes about politics and culture in twice-a-week columns and on the PostPartisan blog.
A bit of background is needed: During his successful reelection campaign last fall, Christie — shown by polls to be a leading contender for the Republican presidential nomination in 2016, should he decide to seek it — tried to run up the score by winning endorsements from elected officials across the state, Democrats as well as Republicans.
The mayor of Fort Lee, the town on the New Jersey end of the George Washington Bridge to New York City, declined to give Christie his support. Shortly thereafter,Christie’s deputy chief of staff, Bridget Anne Kelly, sent an e-mail to an official at the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey — the agency that controls the bridge — that said: “Time for some traffic problems in Fort Lee.”
The e-mail went to David Wildstein, who was installed at the Port Authority by Christie and has known the governor since high school. He replied to Kelly: “Got it.”
Four weeks later, on Sept. 9, Wildstein ordered the closure of two traffic lanesapproaching the bridge from Fort Lee,ostensibly to conduct a traffic study. This may sound like a minor inconvenience, but the George Washington Bridge is one of the most heavily traveled in the country. Closing the lanes caused hours-long traffic jams in Fort Lee for four straight days, snaring commuters in hopeless gridlock. In one widely reported incident, an elderly woman died of cardiac arrest after emergency responders were delayed by the snarl.
Further e-mail traffic involving Kelly, Wildstein and Christie’s campaign manager, Bill Stepien — mostly using their personal e-mail accounts, not their official ones — showed unalloyed glee at the mess Wildstein had created. Finally, a Port Authority higher-up discovered what Wildstein had done and reversed the order.
All along, Christie had ridiculed the suggestion that there was any political motivation in the lane closures. On Thursday, faced with proof to the contrary, he apologized and said he had been “betrayed” by staff members and associates he believed he could trust. “I am embarrassed and humiliated by the conduct of some of the people on my team,” he said.
Christie announced that he has fired Kelly — not because she helped create a maddening and dangerous situation for the people of Fort Lee but because she lied when Christie asked all the members of his senior staff whether they had any involvement in the affair.
That was the central message of Christie’s nearly two-hour performance before reporters: I was betrayed by people I trusted. I’m the victim here.
The whole episode “makes me ask . . . what did I do wrong to have these folks think it was okay to lie to me,” Christie said. He described his principal emotion as “sadness” at the betrayals by associates to whom he had shown loyalty — and from whom he expected loyalty in return.
The governor accepted full responsibility but not an ounce of blame. “Politics ain’t beanbag,” he said, but “that’s very, very different than saying that, you know, someone’s a bully.”
But is it really all that different? Christie maintained that he never sought the endorsement of Fort Lee Mayor Mark Sokolich — never even met him, actually — and therefore had no reason to want him punished. What, then, would make his deputy chief of staff and several of his closest political associates think otherwise?
If Christie is truly in the mood for soul-searching, asking how his aides could tell him such lies should be secondary. The more urgent question is what Christie might have said or done to make these loyal lieutenants conclude it would be appropriate — and a lot of fun — to torment the people of Fort Lee because of the mayor’s refusal to pledge fealty.
Federal prosecutors are reviewing the whole affair. One obvious question is whether other officials who declined to endorse Christie faced retribution of any kind.
If voters see Christie’s pugnacious, in-your-face political persona as refreshing, he has a big future. If they see it as thuggish, he doesn’t. In that sense, you’re right, Governor. This is all about you.
Read more from Eugene Robinson’s archive
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