Chris Christie Assumes the Position for 2016

In all likelihood, Mitt Romney could have been a great president.  At the very least, he and Paul Ryan would have restored fiscal sanity to our nation, rather than doubling down on the mistakes which have brought us to the brink of economic collapse, as Barack Obama is doing even now.  That said, Romney was not the best option the Republicans could have run as our candidate in 2012, despite the assertion by 90% of Republican bigwigs that he was “the only one who can beat Barack Obama.”  After he spent six years campaigning for the job, we made him our nominee for that singular purpose, and he let us down.

Many of the same establishment Republicans who brought us Candidate Romney have another choice nominee they would like to see in 2016—some would have preferred him to Romney in 2012—and that candidate is New Jersey Governor Chris Christie.  They have been and will continue to push for Christie, or someone very much like him, to seek the highest office in the land at the end of Obama’s second term.  If they are once again successful in installing their candidate of choice, he will meet the same fate as their last “best option.”

A couple of years back, I predicted that Hillary Clinton had designs on being the Democrat candidate for 2016, and so far I appear to have been correct.  Clinton played the role of loyal party operative throughout Obama’s first term, dutifully accepting the role of Secretary of State which was offered to her, and covering for Obama while touring the world, building her international stature and credentials.  She has now played the dutiful wronged woman through three terms of Democrat presidents she resents, all to bide her time for her own shot at the Oval Office.  As she resigns her current position for Obama’s second term, look for her to disappear for several months, gradually emerging in the following years to build her own campaign which will at once promise to “finish the great works begun under Barack Obama,” while also correcting the shortcomings of a flawed administration from which she has successfully distanced herself.

Notably, Hillary Clinton did not want to campaign against an incumbent president in 2012, and neither did Chris Christie.  Despite efforts by numerous Republicans to draft him, Christie stubbornly refused to throw his hat into the ring in the last election, but this does not mean he doesn’t want the job.  Christie has made it apparent on several occasions that he would like to be president, but like Hillary, he has been patient in waiting for “his time.”  It may come to pass that “Christie’s time” and “Hillary’s time” both arrive in the year 2016.

Christie was elected governor of New Jersey in 2010, taking the reins from Jon Corzine, a Democrat so corrupt that even a state notorious for being a hotbed of organized crime didn’t want him anymore.  While Corzine went on to “misplace” $1.6 billion dollars of his investors’ money as chairman of MF Global—sort of demonstrating just how New Jersey became such a mess to begin with—Christie set to work on repairing the damage caused by decades of liberal government.  By all accounts, Christie’s leadership has been a blessing and turned New Jersey’s failing economics around even in the midst of a national recession.
 
Christie’s actions and success in New Jersey have made him something of a lightning rod as a national figure, even for a politician.  Conservatives have tended to love him, both for his success at financially reforming a deep blue state, and for his rather aggressive attitude in speaking with and dealing with hostile political and media opponents.  Liberals have likewise come to detest him for exactly those same qualities, particularly when he denounces their messianic president.
 
However, despite his achievements originating from confessed conservative tactics, conservatives must remember that Christie is not a conservative in the truest sense of the word.  Socially, he is rather liberal, and this is likely what allowed him to be elected as a Republican in a state which consistently leans heavily toward Democrats.  He is not a RINO (Republican In Name Only), but he is also not a social conservative or “traditional family values” politician.  And as a politician, he is certainly not above playing politics.
 
Of course there is no way Christie could have predicted Hurricane Sandy, which decimated much of New Jersey and New York just in time for the election; which is to say he could not have expected to have the opportunity prior to October to throw the national election for the Republicans.  However, he could not possibly have done a better job of handing the election to Barack Obama if he had been in league with the DNC and MSNBC from the start.  In the blink of an eye, Christie went from campaigning for Mitt Romney to embracing Barack Obama in a bear hug.  He praised Obama for his leadership, granted him photo ops, and left the door wide open for Obama appear to save the day.
 
Months later, we know Obama did nothing for the residents of New Jersey.  While many of them suffered through winter homeless and helpless, he was vacationing in Hawaii for Christmas and New Years, racking up another $10 million on the national debt by jetting out to golf in Honolulu.  Obama’s photo op costars were completely forgotten, but Governor Christie refrained from criticizing the Democrat president he had just helped to reelect.  Instead, Christie turned his attention to publicly attacking Republicans in Congress for not fast-tracking a “hurricane relief” bill loaded down with wasteful government spending . . . the exact same sort of government waste Christie spent the past several years making a name for himself by halting in New Jersey!  Christie did not even speak harshly of the Democrats who tried to take advantage of the very real crisis for their own greedy purposes; he instead focused his wrath entirely on his own party.
 
Whether he intended to or not, Christie served as a helping hand in the reelection of Barack Obama, the defeat of Mitt Romney, and the White House (presumably) being free of a Democrat incumbent to challenge in 2016 for whomever emerges as the Republican nominee.  Now something of a national celebrity—he was one of Barbara Walters’ “Most Fascinating People of 2012″ (a gesture which was probably intended as a slap in the face of conservatives)—Christie has the name recognition and reputation to be a contender for that nomination . . . and he certainly has the ambition to seize the opportunity.
 
When he is behaving, Chris Christie is the ideal Republican to maintain fiscal sanity in a Democrat-heavy state.  He is not the ideal Republican to represent the party on a national level or hold the Oval Office.  No matter what happens between now and then, if Christie is the opposition candidate to Hillary Clinton in 2016, we will see a landslide victory for the Democrats.
 
Any plans Christie is making to be the Republican presidential nominee must be stopped in their tracks now, before he has the opportunity to gain momentum.  We must remember what has come before, learn from the mistakes of the past, and resist any efforts by the Republican Party to nominate anything other than a solid and consistent conservative.

Original article: Chris Christie Assumes the Position for 2016

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