Walsh: Christie Falling Apart
Joan Walsh at Salon shows what’s happening and it ain’t pretty.
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie is sinking fast. Yet another national poll finds that his 2016 hopes are fading, as he falls from first to third place among likely GOP presidential contenders in the latest Washington Post/ABC News poll, and 12 points behind Hillary Clinton. Like earlier polls, this one finds that Christie is losing his best attribute for 2016: his wide appeal with Democrats and independents.
Now comes another blow: He’s lost the Ron Fournier primary. A year ago the centrist National Journal reporter, long a Christie promoter, wrote that “the smartest man in politics may be Chris Christie.” Today he writes: “I take it back,” in a piece headlined “Why I Was Wrong About Chris Christie.” While taking no stand on Christie’s direct culpability in the scandals erupting around him, Fournier says they show that “Christie ran a hyper-political governor’s office that focused relentlessly on a big re-election win to position him for a 2016 presidential race.”
