But let’s get back to that infant race for the Republican presidential nomination. The WMUR Granite State Poll, which had Christie on top in New Hampshire, put Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky in second. So it was kind of fascinating last week when they got into a fight, carried out long-distance at top volume. Christie started it, when he laced into a “strain of libertarianism” that he termed “very dangerous” to national security. This was a garbled broadside against Paul’s recent campaign against the government’s mass collection of phone and e-mail records. “I want them to come to New Jersey and sit across from the widows and the orphans (of 9/11) and have that conversation,” he concluded. Terrible opening. You cannot win a serious argument by bopping your opponent with the widows and orphans of 9/11. That was a tactic well-honed by Rudy Giuliani, a person whose race for the presidency will be forever remembered in the annals of totally disastrous political campaigns. Senator Paul, in response, trotted off to Fox News and announced that if Christie “cared about protecting this country maybe he wouldn’t be in this gimme, gimme, gimme.” His garbled broadside was a suggestion that by demanding so much money for hurricane relief, Christie was depriving the country of funds for national defense. Double error! First of all, you do not mess with weather-related disasters. Also, Paul left the door wide open for Christie’s next retort, which was to point out that New Jersey gets 61 cents back for every $1 its residents send to Washington, while Kentucky gets back $1.51. So, in the battle for the incoherent defense of the indefensible, Christie won Round 2. There was further sniping, during which Paul called the governor “king of bacon,” then made a peace offering that Christie swatted down. (“I don’t really have time for that.”) And then life moved on. In the end, the governor scored points only when the Yelling Guy was replaced by the rational politician with an actual point to make. What if it turns out that the most celebrated aspect of Chris Christie — his high-decibel tough-talking — is really his biggest handicap as a national candidate? In that New Hampshire poll, Christie got 27 percent of the male vote and 14 percent of the women. All the other candidates mentioned were pretty much gender gapless. It’s just one little poll, but maybe we’re onto something. Maybe quiet and sane trumps loud and crazy, even in Republican primary politics. Could be the start of something soft-spoken.
Posted on: Thu, 08 Aug 2013 20:11:11 +0000
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