Editor’s note: This commentary is by Kevin Ellis, who is a partner in Ellis-Mills Public Affairs. He previously was a principal in the lobbying and strategic communications firm KSE Partners.
I’m from New Jersey.
So Chris Christie is a fascinating person for me.
My mother and lots of old friends keep asking me whether Gov. Christie knew of the dirty tricks being played by his staff and what I think the ramifications would be.
Yes, New Jersey is different. Not because of what you see
on TV. “Jersey Shore,” “Sopranos,” etc.
It is different because it grows people like Chris Christie. Watch the stunning almost two-hour long press conference the governor gave last week. He is at his egotistical, skilled, human, flawed best. He is exactly who he is.
He fired the bad guys, took the blame, apologized. But at the same time, looking to the future, he was combative, smart and setting the board for his presidential run. It is a rare governor who talks about phone calls with his wife and home workouts. What you see with Christie is the real thing, not gussied up by consultants.
Christie has been flying high recently. The media wants him to run for president against Hillary Clinton so they can have an exciting race to cover.
Did he order the acts? No. That’s not how things work at the highest levels of politics. I believe we will discover that this happened because of hubris.
Hubris sneaks into any political operation, any organization in fact. Success breeds it. Christie has been flying high recently. The media wants him to run for president against Hillary Clinton so they can have an exciting race to cover.
Republicans who want to win the White House — as opposed to the Tea Party that doesn’t care — also want him to run.
So the adoring press Christie has been getting leads to a cockiness and arrogance among the staff that they can do anything. It happened with Watergate, the Iran-Contra scandal, the Clinton era and many others.
In Vermont, where I spend most of my time, a scandal like this would never happen. You would never see emails like this from public servants in Vermont. That kind of hubris does not happen. And that’s why Vermont’s state government continues to be the honest, corruption free organism that it is.
Indeed, Vermont Gov. Peter Shumlin shares some traits with Christie – blunt, intuitive, willing to tangle over controversial issues, REALLY smart.
But this would never happen under Shumlin. The people who work for him could not conceive of doing these things or writing those emails. It would never occur to them.
Christie didn’t order these acts. But he got carried away with the limelight in ways that allowed his staff to think they were immune to the limits of the political system.
Now voters – knowing that Christie allowed this environment to happen – can factor this into their future decisions.
