Hurricane Sandy

[Judge Jude]

I hit some black ice before 5 pm last night on a hill about 100 yards from my door. slo-mo accident as I banged into a heating/AC truck that was stuck sideways in the road at about 3 mph. no injuries.

out a $500 deductible, but not sure my many co-workers who have been without power for 10 days will give me the sympathy I deserve!

[Piney Boy]

Very wierd for my town. Those of us that lost power during Sandy still have power. Those that had power during Sandy now have none. We got 3 inches last night and Freehold got 12. Yet here at work in Moorestown, NJ there is nothing. Very wierd. Most Nor'easters do not stay off the coast like this one did. Most like to travel up the Delaware River.

[Long John]

And it's going to be 60 degrees this weekend, so all the snow will be gone by Monday.

[joncarlos]

Christie absolutely destroyed Boehner and the House Republicans in a press conference today, addressing the House failure to pass relief bills for Sandy recovery.

When he was asked if this would impact who he would support in the future (presumably incumbents in future House races), he basically said "we'll see, primaries can be rough."

http://www.cnn.com/2013/01/02/politics/house-sandy-aid-vote/index.html?hpt=hp_inthenews

[JudeBaldo]

Christie absolutely destroyed Boehner and the House Republicans in a press conference today, addressing the House failure to pass relief bills for Sandy recovery.

When he was asked if this would impact who he would support in the future (presumably incumbents in future House races), he basically said "we'll see, primaries can be rough."

http://www.cnn.com/2013/01/02/politi...t=hp_inthenews

http://cnn.com/video/#/video/us/2013/01/02/sot-christie-disgraceful.state-of-new-jersey

[Hornsby]

Here's the fascinating thing, and the frustrating thing about politics. Chris Christie has vaulted himself into the early frontrunner to win the 2016 Presidential election, with his behavior as Governor during the Sandy crisis, and how he scolded the house and Boehner today. Now...this is all assuming that he could survive the Republican primaries in 2016, something that probably isn't possible at this point. The sad thing is that we have a man here who's demonstrated bi-partisanship, and leadership, and that's likely to kill him with his own party, who prefer to eat their own young.

Much better to nominate a clown like Marco Rubio, who can't give you a straight answer on evolution, even though he knows better, and votes against a bill that only 7 other senators did. Just to pander to that wing of the party...makes me sad as hell.

[Judge Jude]

2016 is an eternity away, in terms of what either party is liable to look like. "Fighting the last war" is a bad military strategy, and it doesn't work well in political forecasting, either.

Now, it's also possible that the Republican power structure can become even MORE conservative - I'm not taking anything off the table. But things tend to balance out, if they tend to anything. And anyone - whether Christie or someone else - who is blunt on issues that the vast majority of people agree with, has a shot in primaries, imo.

John Huntsman has said he kicked himself for not raising his hand when that Fox News guy (Brett Bair?) asked in a debate who would accept a deal of $10 in spending cuts for every $1 in new taxes. That would be wildly popular even among many conservatives (no one did).

If someone in either party with a realistic chance ever grows a pair and stops panicking about how "I have to tack to the extreme in the primaries," it will be fun to see what happens. Until then, I guess we're all just speculating.

Somebody here might be able to talk me out of this theory, but I think it's worth putting on the table at least.

[Hornsby]

2016 is an eternity away, in terms of what either party is liable to look like. "Fighting the last war" is a bad military strategy, and it doesn't work well in political forecasting, either.

Now, it's also possible that the Republican power structure can become even MORE conservative - I'm not taking anything off the table. But things tend to balance out, if they tend to anything. And anyone - whether Christie or someone else - who is blunt on issues that the vast majority of people agree with, has a shot in primaries, imo.

John Huntsman has said he kicked himself for not raising his hand when that Fox News guy (Brett Bair?) asked in a debate who would accept a deal of $10 in spending cuts for every $1 in new taxes. That would be wildly popular even among many conservatives (no one did).

If someone in either party with a realistic chance ever grows a pair and stops panicking about how "I have to tack to the extreme in the primaries," it will be fun to see what happens. Until then, I guess we're all just speculating.

Somebody here might be able to talk me out of this theory, but I think it's worth putting on the table at least.

Here's one of the main flaws in your theory, Caucuses. They're run by a tiny minority of the various parties, stacked with dyed in the wool believers, which makes it extremely difficult for anyone to expose that centrist position that you champion. Doesn't matter which party...Obama had to go to the extreme left in 2008, and people here and around the nation are still steaming that he went towards the center. Same thing happened with Romney this year, and you can see it happening with other candidates already, such as Rubio. You think that he really doesn't understand how evolution really works? Do you really believe that he thinks it's all a great "mystery"? Not bloody likely, but he has to dumb it down to have a chance in 2016, same with just about every other candidate.

I'd love it if your theory would come to fruition, but I can't ever see it happening.

[Judge Jude]

That's the flipside, and you have made those points effectively.

But I think Obama got very lucky with Hillary backing the Iraq war, frankly, in the Senate. That counter was not extreme by 2008. And his "extreme left" health care was less of a problem because Hillary had a negative check mark there, from Bill's tenure, fair or not. So I don't think that really makes the case.

McCain was more moderate and ran a lunatic primary campaign, but I'm not sure what to make of that. The sample sizes on these things, as we say in fantasy baseball, are pretty small...

[B-Fly]

The Republicans would need to be convinced that a Chris Christie type is their only realistic shot of winning back the White House. If they believed that, then I think the money would flow to him and he could make it through the primaries, particularly if the right-wing "no compromises" primary vote were split among multiple candidates. If Christie wins re-election in a landslide in blue NJ next year, which looks like a strong possibility at this point in time, then I think he can make a very strong case for himself to the big money donors and the party leadership. They need to be able to win some states like NJ, PA, MI, WI, MN, and they're not likely to get them with an ideologically-pure conservative.

[nots]

I have never donated to a Republican in my life, but if Christie runs, I will.

[B-Fly]

A few more years of bad behavior by Congressional Republicans could cause Chris Christie to consider whether he could successfully raise enough funds to support a run for the White House as an Independent. Again, the hard thing there would be the money and the ground game to get out his voters across the country, and then appealing to enough Democrats to be able to defeat both a Democratic and Republican challenger in a general election, but it would certainly be interesting to watch him try.

[nots]

In the dumb keep getting dumber department: CPAC is not extending an invitation to speak to Gov Christie at its next convention as retribution for his positive comments towards President Obama in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy.
The guy has an approval rating of 71% in blue NJ (54% among NJ DEMOCRATS). He's really the only guy in your party that might be able to win the WH and you geniuses want to punish him for not being partisan enough. Wonderful. Go run Paul Ryan or Marco Rubio and get whipped again while you continue to force all moderates to vote for the Democrat. Again. I hope Christie wears his CPAC rejection as a badge of honor.
Idiots.