If allowing the Pearl Harbor attacks to happen hasn’t much tarred Franklin Roosevelt’s reputation, it is unclear to me why Hillary Clinton should be subject to so much abuse about the tragic loss of American lives in Benghazi, Libya. After all, the country was relieved of it’s tyrannical and insane leader at little overall cost to the United States. If you want to claim that Libya isn’t much better off for it, well, I predicted that, but it’s a different argument. When you go to war and partially occupy a country, there will be casualties. Some of those casualties will be the result of poor decisions on your part. They aren’t somehow disqualifying for further service to your country. But J-Rube gives the game away in her second paragraph:
First, of course, every politician (ahem, a Northeastern governor) is held responsible for what goes on by underlings. The head of an organization must be held accountable for the people she hires. And, yes, leaders need to take ownership of the “culture” around them.
That’s a reference to Gov. Chris Christie, and she’s insisting without evidence that Christie isn’t directly responsible for the lane-closures on George Washington Bridge.
It is now clear that she has fallen in love with Gov. Christie and has appointed herself as his water-carrier. In a piece she published on Saturday, she attacked the credibility of MSNBC‘s reporting. But the quality of their reporting isn’t going to be determinative of what happens. Here’s why:
The New Jersey mayor who publicly claimed this weekend that Gov. Chris Christie’s administration tried to withhold hurricane relief funds met Sunday in private with the U.S. attorney for the state of New Jersey.
“This afternoon I met with the U.S. Attorney’s office for several hours at their request and provided them with my journal and other documents,” Hoboken Mayor Dawn Zimmer said in a statement Sunday. “As they pursue this investigation, I will provide any requested information and testify under oath about the facts of what happened when the Lieutenant Governor came to Hoboken and told me that Sandy aid would be contingent on moving forward with a private development project.”
New Jersey Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno is expected to deny the allegations Monday morning and will be the first top official in Christie’s administration to address Zimmer’s charges.
Zimmer said Saturday in an interview with MSNBC that she would be willing to sign a sworn statement and testify under oath that she had been threatened by the governor’s staff to approve a development project or risk hurricane relief funding for her town of Hoboken, which was devastated by Hurricane Sandy in October 2012.
The mayor of Hoboken has already met with the U.S. Attorney and provided them with her journal and other documentation. It doesn’t matter how J-Rube spins things or whether she is convincing or unconvincing. All that matters is what the evidence shows and how the federal prosecutors feel about that evidence.
Either Christie gets prosecuted or he doesn’t. J-Rube doesn’t get to sit on the grand jury.
Alfred McCoy: It’s about blackmail, not national security
A much better read than J-Rube will ever be. The only excuse for reading and responding to J-Rube is to draw her attention to your blog so you two could have a promotional food fight. Let us know so we can get our FrogPond pennants and crowd the stands. Nominate Arthur Gilroy as cheerleader; that should irritate if not baffle the other side. And a cheer of “Media Strike!” seems so apropos of a food fight don’t you think?
Nominate Arthur Gilroy as cheerleader???!!!
Me too.
Bet on it.
AG
The notion that the MSM and almost any particular part of it is still, except for the lulz or the occasional wtf of a change up, worthy of comment must be examined, imo. Don’t we have better things to do? Isn’t it like beating a dead horse now? How much more do we need to hear that David Brooks or J Rubin exist? Especially now with the BIG and getting BIGGER every day Christie Corruption Cornucopia. For example, did you know that David Samson has hired Michael Chertoff as his lawyer? Now isn’t THAT a little more worthy of our attention?
Port Authority chairman hires former Homeland Security chief as attorney in GWB probe
Look out people, these dots are starting to connect themselves now.
Ain’t that the truth!!!
Who can forget the reports (Was there a photo? I seem to remember one.) of a bunch of “moving men” parked on the Jersey side of the Hudson cheering the 9/11 hit.
Not me…
Man…if only those dots would connect!!!
AG
This guy has connected some sober(ing) dots here.
That is true. She doesn’t “get to sit on the jury.” However, her employers’ employers get to run the investigation. We will be able to gauge the depth and strength of the PermaGov’s Christie fix by how aggressively the prosecution acts…if of course it acts at all…and also by how impartial the judge(s) may be. After this Hoboken thing I personally think that Christie’s days as a useful fix candidate are pretty much over…where there’s one thing like this there are bound to be many more, at least some of which are liable to surface any day now… but there are also any number of PermaGov strings that can still be pulled. Media strings, Justice Dept. strings, threats of retaliation to any individuals who are involved in the case, etc.
We shall see.
Gee. Ain’t politics grand!!!???
Business as usual, Booman.
Business as usual.
Bet on it.
AG
Christie’s days as a useful anything are over.
Proof is that Dawn Zimmer finally talked. If she talked in May she and her city would have been toast. Now with the GWB crap, Christie can’t touch her.
And Fox News talking heads are trying to debunk her by asking why she didn’t talk in May.
Jersey politics is pretty much a contanct sport and Christie had greatly raised the stakes but he is lame duck even before he took the oath the second time.
Booker would be an interesting voice to hear. I wonder how much his arm was twisted to “cooperate” with the governor. My sense though is he may have used his popularity to extort as much out of Christie as the other way around.
Booker? The other side of the same state-to-federal fix coin. He may escape really bad media coverage because the PermaGov always needs a “good,” trustworthy black pol who has proven that he will not rock the boat, but he’s in NJ politics up to his ears. Nobody dives into a sewer like that and comes up all shiny clean and smelling good. Bet on it. Nobody.
AG
What a joke it is that this “mature” woman gets some prime Op-ed and internet real estate to air her post-teenage boy-crushes.
Another one more valuable that J-Rube:
What Happens When the Poor Receive a Stipend
Yet another study is in. From Duke University. About the Eastern Cherokee Nation.
fascinating, thanks for link
The point of publishing J-Rube’s water-carrying is that it attempts to trivialize EACH AND EVERY FACTUAL ATTACK AGAINST REPUBLICAN LEADERS because Bengazi!!! It also continues the GOP 2016 campaign to take back the White House, conservatives’ Clinton obsession (Christ, J-Rube’s still babbling about the Rose Law Firm?), and the all-purpose excuse for whatever happens in the Christie case, up to and including indictments, Because Liberal Media and Activist Unelected Judges.
It is lost on J-Rube, but not on me, that in a column where she obliquely defends Christie, the general frames she sets up act as much more effective critiques of Christie than Hillary.