David Weigel has this over at Slate that Chris Christie gave a speech to the National Republican Committee, one in which he demanded be off-the-record. Seems though somebody taped it and leaked it to Politico.
Could this be Christie's "47% speech" moment?
Here's what he was recorded saying -
"We have the endorsement of 24 building-trade unions,” he said. “We have an opportunity as a political party to drive a wedge in the union movement, and the laboratory where that’s happening right now is in my state.”
Weigel is cribbing from a larger Politico article by James Hohnmann that can be found here - http://www.politico.com/...
In the speech to the RNC, Christie is laying out his case why he should be the establishment candidate in 2016 - because he can win. And part of his case as to why he can win is because he further brags about how much Democratic support he gets in NJ from elected officials and in polling -
He noted that he is on track to win 35 percent of Democratic votes in a state where the opposition has a 750,000 voter registration advantage, and that polling shows he’s winning independents 3-to-1.
Christie said 45 elected Democrats have endorsed him, including the Democratic county executive of the biggest Democratic county in the state.
“This is New Jersey,” he said. “This is not the heartland of Republican politics.”
Then he boasted about a string of endorsements: “This year for governor I’ve been endorsed by the Latino Leadership Alliance of New Jersey, the largest Latino political group in the state, and they’ve never before endorsed a Republican for statewide office,” he said to applause.
“I’ve been endorsed by the executive director of the Black Ministers Council and 24 intercity African-American ministers,” he went on. “If you listen to the national media, you’d think this could never happen, that African-American leaders of this country will never stand with Republicans. We’re going to show you in New Jersey this year that that is simply not true.”
“Lots of folks talk in our party about a gender gap, and we have a gender gap in New Jersey, too,” he continued. “The last public poll showed that I’m winning women 59 to 30 in New Jersey. We have a gender gap, a plus-29 gender gap in New Jersey. And, by the way, I’m running against a female opponent!”
And what does he plan to do with all the Democratic support? Luckily he tells us -
“We’re going to learn things this year that we’re going to be able to apply to the races we have in 2014 and beyond,” he said.
“I’m in this business to win,” he said. “I don’t know why you’re in it. … I think that we have some folks that believe that our job is to be college professors. Now college professors are fine, I guess. You know, college professors basically spout out ideas that nobody ever does anything about. For our ideas to matter, we have to win because, if we don’t win, we don’t govern. And if we don’t govern, all we do is shout into the wind. So I am going to do anything I need to do to win!”
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Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be any of the audio released, so we just have Mr. Hohnmann's reporting. There has however been no denials from the Christie Camp or the RNC, so it certainly seems to be legit. But it doesn't pack the same wallop as if the audio was leaked and we could hear him in his own words - especially for ad purposes.
WAKE UP NJ Democrats. You might think you're just backing the winner - but bloody hell this guy is just using you. He has admitted as much.
And here he is in front of the RNC, we all know what the Republicans are, what their platform is and what they stand for. And Christie has no issue with any of what the GOP is -
“There [is] nothing wrong with our principles,” Christie went on. “The problem is we’ve got to focus on winning again. This is not an academic exercise, everybody. There’s too much at stake for this to be an academic exercise."
He has too many Democrats fooled, swallowed hook, line and sinker. And it's not just New Jersey Democrats - folks here are at best apathetic towards this race. Barbara Buono diaried here last week and nobody cared. Here we have (the office of) Barbara Buono, challenger to Gov Christie spending the time to come diary here and here's the resulting interest -
http://www.dailykos.com/... 6 comments and 15 recs.
We're still three months out, and Christie is up big - but New Jersey will get out mere weeks earlier and resoundingly elect Cory Booker to represent them in the Senate. And in 2012 Presidential election New Jersey voted 58% for Pres Obama to 41% for Mitt Romney. New Jersey is a VERY BLUE state that has been tricked into supporting a partyline Republican and are about to give him a huge boost in his 2016 Presidential aspiration by helping his re-election. If Christie lost to Buono it would end his 2016 dreams, and don;t fool yourselves - he is a HUGE threat come 2016 and his case will be made that he's a bi-partisan problem solver and will point to his victories in New Jersey, especially his re-election with 35% Democrat voter support.
A State that voted Pres Obama almost 60-40, and will likely elect Booker by 60-40 margin will also re-elect Chris Christie by that 60-40 margin? Christie is a Koch supported, Adelson supported dyed in the wool, tried and true REPUBLICAN.