If the mainstream media was worth the biomechanical electricity required
to hit a button on a remote control, it would've long ago pointed out
the screamingly obvious fact that a sitting chief executive does not
have the final say over his guilt or innocence in a scandal by hiring a
million dollar-a-pop white shoe law firm. That's up to legislative
ethics committees and, if necessary, courts of law.
Or, as NBC's
own website says,
Critics have pointed out Christie's close ties to the
chief of the law firm and said that the report lacks crucial testimony
from those most deeply involved with the lane closures, including Kelly,
Stepien, former Port Authority staffer David Wildstein and Port
Authority Chairman David Sampson.
Yes, indeed.
Just as the FBI was blocked from interviewing potential crucial
witnesses (that would be the bin Laden family) in the first days after
9/11, the law firm of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher either blocked
themselves or were instructed to never interview exactly the very
principles involved in the Bridgegate scandal that closed all but one
lane on the GWB starting on the first day of school last year. The most
conspicuous absence of depositions was that of Bridget Anne Kelly,
Christie's former Deputy Chief of Staff.
And yet, despite
David Wildstein's charge that Christie knew about the lane closures
before, during and immediately afterwards, this law firm that enjoys
very cozy ties with Christie announced with all the credibility of the
9/11 and Warren Commissions that Christie's innocence in the matter
"rings true."
Unfortunately and amazingly, NBC's Carrie Dann,
who wrote the article, either elected to ignore and was blithely
insensible to the rampant misogyny of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher's
whitewash job. Essentially, it almost completely chokes off
accountability at Bridget Kelly herself and faults to a far lesser
extent Wildstein himself, the guy who actually ordered the green lights
turned off at all but one lane on the GWB leading from Fort Lee.
As John Amato at
Crooks and Liars correctly points out,
They
show no proof of their misogynist allegations, but they include them
anyway, Why is that you ask? Because this is not a real internal review
report, but a document that's sole purpose is to exonerate Chris
Christie. Why they thought going gonzo on Bridget Kelly was a good idea I
have no clue. Maybe they believe like Bryan Fisher, that women are an
inferior species and make a handy scapegoat.
Which isn't to say we should have a pity party for Kelly, plainly a
partisan political operative with a little bit of power and thought
absolutely nothing whatsoever of inconveniencing countless thousands of
motorists for four days straight in the interests of petty political
revenge inspired by a desire to curry political favor from a man she
knew would be pleased by this. And the "probe", plainly written entirely
by men, shamelessly makes repeated references to Kelly's emotional
instability, a terminated relationship and basically coming thisclose to
mentioning the word "hormones."
Yet, at the very least, the
report still reveals Christie as a boob who hadn't the slightest idea of
what his senior staffers were doing under his nose and during a
re-election campaign. At the very worst, it shows Christie as every bit
the Jersey leg breaker he is by commissioning an internal probe costing
the New Jersey taxpayers,
at minimum, $1,000,000 to take down one
woman who was but one member in a conspiracy designed solely to exact
revenge on a Democratic mayor who withheld his endorsement of Christie
during his bid for re-election. And it shows he is all too willing to
use the tried-and-true Republican tactic of misogyny to justify his
actions after the fact.
The very fact that Christie saw no problem billing the New Jersey Treasury $1,000,000 or more to have a law firm whose top dog is buddies with Christie in the interests of distancing himself
from a scandal that just won't go away and to save his sinking 2016
presidential aspirations speaks volumes. The very phrase "internal
probe" has about as much credibility as a crocodile in a camouflage suit.
And imagine the furor that would've arisen if it had come out that one
of President Obama's Deputy Chiefs of Staff had ordered a lane closure
of a major bridge because its Republican mayor withheld his endorsement
of Mr. Obama's own re-election bid in 2012? John Boehner and Darrell
Issa would have burns and callouses on their hands from the lynching
ropes they'd be endlessly gripping.
Considering Christie's
countless evils against the people of New Jersey, the Department of
Education and a growing line of victims littering the wayside of
Christie's potholed road to Pennsylvania Avenue, it's amazing that it
took this long for one of those scandals to finally stick to his rotund
body. And the more Christie tries to distance himself from this scandal,
the more he lambastes former aides and school chums, the pettier and
smaller he looks and the more he resembles the vindictive Chief
Executive whom David Wildstein said knew about the lane closures and did nothing to mitigate them.
Indeed, for someone who's obviously adept at lane closures in the
interests of petty political revenge, Chris Christie knows precious
little about closure itself.