Christie is no Cicero – Insider NJ

Chris Christie is fun to watch.

That’s one reason he’s getting so much attention in the run-up to Wednesday’s first Republican presidential debate.

He’s also the only GOP hopeful truly attacking Donald Trump.

The uniqueness of that, notwithstanding, you have to figure part of Christie’s appeal is his verbiage.

The following is not his style.

“I do not believe that Mr. Trump is refined or mature enough to warrant another term as president of the United States. His first term, in my view, was unfulfilling.”

No, Christie’s strategy is to insult and name-call, which, ironically, is also the style of Trump.

Check out the former governor as he comments on TV news shows and his social media platforms.

“Who loses money running a casino?” Christie mockingly asked at a New Hampshire town hall, referring to Atlantic City casino owner Trump filing for bankruptcy more than once.

On Trump’s plans not to show up to this week’s debate:

“He’s a coward. A yellow streak down his back.”

Also at a town hall, he said Trump is:

“A completely self-centered, self-possessed, self consumed, angry old man, and he doesn’t care about anybody else other than himself.”

This is great television, especially coming as it does about five months or so before primary voting begins.

It’s also familiar to those who follow New Jersey politics.

While governor for eight years, Christie was always ready to attack his adversaries with juvenile putdowns.

He called Democratic Assemblyman Reed Gusciora “numbnuts.”

At one point, Christie said the teachers’ union was using students like “drug mules” and at another time, he suggested reporters should “take the bat out on” then-state Senator Loretta Weinberg.

These comments, of course, contributed to Christie’s first-term popularity. Here was someone who spoke like an average guy from New Jersey, not a politician.

There’s much truth here.

So many politicians on both sides speak in bland generalities and seem frightened to say what they really mean.

Trump, as mentioned previously, mirrors Christie in this regard.

In fact, Trump in 2016 pushed Christie off to the sidelines – and eventually out of the race – by being more bombastic than the governor.

This time around, Christie says the problem was that Trump’s opponents back in 2016 did not take him seriously.

So when Trump talked about Mexico paying for a border wall – a true absurdity – Christie says he and others in 2016 assumed nobody would believe him.

That, he now admits, was a big miscalculation.

With that backdrop, Christie is attacking Trump whenever he speaks. He’s not going to miscalculate again.

But there won’t be a one-on-one Wednesday night. Trump says he’s not going to the debate.

The guess here is that Christie will seize on Trump’s absence and continue his verbal assault – on a man who will not be there.

Eight candidates are expected to be on the debate stage, so Christie won’t have all that much time to make his anti-Trump case.

Nor will he have much time for anything else.

Which brings up an important point.

Christie is getting a tremendous amount of media attention by being a fierce Trump critic. But his poll numbers are still mostly in the single digits, although he’s doing a bit better in New Hampshire.

There will come a time when Christie is going to have to talk more completely about his vision for the country, and not merely about “thinking big,” which is what he said when he kicked off his campaign.

The first debate is time to begin.

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