2016...Christie vs Cuomo

[Stavros]

Who?

[flabbybody]

Stavros I know you've heard of Governor Christie. big fat guy who gave keynote address at Republican Convention. now he's making all lovey dovey with Obama. Prez showed up in New Jersey after the hurricane with a blank check to fix everything. nice being an incumbent running the Federal government during a national disaster.
Romney's become totally irrelevant during the week leading up to election day.
Sandy has cooked Mitt

[Odelay]

Gustavo Freyn vs Walter White, now there was an epic battle. Affordable meth for everyone no matter who wins.

[Ben]

Let's assume Obama wins a second term and there's no incumbent in 2016.
My prediction is that Chris Christie will win the Republican nomination. Hilary Clinton will love making $200,000 for 40 minute dinner talks and retire from public life. Andrew Cuomo will dance to an easy victory in the Dem primary.

It will be an interesting race. Christie will lose 100 lbs next year on the Rex Ryan diet surgery routine which will make him look more like a serious leader. Andrew will have some cosmetic work around his eyes so he won't look so much like a zombie.

Hopefully Sarah Palin runs. We need a good looking candidate. Something pleasing to look at.
Anyway, both candidates will need to raise a billion bucks.
It all hinges on that: raising a billion bucks. Could Christie do it? Yeah.
Could Clinton? Yeah.
This is what we call democracy in America: which candidate can raise the most cash -- ha ha!

[Stavros]

Stavros I know you've heard of Governor Christie. big fat guy who gave keynote address at Republican Convention. now he's making all lovey dovey with Obama. Prez showed up in New Jersey after the hurricane with a blank check to fix everything. nice being an incumbent running the Federal government during a national disaster.
Romney's become totally irrelevant during the week leading up to election day.
Sandy has cooked Mitt

It was 'Malcom's Dad and Walter White' who confusd me -and I think you are right about Sandy.

[Prospero]

Hopefully Sarah Palin runs. We need a good looking candidate. Something pleasing to look at.
Anyway, both candidates will need to raise a billion bucks.
It all hinges on that: raising a billion bucks. Could Christie do it? Yeah.
Could Clinton? Yeah.
This is what we call democracy in America: which candidate can raise the most cash -- ha ha!

I assume you have a sly sense of humour Ben in proposing that one of the most moronic candidates of recent years have a run at the presidency. That should ensure whoever she runs for - Libertarian, GOP, Donald Duck party - offer the world days of laughter before plunging to disaster.

[Odelay]

The Only Hope For The GOP Is To Be More Like Chris Christie
Josh Barro Oct. 9, 2013, 6:38 PM 8,259 37

A lot of people are talking today about this ugly poll chart for Republicans: Gallup found that just 28% of Americans have a favorable view of the Republican Party, down 10 points from last month and the lowest level since Gallup started asking the question in 1992.

The shutdown is a political disaster for the Republican Party.

But here's another poll chart from yesterday that shows the party isn't doomed. Its candidates can be wildly popular when they don't behave like morons bent on destruction of the economy:

christie buono poll

Fairleigh Dickinson University

That chart is from the Fairleigh Dickinson University Public Mind poll, and it shows New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) leading his Democratic challenger by 33 points.

After Superstorm Sandy hit last October, Christie's poll numbers soared because the public liked his handling of the storm. Many people thought his numbers would fade back to "normal" as time passed. That hasn't happened yet; he's poised for a blowout win, even as the national Republican brand is in the toilet.

Christie's path to sustained popularity and massive electoral success isn't complicated.

He stands up for conservative principles when the electorate shares them. For example, he capped property taxes (New Jersey has the country's highest) and he implemented reforms to bring public employee benefits more in line with the private sector, saving money and helping local governments deliver services better.

But when conservatives want Christie to do things that would anger his electorate, like rejecting the Medicaid expansion or snubbing the president in the aftermath of a hurricane, he refuses.

This makes him popular for two reasons. One, it means he tends to take popular policy stances. Two, he shows the electorate that he cares first about them, not his political party.

Christie's pragmatism doesn't just show up in policy; you can also see it in his style. He works openly and enthusiastically with Democrats. His fights with Democratic legislative leaders have often been publicly acrimonious, but they have a lot of important joint legislative accomplishments, including that property tax cap and employee benefit reforms.

Compare that to Washington where, under conservative pressure, House Speaker John Boehner swore off one-on-one negotiations with President Obama earlier this year.

Christie's openness to Democrats has created openness to him. Dozens of local Democratic officials have endorsed him for re-election. Many polls show him drawing about a third of the black vote, an unheard of level for a Republican candidate.

The latest Fairleigh Dickinson poll shows him ahead by 8 points among non-white voters. Where else on this planet do Republican candidates win among non-whites?

I spoke with Michael Blunt, a black Democrat who has endorsed Christie. Blunt serves as mayor of Chesilhurst, a middle-class suburb of Philadelphia, which is about 50% black and gave 82% of its votes to Barack Obama in 2012.

Blunt had a simple explanation for how Christie has made inroads with black voters: "He talks to them. He makes them feel comfortable."

Blunt said black voters particularly appreciated how closely and warmly Christie worked with Obama in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy, even though he knew he would take heat from conservatives for doing so. "In the heart of a presidential campaign, he let the people of the state of New Jersey know where he stood."

Republicans are worried about how to appeal to voters in a country that is decreasingly white. Christie has shown how much credibility Republicans can gain with black voters simply by showing respect to the president, even while disagreeing with him on a broad swath of policy issues.

This shouldn't be hard, but for most Republican politicians, it is. Much of the party's energy today is based on animus toward the man who happens to be the first black president. Christie is one of the few Republican politicians who understands how damaging that has been to the party's brand.

Christie's broad popularity hasn't translated into a base problem within New Jersey. Republicans consistently give him approval ratings of 90% or higher. He's made a lot of the right enemies, like teachers' unions, and unlike Republicans in the House of Representatives, he has real conservative policy accomplishments to brag about.

Christie's likely big win next month, when contrasted against Ken Cuccinelli's likely loss in the Virginia governor's race and the ongoing massive unpopularity of Republicans in Congress, should send Republicans a message about the direction they need to take the party in. The question is when they will start to listen.



Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/the-o...#ixzz2hkauzQwU

[Ben]

It might be Cruz. He's coming from the base. The establishment loathes him. But will try and coopt him.
The base, as it were, doesn't need corporate funding. Districts, of course, have been rearranged so that they're in safe districts.
The rest of the world is looking on in astonishment....
And for the Dems...

[hippifried]

Cruz?? Really?? .. Coming from the base?? Really?? What base?

[Stavros]

I don't know much about Christie in truth, but I don't see anyone else on the horizon; I suspect the mid-term elections will shape the Republican choice and focus on a need to reclaim the 'centre ground' and whether or not their candidate(s) should be closer to it, or re-defining it someplace else- with the risk that voting Americans don't want to go there. Not sure who is in the running for the Democrats, but Mrs C looks more relaxed these days; retirement suits her. Mid-term right now must be the hot issue given the situation on Capitol Hill.