Bergen Record: Christie Not As Bad As Felons

by: huntsu

Fri Feb 29, 2008 at 10:31:29 AM EST

In the finest tradition of damning with faint praise, I give you the editorial board of the Bergen Record:

Christie has crossed lines before, particularly the one that should separate prosecutors from politicking. But his career as a prosecutor has nevertheless been highly successful, broadly bipartisan and good for the state.
In the Ashcroft matter, he has made an ethical blunder that will and should be part of the debate in any campaign he undertakes. But it can hardly be mentioned in the same breath as the crimes his office has exposed.

So their take is that Christie doesn't deserve to be perp walked and put in jail, and that's the best they can do.

What's interesting, though, is that this editorial and many speakers out there are acting as if there has been an investigation and review of what happened and that all the facts are in evidence.

But Ashcroft hasn't testified, Zimmer hasn't testified, and Christie refuses to talk to anyone but friendly reporters.

Maybe someday you can confidently excuse this as an ethical lapse, but until there is actually a review there's no way we can definitively state whether Christie is corrupt or just unethical.

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"Democrats for Junior" - Federal Inmate Issue

( - promoted by jmelli)

Turns out that the latest individual to join "Democrats for Junior" is none other than the disgraced and convicted Former Hudson County Executive Robert Janiszewski (prisoner #25038-050). From the Star Ledger:

A researcher working for Republican Tom Kean Jr.'s campaign became pen pals with a jailed Democratic political boss in an effort to dig up damaging information on Kean's opponent, U.S. Sen. Robert Menendez.
Former Hudson County Executive Robert Janiszewski, now serving time in a federal prison in Kentucky on corruption charges, offered political history and strategic advice to the Kean campaign in a chatty, friendly letter obtained by The Star-Ledger.
"Political intrigue is ... well ... intriguing," Janiszewski writes in the opening, summing up the unlikely alliance between himself and an agent for a Republican campaign. The letter, dated June 11, suggests an ongoing, secret correspondence.
...
Janiszewski, a sometime-ally, sometime-rival of Menendez's in Hudson County, offered a long list of local politicians who hold grudges against the senator and may be able to provide damaging information about him.
One of those people mentioned by Janiszewski -- Oscar Sandoval, a Union City psychiatrist and former FBI informant who helped land Janiszewski in prison -- rocked the U.S. Senate campaign this week by disclosing a secret recording he had made of Menendez's closest adviser.

For those of you keeping score at home, "Democrats for Junior" now consist of astroturfers posing as Democrats, a racist and a federal prisoner. With friends that dirty, Junior can't claim that he's clean as a whistle.

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