Come Wednesday Chris Christie is going to have some tough choices to make and frankly, some of it will have to be on the fly. In the moment so to speak. The good news for him is for all his awful qualities he has some that might benefit him greatly during the first GOP debate. Yes, he’s an a-hole but he’s smart, well informed and has solid political chops, at least when it comes to the GOP. While it’s been a while, he’s also an experienced litigator, experience he gained in federal court while working for DOJ. Just ask Jared Kushner and Jar Jar’s daddy! Chrisite is also a veteran of debates. And he’ll be well prepared.
So what are these problems I mention in the title? Well, first of all you know that Trump isn’t going to be taking part. As The Guardian reports Trump will be a shark looming over the whole thing (or perhaps lurking just beneath the surface but like the shark in Jaws ready to come up and eat the whole freaking boat and feast on the people left in the water for desert. Christie wants, hell he needs to have Donald Trump on the stage with him, live. A setting where if Trump doesn’t try to stand and go mano-a-mano against Christie MAGAs, but instead stomps off the stage MAGAs will start getting what for them (but to us is normal thinking) that Trump’s a coward and would never back them up in a bar fight after all!
And Trump can’t be having his MAGAs even be open to having such actual thoughts seep into their closed minds!
So Christie (I don’t count Asa Hutchinson in all this because he simply doesn’t have the stage presence needed) needs to call Trump out, to indicate and perhaps even say out loud Trump’s a coward for not being there. BUT the rub is if he goes after Trump too hard Trump won’t show up for any later debates. The trick will be for Christie to strike the right balance, the “Goldilocks Zone” of “just right” to wound Trump’s ego enough to make him show up at a future debate (no matter how much his lawyers beg him NOT to) but not so much as to scare Trump off entirely. Getting pundits, even in RWNJ media land reason to talk for multiple cycles suggesting Trump looks weak for not standing there and taking Christie down like he did to everyone in 2016 will be what Christie might be able do.
MUST do in fact.
Like I said, that’s a tricky balance. But there’s another problem he’ll face and that’s Ron DeSantis. The plain fact is that Christie can end DeSantis’ candidacy long before Wednesday’s debate is over with. Hell, he can use that leaked memo (you can read it here) as a sheet to cover the political corpse of Ron DeSantis after slaying right there in front of a live TV audience. The problem is that he’s got to choose whether Wednesday is the time/moment do do it.
On the one hand getting DeSantis out of the way will give his own polling a chance to go up. More importantly it will attract money from Never Trump Republicans who, just like us Democrats want someone to disembowel Trump on live TV, then cut out his still beating heart and take a bite out of it before Trump dies. Christie needs donors, or at least one sugar daddy mega-donor to fund a robust campaign until that’s done. Deep inside he knows he’ll never get the nomination but if his price for taking out Trump is to have money to stick it out for as long as he wants in the primaries someone will probably think it’s worth it.
However, having DeSantis around for a future debate(s) is part of what might entice Trump to show up! Looking at it from Trump’s point of view, he wants payback on DeSantis for challenging him in the first place. And HE wants to be the one to apply the coup de grace to Ron (and Casey). HE wants to be the one to be a hero to MAGAs for doing the deed instead of Christie!
So, as I said Chris Christie is going to face some interesting moments and choice come Wed. evening. In a perfect world he could have a “twofer”, taking out both DeSantis AND Trump on the same night, and on live television! MAGAs will never forgive him and the GOP will have to deal with their anger but that won’t last. Even if they don’t win the WH next year a politically dead Trump who will be fighting to stay out of jail while on appeal in possibly multiple jurisdictions, and politically dead at Christie’s hand will make the former NJ Governor an elder statesman, a “kingmaker” in the rebooted GOP.
So, when you get down to it the questions/choices Christie will be wrestling with up to and during the debate will be:
- How hard does he attack Trump’s cowardice for not taking part?
- Does he take out DeSantis and risk losing an incentive to get Trump to show up at a future debate?
I don’t know the answers to those questions and I’m willing to bet neither does Christie. I doubt he’ll know even as he takes the stage. He’ll have to decide how to play things as the debate unfolds and during it will be weighing options and consequences of what he might decide to do. So even if you don’t watch, pay attention to what happens at the first GOP debate. The days and weeks after could prove not just interesting, but an important moment in our country’s history.
I disagree. I think he needs to win the Battle Royal in convincing fashion, metaphorically bloody some noses, just absolutely mop the floor with the Trump-surrogates, Trump-wannabes, and Trump-fellatrices. Have ads with pictures of Orangeface with a yellow stripe down the middle. Use Trump-style insults on Trump: Swampy Don, Orange Chicken Don, Trumpkin Pie, etc. Replace InSantis as the lead contender.
If he wants Trump onstage, Chris Christie needs to make himself a clear and present danger to Trumpworld, the candidate Trump MUST defeat to regain the nomination… and then turn up the heat on Ivanka’s molester.
I’ve long thought along the same lines as you. Obviously I’ve grown to doubt that’s the best way to get Trump onstage with him. And while reasonable people can disagree I’ve come to believe that the Voral Sword can only slay the Trumperwock face to face. In person. Live in front of all the slithy toves in the MAGA Wabe.
Let’s just hope the bridges stay open.
“So Christie (I don’t count Asa Hutchinson in all this because he simply doesn’t have the stage presence needed) needs to call Trump out, to indicate and perhaps even say out loud Trump’s a coward for not being there. BUT the rub is if he goes after Trump too hard Trump won’t show up for any later debates.”
denis, I think you’re making a wild assumption: That Trump plans on showing up at ANY debate that treats him as a mere “candidate for the GOP nomination” rather than “the GOP nominee.”
That my friend is at the heart of why I chose to write about this. Trump will have to either be goaded or enticed to show up at any debate. Right now he’s in the driver’s seat because there’s no opponent polling at a level that he needs to worry about so why would he show up? It’s like a military flier going in for an annual flight physical – the BEST you can do is hold your ground/status. So they (correctly) view it as a losing proposition and it’s the same for Trump – the BEST he can do is meet expectations which in this case means laying waste to everyone in real time in front of a live audience in the debate hall and on TV. Only this time he’d be facing off against a couple of people who will fight back.
That’s why I don’t really county Hutchinson because like the other candidates Trump faced in 2016 he’d do things in the traditional way & we saw how that worked out. Christie however wouldn’t play old-school traditional establishment conservative allowing for having to pivot to attract moderates in a general election. Nope, Christie can and would play old-school DIRTY. He’d be Trump’s match and then some & though he hates himself for it Trump knows it too. Like someone who is weak but gets away with being a bully solely on reputation, Trump would have to stand in and TAKE punches, gut punches and punches to his balls in order to be able to deliver a knockout blow to someone else. He knows Christie pretty well, and that Christie knows him and that Christie has far more to attack with than he does.
IF Trump can be made to seem weak, like being maybe a bit of a coward to MAGAs itching to see him decimate Christie Trump might feel he’s got to risk it. Or, he could be enticed somehow. Walk into a baited trap that others will see is a trap but being who he is, with the ego he has Trump will dismiss advice from advisors to show everyone HE is still the “champ.” If he’s got several folks on stage with him and Christie who are running more for VP than actually opposing him he might, might mind you hatch a strategy of counting on them to diffuse Christie’s attacks and air time to make them. “Fairness” dictates they get their turn.
So, while I think you have considerable justification for your opinion it’s not set in stone. You just know that there’s a part of Trump that tells him to get out there and face-to-face kick azz & take, or rather erase names. The trick is getting that to take over his thinking. Can it be done? We’ll see but I wouldn’t dismiss the possibility.
IMO, Christie will do fine! Trump is a COWARD & TOAST anyway!
Good analysis, denis.
I think what all this proves is that the Rs have made EVERYTHING into The Apprentice.