Chris Christie’s 1994 ad was too tough (and inaccurate) for Jersey

[jsr]

http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/chris-christies-1994-ad-was-too-tough-and-inaccurate-for-jersey/2014/01/19/b69f0d86-7ef8-11e3-93c1-0e888170b723_story.html

Chris Christie’s 1994 ad was too tough (and inaccurate) for Jersey
By David A. Fahrenthold, Sunday, January 19, 7:10 PM

In Chris Christie’s first successful campaign for public office, he sat down next to his wife and baby, looked into a camera and told voters something that wasn’t true.

It was 1994, and Christie was a 31-year-old lawyer, running for the county board in suburban Morris County, N.J. He was making a television ad, saying to the camera that his opponents were “being investigated by the Morris County prosecutor.”

Actually, they weren’t. But Christie’s inaccurate ad ran more than 400 times on cable TV before the June GOP primary. He won.

Today, Christie is the Garden State’s governor, facing allegations that, during last year’s reelection campaign, his aides snarled traffic on a major bridge to punish a political enemy.

[Laxman]

1. That Is An Excellent...

summary of his early political career. That made for cable ad ran over and over. A good example of the fact that he would and will do anything to promote himself. Leopards don't change their spots.

[Dread Pirate Roberts]

2. Neither does a Walrus I guess

Does a walrus have spots?

[karynnj]

4. He won - but the Republicans with him on the Freeholder board - made sure he lost the

primary of re-election. They ran with someone else as a team. Morris County has not had a Democrat on the Freeholder's board in (I think) over 100 years.

(I lived in Morris County for 40 years - now I am happily in VT.)

[mountain grammy]

3. Once a lying sack of shit, always a lying sack of shit.

[nxylas]

5. I may be Captain Obvious here, but isn't that illegal?

Distortions of the truth are de rigeur for political attack ads, but surely his opponent must have had some recourse to stop a flat-out lie being aired like that.

[karynnj]

6. It is very hard to do so for public figures -- witness the lies against John Kerry

Here the claim was that they were "under investigation". The opponents DID deny it and the local paper did back that they knew of no investigation.

(The SBVT actually were on shakier ground - as they disputed the official Navy record without one piece of evidence and several of them were caught in lies - speaking of events when they were provably nowhere near what they disputed.)

Here, Christie was forced to take it back and apologize, but he was still freeholder. They did kick him out in the next primary. It is very creepy that liars can gain election using lies that are difficult to confront before the election. In this case, very few people pay attention to the freeholder race - and the ads obviously established him as a young anti corruption lawyer.

[Kire]

10. Hence the defamation conviction.

nt

[WillyT]

7. K & R !!!

[cactusfractal]

8. GOP Core Strategy...

Lie.

Get what you want.

Apologize without consequences.

Lather.

Rinse.

Repeat.

[Kire]

9. I was a resident of Morris County during this time.

Granted, I was very young, but I was politically aware. Why am I hearing about this for the first time today? And why was this not even brought up during the two governor's campaigns?