Indeed, the Thug-in-Chief - shit, can you imagine if that schmuck got into the White House? Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. He literally would be the Thug-in-Chief. And we'd be back to swaggering around the globe with a big stick and big armies and troop movements and aggression everywhere.
So if he's in-yer-face and cocky as hell and leaning on people to do his bidding or else, what ELSE are his top aides going to think? He ABSOLUTELY set the tone for this kind of ham-handed look-at-me-I'm-Don-Corleone crap, with his senior staffers talking about retaliation and targeting other pols to make sure they bend the way they're supposed to, and he/she isn't "playing ball", and "they're playing in traffic" - how else would they get the clear message "that's how we do business around here, pal"? How else would they get that message - if that's not the environment of the Governor's office? If that's not the tone that's set, if that's not the climate in which they operate? How else? Michael Dukakis once talked about how "the fish rots from the head." Well, biologically I'm not sure that's completely true, but politically it sure is.
If you're a leader or a boss, you gather the people around you who think like you and operate like you. Because you want 'em doing what YOU want, the way YOU want it. You want them reflecting your "style of leadership." If you're cold-hearted and calculating and arrogant and power-hungry, you're gonna have your people constantly reinforcing and reflecting that, having your back, and taking your lead. Your own personal little version of WWJD.
The christie administration is a textbook example. They did that stuff because that's the kind of shit HE wanted and expected them to do. Clearly, and as certainly as the sun rising in the east every morning.
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