Alan Steinberg's blog

Within 24 hours after the election of Chris Christie as Governor, the battle was joined between the Governor-elect and the New Jersey Education Association (NJEA).  This could become the Ali-Frazier of New Jersey issue battles.

I must begin by congratulating the strategists, senior advisors, and management staff of the Christie campaign whom I often vigorously criticized during the campaign.  My criticisms were based on my honest judgment and analysis regarding the various trends in the polls and the key policy issues discussed in the campaign.  The main thing that matters in politics, however, is the ultimate outcome, and you deserve the credit for the victory of Governor-elect Chris Christie.

With one day left in the campaign, it is clear that Chris Christie has major momentum.  The election outcome will be determined by turnout.  In this regard, the key question will be:  How effective is each candidate’s GOTV (Get-Out-the-Vote)?

Almost exactly 48 years ago, November 2, 1961, five days before the 1961 New Jersey gubernatorial election, President John F. Kennedy spoke at a rally for Democrat gubernatorial candidate, former Superior Court Judge Richard J. Hughes at the Trenton War Memorial.  Hughes had been an underdog against Republican candidate James P. Mitchell, the highly regarded former Eisenhower administration Labor Secretary.

Movement conservatives have been upset with the campaign strategy of Chris Christie, his positions on energy issues, and his self-association with Barack Obama.  I also have written columns on this website critical of both the Republican candidate and his campaign.  In many ways, I have been more disappointed by Christie than any other Republican statewide candidate over the past two decades.

Aside from party loyalty, however, there is one issue that motivates me to continue to strongly support Chris Christie for Governor:  the appointment of justices to the New Jersey Supreme Court.  During the next four years, two New Jersey Supreme Court justices will reach the mandatory retirement age, and two others will be up for reappointment.  

This is the last election under the 2001 New Jersey legislative district reapportionment, which ultimately resulted in the transformation of the 22nd, 34th, and 38th Districts from Republican to safe Democrat.  Subsequent political campaign developments in this decade have resulted in the formerly Republican 3rd, 4th, and 36th districts becoming safe Democrat domains.  While the 12th District was a battleground district in the 2003 and 2005 elections, it is now safely under total Republican control.

While I have written extensively about the ineptitude of the Christie campaign, I have never wavered in my belief that Chris Christie is by far the best choice for Governor among the three leading candidates in the Tuesday, November 3, 2009 election.

With a possible pending Philadelphia Phillies-New York Yankees “New Jersey Turnpike World Series”, baseball analogies regarding the gubernatorial race abound in the Garden State.  In baseball lingo, within the past 24 hours, the Christie campaign has had two hits, two errors, and a late inning lucky break.

Kim Guadagno is a new Republican superstar.  She represents the best hope that Chris Christie has of regaining the support of Independent women that he has lost over the past month.

Every morning, as I watch local New York news shows between 6:00 am and 7:00 am, I see a Corzine commercial that basically portrays Chris Christie as a misogynist – a person who hates women.  The commercial is very unfair, but that is the nature of modern television political campaign advertising.

The Christie campaign could very easily counter this portrayal by having a television commercial in which Guadagno talks directly into the camera and says, “I’m Kim Guadagno, Chris Christie’s running mate for Lieutenant Governor.  As a wife, mother, lawyer, and public official, I can tell you that more than almost anybody I’ve met in politics, Chris Christie understands the needs of women meeting the twin challenges of career and family.”

I thought that Chris Christie’s performance at the William Paterson University televised debate on Friday was his best yet in Gubernatorial Campaign 2009, including the primary as well.