When a reporter at a Trenton press conference asked Chris Christie about his drop in the polls over Governor Corzine from a double digit lead to a statistical dead heat in a poll released this morning, Christie asked for a show of hands.  

“Did anybody think I was going to win this by 10?  Raise your hand if you thought it was going to happen,” said Christie.  None of the two dozen or so reporters, cameramen of political staffers did.  

“It wasn’t,” said Christie.  “I said right from the beginning this is going to be a close race.  The three last Republicans who were elected in New Jersey won by one point.”

Christie’s lead, which reached double digits in several polls over the summer, was four points in last week’s Quinnipiac University poll,, three points in last week’s Monmouth University poll, and he actually trailed Corzine by one point in the Fairleigh Dickinson University poll from this morning  -- the first time since February that Christie was not ahead of Corzine.

“We’re in a dog fight in the last four weeks in New Jersey as the Republican candidate for governor.  Who would have predicted that?” said Christie.  “All I can tell you is this: 45 polls, 44 of them we’ve been ahead. We’re still ahead in every other public poll except the FDU poll.”

But Christie actually took issue with the FDU poll’s methodology, citing “a lot of quarkiness” in the 12% support for the virtually unknown independent candidate Gary Steele.  

“I don’t know that anybody thinks Gary Steele is really going to get 12% on election day.  So I don’t know how great the poll is or isn’t,” he said.

The pollster used Steele’s name in place of Daggett to try to tease out just how much of Daggett’s 17% of support in the survey came from voters who merely did not want to vote for either of the major party candidates (4% of respondents volunteered Daggett’s name when it was not mentioned with Corzine and Christie).  

Christie used those same numbers, however, to demonstrate that Daggett “has no chance to be governor.”

“If Gary Steele is at 12% in the FDU poll and Chris Daggett is at 17%, I think you know exactly what that means.”

The Corzine campaign, of course, had their own spin on the poll.

“Clearly, the only poll that matters is in November, but the trends are undeniable,” said Corzine Communications Director Sean Darcy, who said that the Democratic-leaning state was coming to recognize Corzine’s contributions of expanding health care for children, supporting abortion rights and supporting paid family leave.  He went on to list a number of Christie’s conservative positions.

“The more people hear about Chris Christie the more they see the clear choice between these two candidates.”