Bridgegate Was Not An Isolated Incident, But Part of A Corrupt Political Strategy That Drove The Christie Government

Wildstein Exposed the Inner Workings of the Corrupt Christie Machine

Abuse of power was not the result of young, inexperienced, retaliatory rogues

 Bridgegate was not a bug, it was a feature

Christie institutionalized the pay-to-play patronage politics previous Governors engaged in on an ad hoc basis

We do not live in a democracy. We live in a political system that has legalized bribery, exclusively serves corporate power and is awash in propaganda and lies. ~~~ Chris Hedges (5/4/15)

[Updates below]

In the Wildstein guilty plea and Baroni/Kelly indictment media frenzy, the media narrative has fallen into the same narrow trap as the initial coverage of the original Bridegate scandal.

I had hoped that the Mastro Report interviews and the Legislative testimony – particularly of Christina Renna, Bridgette Kelly’s replacement at the Office of Intergovernmental Affairs (IGA) who laid out the role of IGA as the bridge between the Christie re-election campaign and the Christie government – coupled with the Port Authority finance and Samson scandals –  would have made the broader meaning of the Bridgegate scandal obvious to our media mavens.

Apparently not.

So, let’s not kid ourselves and engage in revisionism.

We all knew – and had plenty of supporting information – that Christie was a political thug.

And we knew that long BEFORE he even RAN for Gov. in 2009.

For some reason, the NJ press corps never wrote that story. No intestinal fortitude.

It took the national press corps to connect the dots and weave a coherent narrative of just how corrupt Christie is as a human being, see The National Review’s killer story:

•  Chris Christie’s entire career reeks – it’s not just the bridge

Long before Christie was Governor, we knew he was a thug.

Bridgegate is part of of the politics and character flaws of Christie.

• The Real scandal

Last week, a NY Times story  “U.S. Indictment Details Plotting in New Jersey Bridge Scandal” opened the door to the broader scandal and real meaning of Bridgegate.

But, after the Times hinted at the broader implications, that angle was immediately shut down by claiming that the scandal was a result of an operation run by young kids out of IGA:

Mr. Christie’s strategists were hoping to use his 2013 re-election campaign to build a case for him to run for president. Their goal was to secure endorsements from a broad spectrum of officials, including Democrats such as Mayor Sokolich.

This cultivating fell mostly to young staff members in the wing of Mr. Christie’s front office known as Intergovernmental Affairs. 

Carl Golden, columnist at NJ Spotlight shares that perspective that young inexperienced people abuse power. Golden concludes:

Inexperienced people like Kelly were unaccustomed to handling the power suddenly found in their hands and it controlled them rather than the reverse. Bridgegate — or something similar — was the inevitable result of such an environment.

Astute and well written, but just flat out wrong.

[These were not inexperienced kids, they were political operatives. Kelly and Wildstein were over 40 years old. Baroni was a former State Senator.

People forget that during his legislative testimony (the traffic study cover story), Baroni had Easy Pass & Census data on GWB use, by legislative district of members of the Committee, a repose of his attack on Senator Lautengerg, where he had data on GWB use. This was not some amateur rogue Op. Stepien ran a sophisticated political operation.]

Bridgegate was not an “inevitable result” of giving power to young inexperienced people.

And it was not the result of creating some kind of “cultural climate” where retaliation is rewarded.  Again, Mr. Golden:

Fishman’s findings also renewed criticism of the Christie Administration as a cultural den of political intrigue where retribution against enemies — real or perceived — was encouraged and celebrated. Abusing governmental power and authority was business as usual because, critics claim, the governor had created an atmosphere in which opponents of his politics and his policies were fair game, targets to be punished.

And we agree with Ms. Kelly – Bridgegate is not about weepy women, working mothers, or other individual psycho-drama either. It’s not about “low life sociopaths” as Salon would lead us to believe.

Bridgegate is completely consistent with all we know about Chris Christie.

So, let me be clear: Bridgegate was not some isolated event.

David Wildstein exposed the inner workings of the Christie Political Machine. It was strategic, systemic, and well organized, not a single event driven by flawed individuals.

Christie institutionalized the pay to play patronage politics previous Governor’s engaged in on a case – by – case basis. He obliterated the distinction and lines between the political campaign and governing. He put a political campaign inside government and used government as his own political machine.

• We’ve seen all this before – Nixon redux

There are echoes of Nixon’s Committee to Re-Elect The President (CREEP).  It was all about political power.

The Christie team was not some young, inexperienced, emotionally driven, mean spirited band of rogues. No “motley crew”.

And Bridgegate was not an anomaly. As the techies say, it was not a bug, it was a feature.

The Christie team created a powerful strategy to integrate politics and campaign field operations in the day to day function of state government. Every lever of state government – contracts, grants, permits, subsidies, and approvals – was coordinated with the campaign operation run by Stepien.

The meaning of Bridgegate is not as a simple retaliatory abuse of power by people too young and inexperienced to manage power – it was part of a sophisticated and coordinated strategy.

Just like the Watergate break in was not some rogue band of petty thieves. Just like Watergate, the bridge gate episode is the tip of a large iceberg.

Kelly’s Office of Intergovernmental Affairs was the functional equivalent of Nixon’s CREEP –

For just a taste of the many striking parallels between President Nixon’s CREEP and Gov. Christie’s IGA, check this excerpt out, from the official Nixon Library on the Administrative history of CREEP:

“Malek’s other task when made the head of the White House Personnel Operation was the “responsiveness program,” a way to gain political support for Nixon’s re-election by using federal resources and grants to influence key states and voting blocs, especially minority groups (the Senate Watergate Committee later investigated and censured this program). While still running the personnel operation, Malek played an active role in the Committee for the Re-Election of the President by applying the methods and information used in the “responsiveness program” to CRP programs.”

So, where are the next Woodward and Bernstein that can connect the many dots and break this story?

[One place to start would be how IGA set up a meeting with DEP and DCA Commissioners on permits for the Rockefeller development in Hoboken. Not only is it highly unusual to get the DEP Commissioner to attend a meeting on a storm water permit, Mowers from the political campaign was at that meeting. It also jibes with attorney Joe Marazitti’s email about a “full court press” from Samson and Lori Grifa. A lot of high level moving parts integrated. That’s no accident.]

[Update: 5/7/15 – NY Times reports on the Lt. Gov.’s alleged “clearance” from criminal investigation for her role in the Rockefeller/Mayor Zimmer threat – note how narrow the news coverage and criminal investigation appear to be – e.g. no linkage to Marazittie “full court press”, to IGA’s involvement, to Matt Mowers IGA/re-lection campaign involvement, to meeting with DEP Commissioner on permits, DCA permits, etc:

Ms. Zimmer first discussed the allegations on MSNBC in January 2014. She said Ms. Guadagno had told her that if she wanted Hurricane Sandymoney, she would have to approve a development proposed by the Rockefeller Group, and implied that the warning came from Mr. Christie himself.

Rockefeller was represented by David Samson, a lawyer and close confidant of the governor who, at the time, was the chairman of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey.

Of course Mayor Zimmer’s account was true – Fishman just did a lousy job:

Ms. Zimmer said that while she respected the judgment of prosecutors and their conclusion, she stood by her account.

“What did she mean, ‘Play ball?’ ”she said in an interview on Saturday. “That means, ‘Do what I want her to do.’ I don’t think she was talking about playing a game of baseball.”

Ms. Zimmer also noted that reporters had given Mr. Fishman the chance to exonerate public officials at his news conference Friday, and that he had declined to do so.

“If they can’t prove it beyond a reasonable doubt, they’re not going to bring charges,” she said. “Not being charged and being exonerated, there’s a big difference.”

[Update #2 – 5/10/15 – Shawn Boberg at the Record ran a story today that made an explicit allusion to the Nixon Watergate experience with a focus on “unindicted co-conspirators”. I’m not sure if this is the first linkage, see:

• ‘Unindicted’ and anonymous; names of possible co-conspirators in GWB case could come out at trial

It’s not the first time the term “unindicted co-conspirator” has added intrigue to a political scandal. The term is used to describe someone whom prosecutors have “probable cause” to believe was part of a conspiracy but whom they declined to charge.

President Richard Nixon was tagged with that label in the Watergate investigation when seven administration officials were indicted by a grand jury in 1974. Prosecutors investigating the Whitewater controversy in Arkansas in the mid-1990s described a White House deputy counsel under President Bill Clinton that way.

A few observations:

1) I hope the Record is not waiting until the trial to disclose the names and roles of the unindicted co-conspirators. As suggested above, this is a far broader conspiracy than just Bridgegate – so they need to expands the scope of the story and start connecting the conspiracy dots – many of which are stories the Record already broke.

2)  I got a kick out of this reason for withholding identities:

“There are cases where witnesses and unindicted co-conspirators should be kept secret until the last moment, such as organized crime or gang cases,”when individuals’ safety may be at risk if they are exposed, said Koenig, the former federal prosecutor. “Generally, defendants should not have to guess or speculate what the evidence is or who the witnesses against them are, or who the unindicted co-conspirators are.”

I don’t want to get too tin foil hat here, but considering that Wildstein signed a plea deal back in January, it is not outside the realm of possibility that John Sheridan’s death could have been intended to send a message to Wildstein and other  Bridgegate conspirators.

Who knows, the Christie Mob may have created the stress that led to Wildstein losing all that weight.

3)  There are viable State law violations and prosecutions that are not being covered by the press, particularly this State law, which Wildstein’s plea seems to prove. Misconduct based on the purpose to injure prong is a second degree offense that comes with a mandatory 5 year sentence:

OFFICIAL MISCONDUCT – NJSA 2C: 30-2