Christie and His Underlings

("Gov. Christie's Shadow Over Bridgegate")

It was a corrosive atmosphere, a corroded home to ugliness, orchestrated by a master bully.

It was clear, even from the first taunting denials of Governor Christie, the first press conference in which he dismissed the connecting the dots theory as balderdash, that his bravado and mockery could not hide one undeniable truth. Those under his command were emboldened to act by fiat of a boss whose hubris knew no bounds, whose petulance was omnipresent and who believed payback was both his right and the duty of his underlings.

Governor Christie may have been unindicted, he may not have moved the cones as he so derisively stated, but he moved all the pieces on the chess board as an example for the ages of everything abusive about power placed in the wrong hands.