New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie said the following at the latest Republican Party presidential debate Thursday night.
Frankly, it’s a hoot.
“Mr. President, we’re not against you. We’re against your policies,” Christie said. “The American people have rejected your agenda and now you’re trying to go around it. That’s not right. It’s not constitutional. And we are going to kick your rear end out of the White House come this fall.”
This is the guy who told a constituent to “sit down and shut up!” when the constituent — for whom Christie works in New Jersey — had the temerity to issue a critical statement at a public event. I’m trying to imagine myself telling any of the bosses for whom I worked to “sit down and shut up!”
It’s the kind of rhetoric that seems to endear him to many within the GOP.
But the idea that the Republican presidential nominee, whoever he or she is, will kick the president’s “rear end out of the White House come this fall” misses a fundamental point.
Barack Obama isn’t on the ballot. The U.S. Constitution places term limits on him. The 22nd Amendment says a president can be elected twice to the office. That’s it. Two and out, man.
Barack Obama was elected in 2008, winning 365 electoral votes while capturing more than 10 million more popular votes than Republican nominee Sen. John McCain; he was re-elected in 2012 with 332 electoral votes, while defeating GOP nominee Mitt Romney by nearly 5 million popular votes. He needed 270 electoral votes to win both times. His Electoral College majorities in both elections were substantial.
So, have “the American people rejected” the president’s agenda?
Seems to me — and I’m just tossing this out from the Flyover Country peanut gallery — that the president’s agenda played pretty well in the past two presidential elections.
The president is going to leave the White House a year from now on his own terms. He isn’t going to get his rear end “kicked out” of the place.
However, the tough talk that Christie — not to mention the other GOP hopefuls who debated the other night — sounds good to those who want to hear it.
If only it were true.
