Why do NJ politicians suck-up to someone who put kids in danger?

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By Rubashov

Section 802 of the USA PATRIOT Act (Pub. L. No. 107-52): A person engages in domestic terrorism if they do an act “dangerous to human life that is a violation of the criminal laws of a state or the United States, if the act appears to be intended to:  (i) intimidate or coerce a civilian population; (ii) influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or (iii) to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination or kidnapping.”
 
Let’s remember what Bridgegate was all about. Wikipedia explains: “The Fort Lee lane closure scandal, also known as the George Washington Bridge lane closure scandal or Bridgegate, was a political scandal involving a staff member and political appointees of New Jersey Governor Chris Christie colluding to create traffic jams in Fort Lee, New Jersey, by closing lanes at the main toll plaza for the upper level of the George Washington Bridge… It was later suggested that the lanes had been closed intentionally to cause the massive traffic problem for political reasons, and especially theorized that they were a retributive attack against Fort Lee's Mayor Mark Sokolich, a Democrat who had not supported Christie as a candidate in the 2013 New Jersey gubernatorial election. The ensuing investigations centered on several of Christie's appointees and staff, including David Wildstein, who ordered the lanes closed…”
 
According to the New York Times (May 1, 2015), the School Superintendent of Fort Lee believed that Bridgegate was an act of terrorism. Here’s how the New York Times covered it:
 
Fort Lee School Head Calls Lane Closings an ‘Act of Terrorism’
FORT LEE, N.J. — Hearing that the bridge lane closings were intentionally scheduled for the first day of school made Dr. Paul Saxton, the interim superintendent of the town’s schools, angry all over again on Friday.
 
Dr. Saxton called the plot “an act of terrorism.” To carry out a “premeditated action designed and targeted toward the kids, what did they expect?” he said in a phone interview after a former Port Authority official pleaded guilty in the scheme.
 
The official, David Wildstein, told a judge that the lane closings were timed to the first day of school in 2013 to maximize punishment to Fort Lee’s mayor, Mark Sokolich.
 
The gridlock, which lasted for days, created all sorts of headaches for the school district and for Dr. Saxton, who was starting out as the interim superintendent.
 
School buses were stuck in traffic, teachers could not get to work, crossing guards failed to make it to their posts. Worst of all, Dr. Saxton said, were the hazards all the distorted traffic posed for the majority of the town’s schoolchildren who walk to school.
 
“It was a thoughtless, mindless action,” he said. “It’s really disturbing to think that the kids were targeted.”
 
Is David Wildstein a “toxic” personality? Is someone really all there who gets off on shutting down roads, with school buses on them, on the first day of school? And to do so for politics – and just to get back at someone. What kind of a weirdo does a thing like that?
 
Apparently, someone is a little off and easily aroused. Throw in some deep insecurities and an obsession with being an “insider” – add the need to pleasure some perceived “powerful” person or persons. What you get isn’t pretty.
 
What does it say about the political class in New Jersey that they continue to suck-up to a critter like David Wildstein? In any other state, classy politicos would avoid someone with his “credentials”. But in New Jersey, he is allowed to pose as a kind of moral arbiter, which is all anyone needs to know about morality and politics in New Jersey.
 
If Bridgegate could reasonably be described as “terrorism” (read the law) and some people (people like the former head of the school district in Fort Lee) have made the accusation that it was terrorism, then is appearing on NJ Globe the same as appearing on a “terrorist” website? Would it be okay to employ the style of reportage used at the NJ Globe to claim a “link” to a “terrorist” website? Heck, just writing “linked to Bridgegate” would probably be enough. Average voters remember the word “Bridgegate” and know it was bad.
 
Could a political consultant like Chris Russell put that in a direct mail piece and feel good about? Might this become a standard line of attack?

"Mastermind of Bridgegate" David Wildstein, the anonymous blogger formerly known as "Wally Hand", has a new obsession (or maybe he understands that blog wars build readership?).
 

“It was a thoughtless, mindless action… It’s really disturbing to think that the kids were targeted.”
 
Dr. Paul Saxton, Fort Lee School District

"If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear."

George Orwell

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