Dear Editor:
The following is an open letter to Governor Christopher Christie
Dear Governor Christie:
The following are good reasons why you should not continue in the Governorship. Regardless of your good work and obvious political skills, you remain blind to what defines power abuse in “ends justifying means”. Your legal actions alone, demonstrate a distorted sense of what a politician is entitled do to maintain support. You seem confused between leadership and authoritarianism: You threatened to veto legislation before you took office! In a far-worse misappropriation of a New Jersey Gov.’s unusual degree of “legislative” power you vetoed equal marriage legislation, then threaten to spend more of New Jersey’s borrowed money on a Court of Appeal of an override! You used the extreme power of line-item veto to punish political enemies. Your legal right to call for a special election was not only a clear abuse of power, but ironically could have funded 24 teachers whose jobs you cut, for five more years. Just a 5 percent cut affects 18,000 students with reduced teacher attention. (Not to mention the costs to individuals and businesses of an unnecessary trip to the polls).
Enough examples; the question is, what can you do about it before we must? Your political career has likely ended in the minds of the public. Why take on the inordinately distracting hurdles at further expense to the state and its management? You are a young man who still has time to understand that life is not a football game where the big guy should dominate. It is immoral to think that the allowable political action is to fire members of your staff, (who albeit suffer morale of the issues of their own), who would not be in their jobs were they not willing to push the practices of politics way beyond its fuzzy line of decency. Resignation will be best for everyone, as you will ultimately realize. The Office of Governor is not primarily a political strategist position. You have already been re-elected. You have a fiduciary responsibility to run the State, not run for President, despite the acceptance of this despicable practice. Now you really are in no position to govern in the way NJ deserves. You will be remembered as our Sandy hero despite the harm. Please quit before you get further behind. The fact that you wish to be President is further proof of myopic selfishness. You have inadequate experience and temperament for that job and have nothing philosophically special to offer. Will you please watch the end of “White Lightning” where James Cagney begs his mother for forgiveness, if any question remains in your mind?
Neal R. Monda
PS. My letter suggesting you reverse your veto of the equal marriage law went unanswered by your office, but in the end, you saw what made sense. Here is another opportunity.