Charles C.W. Cooke reports on Governor Christie’s latest pardon of yet another person who found himself caught up in the web of the Garden State’s byzantine gun regulations. Christie still has not announced whether he’s going to run in 2016. Despite the fact that he’s been better on guns than most every other New Jersey governor, he’s not going to overcome the fact that he’s a governor in a state where people die waiting for gun permits. That’s not a small issue. For Carol Brown, whatever Second Amendment rights anyone will claim she had did not effectively exist for her. She would have been no worse off living under a regime where guns were simply banned entirely, because she died waiting for fingerprints to get back from the FBI.
Personally, my biggest beef with Chris Christie is that he’s got a “law and order” streak a mile wide, and I’ve grown tired of that branch of the “conservative movement.” He also does not hide his contempt for libertarians, so I don’t see he’s really working to earn my vote. But I will give him credit where it is due, pardoning Steffon Josey-Davis was the right and decent thing to do.
I voted for him twice as Governor. Barring something catastrophic happening to most of the other contestants, I’m going to go a long way out of my way to vote against him in the primary for Pres. He’s not my bottom choice, but he’s not far from it.
I’d probably take him over Huckabee or Jeb Bush. And even Jeb Bush I’m kind of iffy on.
Because this country needs another Bush/Clinton presidential contest…
There’s a couple more holy roller types I’d slot in lower than the NJ Governor, I guess. Though I’m not sure I could name more than a half-a-dozen R candidates right now if someone asked me without prompting
Didn’t Christie launch his political career by picking on so-called “assault weapons”? Yeah, Christie could have a full on pro-gun conversion, pledging a tank in every garage and still I would never trust him to do right by us as President.
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/356224/christies-belated-backtrack-guns-charles-c-w-cooke
There are almost no politicians that are pro-gun because they are really pro-gun. Most of them arrive through the issue based on what’s politically expedient for them. So I’m not bothered as much that Christie once espoused a different opinion years ago. Most politicians would abandon us in a heart beat if they thought it might cost them their seats. If we only relied on true friends, we’d be screwed.
So far, this race, I’m pretty sure Lindsey Graham and Rick Perry are gun guys for real. It’s kind of amazing we’re even doing that well. I don’t think that’s ever happened before.
All politicians lie to one extant or other. Which is why I always judge pro vs anti-gun on actions rather than words.
It’s why I knew I could trust GW Bush in 2000, despite his claim to support the Fed AW ban. I paid attention to the actions Bush took as Governor of Texas, even when it not convenient for him. Such as his signing tort reform legislation protecting gun companies, during the height of the Columbine hysteria.
Bush was elected, 2004 finally rolled up and I was proven right and the doomsayers were wrong about Bush renewing the AW ban.
1991 was 25 years ago by the time the election rolls around; and, as Sebastian says, politicians tailor their views. If you don’t allow a politician to benefit from this, why should they bother?
Way to minimize the awful. Christie’s history on guns only began ‘moderating’ recently when his ambition for the Presidency became obvious. I’m not fooled one bit.
Plenty of ‘law and order’ Republicans have advanced some of the worst gun control laws. It was a Republican governor who in 1989 signed the nations first ban on so-called “assault weapons”, right here in Commiefornia.
And Ronald Reagan signed the open carry ban in CA. Your point?
The fact that his anti gun stance moderated when he ran for president is an indication we’re winning.
Are you seriously trying to support Christie based on gun-control? If the vote in November 2016 came down to Webb vs Christie, I would have to seriously consider voting for Webb based on gun control. That’s how bad Christie is.
And considering Reagan’s history of supporting the 1994 AW ban, I wouldn’t use him as an example of ‘moderating’ on gun control.
I’m against him for his lawn-order prosecutorial-discretion tendencies; his windsocking on gun control has little to do with it.
Chris Christie has been the governor of New Jersey for the last five years, I think. In all of that time, I do not recall ever hearing Governor Christie speak out regarding the inherent unconstitutionality of any of these various New Jersey gun laws. The knife laws in New Jersey are also inherently unconstitutional too, and I have never heard Chris Christie say anything about those laws, either.
During Chris Christie’s time as the governor of New Jersey, it seems that only when a gun case in New Jersey got some national publicity, which in turn made New Jersey look ridiculous to the rest of America, such as when Brian Aitken got arrested and sentenced to seven years in prison for possesssing handguns that he legally owned in Colorado before he moved back from there to New Jersey, did Chris Christie quietly behind the scenes do anything to undo the undeserved damage that was done to Brian Aitken’s life. (Chris Christie commuted Brian Aitken’s sentence to time served rather than pardoning him outright.)
Chris Christie has never been afraid to speak out to the media on issues that he feels strongly about. For example, there have been times when he has let us all know that he is against marijuana legalization in New Jersey and everywhere else. He never backed down from any of these teachers who confronted him over pension issues at town hall meetings. When it comes to Second Amendment issues however, Chris Christie seems to have been quite reserved in all of the time he has served as the governor of New Jersey.
I would have loved to confront Chris Christie over his lack of public support for the Second Amendment at a town hall meeting. I don’t know what he would have said to me though. Maybe he would have told me to sit down and shut up. Anyway, I simply cannot put my support behind Chris Christie for the Republican nomination in the 2016 presidential election. He seems to only support the Second Amendment when it is convenient for him, not because he believes in it.
“He seems to only support the Second Amendment when it is convenient for him, not because he believes in it.”
That’s most (approaching all) politicians. And it’s not just the 2A.
The last line of the Pardon says:
“This order is subject to revocation at any time, at the discretion of the Governor, without notice.”
Is this normal language for a pardon? I had always assumed once you were pardoned, you stayed pardoned, and there were no take-backsies.
I still haven’t heard of anyone asking Mr. Josey-Davis the question that’s been on my mind since this hit the news. If you do become a cop, and you stop someone for driving with expired registration (a plague on urban areas, btw) and the driver tells you that he’s violating NJ firearms laws, are you going to arrest him?
I thought the same thing.
Come to think of it, shouldn’t the title of this post be “Another Pardon from Chris Christie”? Using “for” implies that Chris Christie is racking up the pardons, which would imply that he’s been neck-deep in illegal activity.
Which, considering that he’s a politician, might be true, but even so, that’s probably not the message you are trying to convey….
Another pardon that wouldn’t be necessary if our NJ gun laws weren’t so bad.
Bingo!