The developing scandal involving the shutdown of the heavily-traveled George Washington Bridge last September for political payback has New Jersey Governor and man-with-his-own-gravitational-field
Chris "Krispykreme" Christie throwing his staff under the bus. After months of denying that any politics were involved in shutting down lanes of the bridge to teach the Democratic Mayor of Ft. Lee a lesson for not endorsing him, Gov. Krispykreme now claims that his "staff" misled him, apparently referring to his Deputy Chief of Staff
Bridget (yes,
Bridget
) Ann Kelly. In e-mails between Kelly and the Governor's appointees at the Port Authority, it's clear that the road shutdown was staged to cause massive backups and delay commuters in order to embarrass Mayor Mark Sokolich. The bridge carries I-95 travelers, some 104 million per year, and is the busiest bridge in the world.
This would be just another example of Krispycreme's thuggish personality and political fun and games, if it were not for the fact that numerous school buses and some four emergency vehicles were also delayed by the lane closures. There are reports that a 91 year-old unconscious woman's ambulance was delayed significantly, and
she later died in the hospital.
Everyone needs to ask themselves whether the Governor's Deputy Chief of Staff would take it upon herself to engineer this stunt that effected hundreds of thousand of travelers without any nod from or acquiescence of Krispykreme. This story needs a complete investigation, not only because a life was lost, but also because this type of political thuggery from the Governor needs to stop.
UPDATE: New Jersey's U.S. Attorney plans to open
a preliminary investigation of the scandal. Get the popcorn ready….
