‘Splainin It
By Da Chipster
Recently, I had to explain to a youngling why every political scandal – real, imagined or manufactured – had “-gate” as a suffix. All you fine folks at this here shop are like me in one of two ways 1) older than dirt or 2) historically literate. As such, you know the answer. But when I explained this etymology, the only comment in return was “yes, but what did WATER have to do with it?”
Water? It’s in the tears I weep for my country’s future.
All this was in aid of Chris Christie’s “Bridgegate,” which is Nixonian in nature if not in scope. It features expendable staff, enemy paybacks, earnest self-investigations, and an egotistical principal who scoffs at the very mention of the thing, as if it were some third-rate burglary. Haldemann, Mitchell, Dean, Hunt, Liddy – they can all be found in this opera bouffe, although diminuendo and transposed to a minor key.
But it was one early Christie comment attempting to bluff his way past the 2016 off-ramp – that he was out there placing the cones – that clued me in: this is not Nixon-style politics. This is CHICAGO-style politics.
You may remember me mentioning my uncle, Jimmy “Barstool” Grobnik, who got the nickname because he is short and round and can always be found in the corner tavern. He got into the Hachecristo family business of “working” on Chicago street crews by marrying my Tia Lucha, and spent many a summer in an orange vest, posing as a traffic barrel with very skinny legs.
So I called Uncle Barstool, who knew where I was going right away.
“It’s like I always toldja,” he said, the accent as crisp as the pickle spear on a Chicago-style hot dog. “Dis is how politics useta work. Da Boss, he’s got da clout. You back him? Yer set! You cross him? It’s yer own lookout. Dis Christie fella, he’s old school, a real t’rowback. Mare Daley, da greatest mare of da greatest city ever, he would unnerstan’ dis guy.”
Patronage – the spoils game – is what kept this country humming for the first 200 years of its existence. The ability to award jobs to your allies and supporters was just the beginning. Who owes bribes, who collects bribes, who gets a piece of the bribes – all that was there too. But clout was about more than bestowing largesse. It was also about the double-cross, and retribution. Payments and paybacks. Was it wrong? Yes, but it was a step up from the older days in Machine politics, when the Outfit decided such things, and the retribution was more… permanent. Cement contracts, or cement shoes.
New Jersey – not Chicago – is the last bastion of Machine politics. And Chris Christie by dint of his outsized personality had adroitly become one of the last great political bosses. He would not only have been at home in the old days, he would have thrived. It’s not that he was born bad…
Just too late.
What you so eloquently state of the nature of these pols and the system seems to miss the crucial point, IMO, and that is how do they get into power in the first place but for enough people who vote them that power even when most presumably are not directly benefitting? If this is valid, then how is it corrected? Or am I missing something?
1By the way, can I be both 1 & 2? 🙂
I thought it was great when, at the town hall meeting Christie held recently, he abruptly took the microphone from a questioner and the guy grabbed the mic back to continue lambasting him. This little scene apparently didn’t show up on Christie’s Youtube shrine of his “in-your-face” encounters. It looks like the natives, at last, are becoming restless.
2I’m just not sure that Christie has what it takes.
His version of machine politics is to real Chicago-style politics as Chicago-style pizza is to real pizza: doughy, gooey and thick.
3You gotta step back and be in awe of a man who writes a letter to the NJ policeman’s union and tells them he would NEVER mess with their pensions—please endorse him. But what is his very first act as governor?— To loudly and aggressively mess with their pensions.
And to think–he probably kisses his loved ones with that mouth.
4love your post……this “gate” is the true heir to ‘watergate”.
5I t’ink your Uncle Barstool was drinkin’ buddies wis my Uncle Guido. Guido worked for da city, at least when da 10th Ward needed heelers to get old ladies in da neighborhood to vote. Generous guy, Uncle Guido – he’d even help in the voting machine booths by showing da gals how to pull dose little levers. Udderwise you din’t see him much except every udder week when he’d show up at Streets & San to drop off his time card. Uncle G made more money carrying around his Louisville Slugger with the genuine autograph from Nellie Fox. It got lots of admiring looks from guys Guido would visit to collect on their juice loans.
6OK! Good writing! Point made and taken. But Chicago is not the only city to use for comparison. How about Boston? And I don’t mean the Sox or the Pats. Boston had at least one mayor who was the model for a best selling book and a movie based on the book. What he had going for him the NJ goon won’t even be able to buy. In this case, money ain’t the question. Its the savvy. Christie’s savvy seems to be capped at a certain level. I think he got so used to dealing as a prosecutor with indicted people that his skill level with the rest of the world never really developed as it should. When he threw a deal at the accused, he made damn sure they took it. Too bad he didn’t realize the rest of us ain’t indicted nor felonious.
7I think he was born bad And born late.
Forgot where I read the article, but his whole career stinks, not just his time as Gov.
There was very little talk at the time when Romney did not choose him for VP but for someone as ethically challenged as Romney to stay away, you know he is REALLY bad.
8I remember during the Watergate Hearings, when Corpus Christi was considering the Choke Canyon Dam for water management, ol’ Gene Looper from Channel 10 (if I remember correctly) went out and did some televised person-on-the-street interviews. The results were pretty typical for Corpus:
Looper: What do you think about Watergate?
Local Woman: It’s wonderful. I think every city should have one.
9Christie is an amateur at Chicago style politics. Mayor Daley could have made Christie cry with just a stern look.
10Interesting comparison to the Watergate scandal. Now, if somebody could just discover the tapes.
11Yes, young ‘uns, there was a time prior to the digital age when people used tape recorders to record history in the making, or in this case, criminals in the making.
And before that, it was women stenographers hidden in the closet, taking the notes.
Husband’s mother was one of those. She and another were locked in the closet while international deals were being cut on things like, oh, Lend-Lease.
I presume before that it was male private secretaries taking the notes, possibly even being allowed to be in the same room, not a closet.
And I’m fairly sure when Moses finally cut that deal with Pharoah, there was someone behind a screen jotting it all down on papyrus.
12Gate is soooo 20th century.
I call this one Bridge-ghazi.
13” they can all be found in this opera bouffe, although diminuendo and transposed to a minor key.”
I thought Juanita was channeling the ghosts of Mike Royko and Studs Terkel. I loved it but couldn’t believe that she was writing in this combination highbrow/old-time Chicago style. Then when I paged back up to re-read it I saw da Chipster’s byline. Thanks for taking me back to the golden age of Chicago journalism.
14Bill Cahill 1974 to Chris Christie 2014. Forty years of GOP ‘progress’ in NJ.
15One funny detail was the email sent from an aide in Christie’s office to a buddy at the Port Authority saying, more or less, ‘don’t discuss this via email.”
But the aspect that most fascinates me is how many of Christie’s associates are old high-school friends. Christie must have run the meanest high school clique in history.
16Wally, I “borrowed” the Grobnik name from Royko’s famous pal “Slats” Grobnik. For those keeping score at home, Jimmy “Barstool” is the nephew of Slats.
And let’s not forget Bob Greene!
Dose were da days, my frien’!
17daChipster — Excellent, just excellent! Mike Royko was one of my heros (of course I was too young to read then, but my mother read his columns to me – wink, wink) and your article was delightful, as were the comments. So many, many reasons to visit the salon.
18daChipster: Any news from your other cousin, Jesus Hachecristo?
19I was born and raised in Chicago, although now I live in Tennessee. Chicago, of course, is known for it’s graft and corruption, as any large (or small, for that matter) city is. And, of course, Chicago is known for the vindictiveness politicians can show towards one another, especially during, or after, an election campaign. But no true Chicago politician would ever be stupid enough to do what the Christie folk in NJ did: screw up the lives of everyday constituents. You can shiv a fellow alderman in the back, but don’t you dare tie up traffic on the Dan Ryan Expressway so average hardworking voters can’t get to their jobs and their kids can’t get to school.
20A lot of Chicago politicians were and are corrupt, but the vast majority are not in the same league of stupidity these New Jersey clowns are in. I can see the ghost of “Da Boss” Daley enjoying quite a hearty laugh at these Jersey buffoons.