I just watched the 17-minute opening of last night's Rachel Maddow show.

It's her job to stretch out a simple idea into 17 minutes, but it's painful to watch.

Let me save you some time...

Synopsis

  • The crazy shutdown of the GWB had nothing to do with the endorsement of the mayor of Fort Lee, New Jersey.

  • It was about the NJ State Supreme Court and the State Senate and Christie of course.

  • In 2010, Christie refused to re-appoint a judge.

  • The NY Times ran an editorial.

  • The NJ State Senate was livid.

  • They refused to approve of Christie's appointments to replace him.

  • He refuses to re-appoint a Republican member of the court, the wife of a member of his administration, not wanting to put her through the approval process by "animals."

  • The Democratic leader of the Senate represents (drumroll please) Fort Lee.

  • All this came to a head on August 12, the day before of the famous email saying it was time for Fort Lee to have "some traffic problems."

Sidebar

  • Fort Lee was a punchline in a standard SNL skit in the early years.

  • Roseanne Rosannadanna, played by Gilda Radner, would always respond to letters from "Richard Feder of Fort Lee, New Jersey."

  • I'm pretty sure this has nothing to do with the Christie scandal.

01/10/14; 10:15:16 AM

Last built: Fri, Mar 14, 2014 at 12:29 PM

By Dave Winer, Friday, January 10, 2014 at 10:15 AM.