Doris Kearns Goodwin Speaks....

[Laxman]

from a place other than her mouth! At a recent event at Rider University she compared Governor Christie to Theodore Roosevelt. Ms. Kearns-Goodwin, Harvard just called-they want their PhD back. I guess she can be excused, Theodore Roosevelt liked to use the word "Bully!" and Christie actually is a bully, but the similarities end there. Comparing a man who made his reputation as a rugged outdoorsman who took on monied interests and championed environmental protection with someone who made his reputation yelling at school teachers and eating ice cream cones on the boardwalk while sucking up to the monied elite is laughable. T.R. came from wealth and privilege and knew how the rich had rigged the game. That's why he fought to give everyone a "square deal" by taking those interests head on as a trust buster. Christie is a wannabe suburban kid who longs to be one of the people who rig the game and will do anything to get there. His environmental record is atrocious and we know full well about his lack of integrity. The notion of equating Christie with the man who spent 3 days with John Muir in Yosemite, charged up San Juan Hill, climbed Mount Marcy for fun and was known, not just for blunt talk, but for integrity, is insulting.

Gov. Chris Christie draws comparison to Teddy Roosevelt from historian Doris Kearns Goodwin

“Clearly there’s some resemblance with Theodore Roosevelt,” Goodwin said. “That direct confrontational style of leadership.”

Christie almost seems to enjoy taking on opponents, which Roosevelt certainly did, Goodwin said. She said she hasn’t followed Christie as closely in recent months, but that what she knows about him lines up in multiple ways.

“The part about him that seemed appealing, and I haven’t seen enough of what he’s been like after this whole bridge problem,” Goodwin said. “Was that he did seem to like being with people. He seemed to enjoy the rough and tumble of politics.”

The George Washington Bridge scandal is not a fatal wound to his candidacy, she said.

http://www.nj.com/mercer/index.ssf/2014/09/gov_chris_christie_draws_comparison_to_teddy_roosevelt_from_historian_doris_kearns_goodwin.html

Doris, what a crock! Is this what passes for critical analysis these days? (I know the answer is yes and that this is pretty high-brow compared to most commentary) Can we really be this ignorant and silly? Theodore Roosevelt was an actual tough guy. Christie plays one on T.V. There is a difference.

Doris-do you really see a resemblance?

[elleng]

1. She responded to a question.

Big f*king deal!

'Before Goodwin spoke at Rider University as part of the school’s 150th anniversary celebration, she fielded questions on a range of subjects including Christie’s possible entrance into the 2016 presidential race.

“Clearly there’s some resemblance with Theodore Roosevelt,” Goodwin said. “That direct confrontational style of leadership.”'

[hack89]

2. She says nothing about his policies or effectiveness, just his style

I don't see what the big deal is.

[elleng]

3. Right.

[Arkansas Granny]

4. I agree.

[Laxman]

10. It's A Big Deal Because...

her comments legitimize his "leadership style" as an equivalent of Theodore Roosevelt's. She refers to Christie as a maverick and a moderate and this comparison perpetuates the fiction of Christie as a straight talking straight shooter. Yelling at teachers, bullying opponents, belittling people at town hall meetings and abusing the powers of your office do not earn that comparison. That's the reality of Christie. If that kind of behavior earns the mantle of "strong leadership" then we are apparently handing out that moniker rather easily these days. Someone with her background should know better than to cavalierly make such a comparison.

[hack89]

12. Or she was trying to politely answer a question in a public forum

Without offending the participants.

[Major Hogwash]

15. I agree with your assessment. Christie couldn't even polish TR's boots!!

I have no idea what she was thinking when she made these comments, but she has spouted nonsense before about Ronald Reagan, George H.W. Bush, and even George W. Bush.
I think she just wants to be liked, so she says nice things about former Republican Presidents, and now this about Christie.
But, honest to pete, at some point in time you have to look at the big picture and judge the person being discussed on the whole, the entire spectrum, not just on some superficial concept of style.

She was a rather harsh critic of Bill Clinton when he was President, and even though he may have deserved some, or even all of it, I thought it rather odd that she couldn't find any sort of criticisms in that same vein when she was discussing Dubya Bush.

I disagree with her that Christie is much of a maverick.
Christie is more like Al Capone than anyone else.

[MADem]

5. TR had a dark side, too. He was a bit murderous.

Anyone who gets gleeful about the dead bodies piled up on San Juan Hill in Cuba is no particular saint--and TR did get overjoyed at the sight of that carnage. And he never met an animal he didn't want to shoot and stuff.

Christie liked to see cars piled up on bridges, and he never saw an animal he didn't want to cook and eat.

Both had issues.

[roamer65]

13. A very dark side.

I remember hearing well before the PBS program that TR constantly badgered President Wilson to declare war on Germany during the early years of WW1.

[MADem]

14. I'm certainly no fan of Christie, but I can't imagine him riding up San Juan Hill

chortling at the corpses of Spaniard after Spaniard....!

In the evening, Roosevelt stalked happily back and forth across the brow of San Juan Hill, the highest peak of the San Juan Ridge. The trenches below him were filled to capacity with cadavers. Roosevelt seemed to take a grim satisfaction in contemplating the day's carnage. As his close friend and fellow Rough Rider, Bob Ferguson, wrote, "no hunting trip so far has equalled it in Theodore's eyes.... T. was just revelling in victory and gore."

Throughout the evening he stood high on the crest of the ridge in range of firing Spanish guns, just so he could get a good view back at all the "damned Spanish dead." At one point a shell landed so close it singed him. The same shell killed several men standing nearby. At least one observer commented that Roosevelt seemed to think himself invulnerable. The only time he bent low was to collect spent cartridges he thought his young sons would like as souvenirs.

Roosevelt personally brought down one Spaniard that day--the first and only time he ever killed a man. The events at the San Juan Ridge made him a celebrity and primed his political career to take off like a rocket upon his return to the States. Yet, as he told one of his closest confidants, the most important thing about his charge at San Juan was that it would serve forever for his children "as an apology for my having existed ... should the worst come to the worst I am quite content to go now and to leave my children at least an honorable name." To another friend he wrote that the war against Spain was his "one chance to cut my little notch in the stick that stands as a measuring rod in every family. I know now that I would have turned from my wife's death bed to answer that call."

http://www.nytimes.com/books/first/r/renehan-pride.html

[YOHABLO]

6. I'd say Christie is more like President Howard Taft

[MADem]

9. Just in their pants size--not in their temperament or love for the law.

Taft went on to the Supreme Court--Christie shouldn't be trusted to sweep the floor of a courtroom. He has no respect for the law.

[Egnever]

7. Good lord whats the fuss about?

She was speaking about their leadership styles and admitted she didn't know that much about Christie.
I agree with her the bridge thing isn't going to do him in.

[tartan2]

8. Doris what the hell are you thinking?

Oh I know, let's chalked it up to a nasty brown brain fart!!!

[ProudToBeBlueInRhody]

11. She's a historian, not a political pundit

She makes no comment on whether he's right or wrong on his policy. Much ado about nothing.

[davidpdx]

16. +1

[Laxman]

17. All The More Egregious....

political pundits are providing a particular view. Their comments provide a biased, but sometime accurate commentary for the purposes of advocacy. A pundit's comments can be assessed, accepted or dismissed in that vein. A historian's role is about more than just telling stories. It's about giving us a sense of where we have come from and providing a clearer context for current events. Analyzing past facts and circumstances in a manner that helps us understand the present. It is therefore assessed and weighted differently. I'm not contending that Kearns-Goodwin was being an advocate for Christie. Quite the contrary. She's speaking as an academic. She made a sloppy and inaccurate comparison that only serves to help perpetuate the myth of Christie as a strong leader, when in fact nothing could be further from the truth. For all of his faults, we know what Theodore Roosevelt was and the invocation of his leadership qualities is a known reference that is ascribed a particular value. Because of the way that the media treats him, and the way casual observers assess him, what Christie is is not always so clear. We are quick to anoint someone as tough or a strong leader very easily today based on little more than play-acting. Christie is perceived as some kind of strong leader based upon his orchestrated acts of public bullying and his abuse of his powers of office. The juxtaposition of Christie's actions with that known quantity and characterizing it as another example of strong leadership falsely legitimizes his behavior as somehow equivalent-perhaps not so much to us here where his actions are viewed very critically, but certainly to the general public reading her comments.