New Jersey Slasher: Budget-Cutting Chris Christie is Conservatives' New Favorite Governor (Politics)

NEW JERSEY GOVERNOR Chris Christie wasn't supposed to become a hero for the Right. He wouldn't even accept the label "conservative" during his campaign. He was a washed-up local pol turned lobbyist but with enough connections to become George W. Bush's top attorney in Jersey. Christie made some headlines going after political corruption; to no one's surprise, prosecutable officials are more common than tollbooths in New Jersey. Then he beat an incumbent governor in a terrible year for incumbents. So what? Christie was an overweight, less heroic, bridge-and-tunnel version of Rudy Giuliani.