Christie is the new W. Bush do not mis-underestimate him for ONE minute.

[Hippo_Tron]

37. Christie is a lot more dangerous than Bush in some ways, less in others

On economic issues, Bush campaigned from a place that was far more moderate than Mitt Romney. Christie can't do that because he's going to be forced to the right by the Teabaggers, much the way Romney was.

OTOH, he's the popular Governor of a big Democratic northeastern state who spoke prime-time at his party's convention and went on to win re-election in a landslide.

Bush "won" the presidency with the south and the plains states and squeaking by in a few swing states. Christie gets the south and the plains states by default, because the south has become drastically more Republican since the Clinton years. Hillary MIGHT have a chance in Arkansas and West Virginia, but that doesn't even offset New Jersey's 14 electoral votes that Christie almost certainly puts in play.

Christie could also seriously compete in Pennsylvania and that along with his home state puts us on serious defense. If the Democrat can force the Republican to give up on Pennsylvania relatively early (as Obama has done twice) the electoral college odds are highly in their favor. But if they're defending it up until the last second, like Kerry was, they're playing a defensive game and most likely going to lose.