Chris Christie believes in establishing respect before seeking love. Great. But what's up with the Republican gestures? Christie is a left handed boxer at the podium. @BobJagendorf
He's another of this current generation of Republican governors who have chosen not to live in the state capital, to decline to inhabit the governor's mansion. I can understand his attachment to Mendham, New Jersey. He coached his sons in soccer there. He cheered his daughter in the parades on the streets of Mendham.
I am wondering where the speech coaches hired by the Republicans learn their craft. Ann Romney made multiple symetrical air points. Isn't that a gesture left over from Sarah Palin? It's like the Fonzi two thumbs up, except its performed with the forefingers. The forefingers are held up in a way that reminds me of pistols. Christie kept punching the air and thumping the podium with his left hand. Okay, so he wanted to be perceived as a pugnacious combination of Irish and Sicilian cultures. I found the left hand punctuation of every point to be lacking in nuance. He's been Governor of New Jersey for less than three years. He declared a financial emergency in New Jersey within three months of assuming office. He defunded departments without support of the legislature. He made a budget law after line item vetoes of one billion in expenditures. He's a man in the cast of Governor Rick Snyder of Michigan, who also cracked down on budgets in that state. In his speech, he took lessons from his mother, and spun them into a mandate for federal cutbacks and austerity. As he said, "I believe we have become paralyzed by our desire to be loved." There's no pandering from Christie. The polls have not yet elected Romney. Christie dismissed the polls as being winds of opinion ignored by men and women acting in principle.Clearly, Obamacare, public employee salaries are in for change should Ryan and Romney be elected and Christie placed into a cabinet post. I wonder what seniors are to expect concerning social security and medicare after the election of a Republican administration. I am wondering what he means when he says that seniors will support the sacrifice. The idea of American exceptionalism raised its head again. I like the idea, but Christie doesn't explain it. Ryan often uses the term without explaining it. I wish speeches allowed time to define terms, even when listeners can be assumed to understand them. As Christie declaims in his finale: "A second American Century where real American exceptionalism is not a political punch line, but is evident to everyone in the world just by watching the way our government conducts its business and everyday Americans live their lives" If you wish for me to vote for you, open up about your code words.And maybe try out a few different hand gestures. Text of Chris Christie's Speech at the Republican National Convention, August 28, 2012.http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0812/80347.html