By Brenda Flanagan
Correspondent
It’s an Ebola blitz: Gov. Chris Christie’s arguing with anchors on network news, dismissing the Obama administration’s quarantine protocols as incredibly confusing and talking tough about New Jersey’s mandatory rules.
“We’re trying to be careful, here. This is common sense. The American public believes it is common sense and we’re not moving an inch. Our policy has not changed and our policy will not change,” the governor said.
Christie’s even upstaging candidates during RGA campaign stops across the country. Today in Rhode Island, he relished questions about threats of lawsuits.
“I get sued lots of times. Get in line. I’m happy to take em on,” Christie said.
A consummate politician with his eye on 2016, Gov. Christie recognized a perfect opportunity when he saw it, according to polling analysts.
“We find that 96 percent say they’re paying very close or somewhat close attention to the issue,” said FDU PublicMind Poll Executive Director Krista Jenkins. “It’s huge.”
And FDU’s PublicMind Poll of New Jersey residents gives Christie a 66 percent approval rating for how he’s handling the Ebola crisis. Apparently, far fewer trust the federal government’s initially stumbling approach.
“Right now the numbers seem to suggest that there was an opening for him to do something bold and certainly a departure from what the federal government was doing,” Jenkins said.
And few do “bold” as well as Chris Christie. During Superstorm Sandy, he ordered sightseers to “get the hell off the beach.” He’s taken on teachers’ unions and protestors with pugnacious fervor, and — standing alongside Gov. Andrew Cuomo — took on the CDC Friday when he announced that stringent mandatory 21-day quarantine for health care workers returning to Newark Airport from West Africa’s Ebola hot zones.
“There was going to be no more voluntary quarantine in New Jersey because you just can’t count on people to do that and the stakes are just too high,” Christie said.
But after New Jersey quarantined nurse Kaci Hickox inside a tent at University Hospital this weekend, she bitterly complained. The White House reportedly complained. Christie let her go home, saying she’d been asymptomatic for 24 hours. The Far Right claimed Christie caved.
“We need to quarantine Chris Christie,” said Rush Limbaugh.
Limbaugh called it comparable to the so-called Obama Hug he claims cost Mitt Romney the presidency.
“He finds himself in the middle here again, taking center stage of another national crisis with another Obama hug moment. I really, I think the Republicans ought to make sure Gov. Christie gets quarantined,” Limbaugh said.
“But we don’t want to do things not based on science and best practices,” President Obama said.
The president again defended the CDC’s quarantine protocols, but Gov. Christie claims he knows a scientist who agrees with him.
“Six other states have joined us as well, both Republican and Democratic governors. As has the United States military. As has Dr. Bruce Beutler, a Nobel Prize winning physician who this morning said he favors our policy,” Christie said.
The science may be uncertain but the politics is — perhaps — a bit more clear. Gov. Christie’s taking a tough stand. And voters across the nation are watching.