Chris Christie Gets his GOP History Utterly Wrong In Anti-Palin Attack

The New Jersey site "The State Column"
 AT THIS LINK describes an attack by New Jersey Governor Chris Christie on those who believe a brokered convention will happen, or if it did happen, would be good for the GOP. as being something that could be focused onto Sarah Palin even though Gov. Christie "did not mention her by name."


"Although Mr. Christie did not mention the former Alaska governor by name, his comments can certainly be directed towards her."

Christie effectively dismissed the idea there could be a brokered convention by advising such a thing had not happened with the GOP since 1940 when Wendell Willkie's fans in the auditorium get up a "We Want Willkie' chant for hours until the delegates gave in.


“That’s stuff that folks in the media and in political punditry like to talk about because it’s like their dream come true, that we’d actually indecision going into a convention,” said Mr. Christie during a press conference Tuesday. “It hasn’t happened to the Republican Party since Wendell Willkie. I don’t think it’s going to be happening in 2012.”

It is always a matter of utter amazement to me that people, such as Gov.Christie who are clearly intelligent and are held up by the likes of Ann Coulter as being paragons of all values can get simple, basic historical facts utterly wrong.

The 1952 Republican convention was in fact bitterly contested and almost caused a massive split between the conservative grouping who supported Robert Taft and the centrists who supported Dwight D. Eisenhower. To say there was not "indecision" in 1952 is ludicrous.

Either Governor Christie is utterly ignorant of Republican history or is so Romney biased that he is blind to the facts-either way it reflects poorly on his judgement.

Wikipedia, for Gov. Christie's edification has the history of the 1952 convention AT THIS LINK.
Here is a relevent extract;

"After being persuaded to run, Eisenhower scored a major victory in the New Hampshire primary when his supporters wrote his name onto the ballot, giving him an upset victory over Taft. However, from there until the Republican Convention the primaries were divided fairly evenly between the two men, and by the time the convention opened the race for the nomination was still too close to call.

Taft won the Nebraska, Wisconsin, Illinois, and South Dakota primaries, while Eisenhower won the New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, and Oregon primaries. Harold Stassen won his home state of Minnesota, and Warren won his home state of California.



When the 1952 Republican National Convention opened in Chicago, Illinois, most political experts rated Taft and Eisenhower as neck-and-neck in the delegate vote totals."

John Frank advises further;

You forgot the primary race of 1968 and the subsequent convention.

Governor Reagan made a late entry in an effort to stop Richard Nixon from winning the nomination.
The issue had to be resolved on the convention floor.
Ultimately, because Governor Reagan and Governor Rockefeller could not agree on who would run as President and who would run as Vice-President, the convention selected Nixon as the nominee, who almost lost the general election.

 In many ways, this 2012 primary race for the Republican Presidential nomination has striking echoes of the 1968 primary race for the Republican Presidential nomination.





Thanks John.


And of course the 1976 convention, with the famous battle between Ford and Reagan, is another example of Republican convention "indecision" (See Wikepidia).