In a severe blow to his presidential bid, Gov. Chris Christie will not be one of the Republican presidential candidates taking part in next week’s debate hosted by Fox Financial Network. Christie failed to average 2.5% in the four most recent national polls used by the network to determine eligibility.

What a stunning reversal of fortune for the Republican once viewed in the same light as Hillary Clinton: a lock for their party’s presidential nomination. The New Jersey governor was arguable the most popular politician in the country not that long ago. Now he will be sitting at the kid’s table for the upcoming debate, along with Huckabee, Jindal, and Santorum.

Ironically, much of Christie’s fall can actually be traced to the liberal media. It was Rachel Maddow who picked up on a little known story about the closure of some lanes on the George Washington Bridge that eventually turned into a national scandal.

The closure of two of the three access lanes from Fort Lee to the Washington Bridge turned out to be political payback for the town’s Democrat mayor, Mark Sokolich, refusal to endorse Christie’s reelection bid for governor. Of course Christie, to this day, has denied involvement in the ordering of the lane closures and has basically thrown members of his staff under the bus.

But the damage was done. As more reporters picked up on the story, the American public learned what citizens of New Jersey knew all along: the man is a vindictive bully. Other New Jersey politicians started accusing Christie of misdeeds. The mayor of Hoboken, to name just one example, claimed that Christie’s office pressured her to approve a big development project represented by a Christie crony—or risk losing recovery aid for damage caused by Hurricane Sandy.

The “Bridgegate” scandal is ongoing. While one Christie associate, David Wildstein, pleaded guilty in May on two criminal counts, the federal trial of two other allies, Bridget Kelly and Bill Baroni, is still pending. Originally scheduled for this past July, and then September, the trial has now been delayed to April 2016.

What has been most amazing about Christie’s presidential run is that he chose to seek the Republican nomination while still not out of the woods on “Bridgegate.” More people could face charges connected to the notorious Fort Lee traffic jam, including Christie himself.

Unlike the access lanes to the bridge, this scandal is far from closed.

Photo | huffingtonpost.com

All hell has broken loose between the Republican presidential campaigns and the Republican National Committee (RNC). A mutiny is afoot! It appears after this week’s presidential debate hosted by CNBC – a disorganized disaster widely panned by political observers – the candidates want to take control of the debate process going forward.

To a man (and woman), each candidate complained about the tough questions they were asked and the apparent bias of the CNBC moderators.

Sparked by Iowa front-runner Ben Carson and second-tier candidate, Bobby Jindal, a meeting will take place this Sunday in Washington D.C. among representatives of the various campaigns. Think “The Godfather” and the meeting of the “Five Families.” Most, if not all, campaigns will be represented at the meeting.

It appears there will be one notable player missing from the Sunday meeting, RNC chairman Reince Priebus. The campaign reps want to be left alone to plot how they will alter the party’s debate process without the entity responsible for scheduling and co-sponsoring each of the officially sanctioned debates!

So it will be the cranky children conducting their own meeting without any adult supervision.

Good luck with that!

While all the candidates may not like how some of the debates have been conducted so far, each campaign will come to the big meeting with it’s own set of wants and gripes. Some candidates have complained about unequal speaking time. Others have griped about how polling is used to determine who qualifies for the prime-time and undercard debates. Some have insisted on opening and closing statements.

You thought the last debate was a free-for-all?

There is one simple way to make the debates better and more meaningful. No, it is not to take Ted Cruz” suggestion of having the next debate moderated by Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh. It is for the top-tier candidates to tell the wannabes within their ranks to exit stage door right, pronto … for the good of the party, of course. But that sensible idea might not go over well with New Jersey’s favorite bully,  Gov. Chris Christie. “If some unlucky accident were to befall Gov. Christie,” said campaign manager Luca Brasi, ” I am going to blame some people at that meeting.”

Photo | nytimes.com

I occasionally will watch Fox News. You know, to see how the Republican propaganda machine will spin the day’s news (OK, I like to gaze upon Fox’s foxy Megyn Kelly!).

Last night Megyn had a group of about 25-30 Republican voters she quizzed on their take of the third Republican presidential debate. The most interesting segment of her show came towards the end when she discussed a few of the “untruths” spouted by some of the candidates.

Marco Rubio was asked about his poor handling of his personal finances:

MODERATOR: Senator Rubio, you yourself have said that you’ve had issues. You have a lack of bookkeeping skills. You accidentally inter-mingled campaign money with your personal money. You faced foreclosure on a second home that you bought. And just last year, you liquidated a $68,000 retirement fund. That’s something that cost you thousands of dollars in taxes and penalties. In terms of all of that, it raises the question whether you have the maturity and wisdom to lead this $17 trillion economy. What do you say?

RUBIO: Well, you just – you just listed a litany of discredited attacks from Democrats and my political opponents, and I’m not gonna waste 60 seconds detailing them all.

Megyn told her panel, after some fact checking, it was determined that everything the moderator said about Rubio’s poor financial acumen was true.

So not only is Rubio a poor manager of his personal finances … he’s a bald-faced liar!

Megyn then asked her Republican panel members if any of this mattered to them. I believe two people raised their hands.

News outlets have a field day fact checking statements made by politicians after debates. It is very clear that facts, or lies, do not matter so much to your average Republican voter. How else could one explain the level of support for Donald Trump and Dr. Ben Carson (or the entire Republican field for that matter!).

Photo | salon.com

At a Houston gathering earlier this week, attended by Jeb Bush’s richest donors, the Bush brain trust huddled together to salvage the Bush family name and Jeb’s flagging presidential hopes. As has become clear to everyone in the Bush camp, Jeb, as a political candidate, is just not meeting the expectations of the Bush brand.

Both former presidents, George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush, attended the pow-wow organized to help breath life into Jeb’s once thriving presidential bid. But what all the Bushes and mega donors do not seem to understand… the brand is toxic. No amount of money spent on advertising will make a skunk smell like a rose.

What is so odd about trying to resuscitate the Bush brand is that at the start of his campaign, Jeb did all he could to run away from the family name. But that wise strategy didn’t last long. Before you could blink an eye, Jeb was praising his brother W. for his service as president, especially on his foreign policy. Not only did he claim on a debate stage that W. “kept us safe,” but also later doubled and tripled down on the absurd comment.

The Bush brand has come to be associated with the 9/11 attack, the Iraq invasion, Hurricane Katrina and the largest financial meltdown since the Great Depression. While it is true voters have a short memory, all the slick ads in the world will not dispel the disastrous associations with the Bush name.

On the other end of the Republican presidential spectrum, you have the front-runner, Donald Trump, and his own ubiquitous brand. But unlike the negative connotations of the Bush brand, the Trump name is associated with success, excitement, sincerity and being a winner. It is easy to see why Republican voters are shunning the Bush brand for that of Trump’s.

The candidate that once talked about being “his own man” has now fully embraced the family brand. Why Jeb and the campaign intelligentsia have done such a complete reversal from the original, sound campaign strategy is a mystery to all. It seems like a sign of desperation; a Hail Mary pass. It is abundantly clear to all but the group gathered in Houston that Jeb will not secure the Republican presidential nomination as long as he is wearing the same brand as one of the worst presidents in modern history … the Bush brand.

Photo | all-len-all.com