I MAY HAVE FOUND THE PERFECT CANDIDATE FOR THE NO LABELS RATFUCK

It's obvious what No Labels is up to in the 2024 campaign: The group is funded by right-wingers who fear that Donald Trump will lose a head-to-head contest with Joe Biden. The donors want to run a third-party candidate who'll split the anti-Trump vote with Biden and throw the election to Trump.

But even gullible voters who are susceptible to the No Labels scam aren't likely to associate the group's likely candidate, Joe Manchin, with anti-Trumpism. I'm beginning to suspect that the ideal candidate for the No Labels ratfuck would be this guy:

Chris Christie brought his Talking Truth to Donald Trump performance back to New Hampshire on Wednesday evening, aiming a fresh quiver of poison darts at the former president. His talk pleased a small Trump-skeptical crowd, but raised the big question about Mr. Christie’s candidacy: Where are all the other Republican voters?

For the most part, Mr. Christie was preaching to the choir. Submitting to more than 90 minutes of questions in a town hall format, he heard from an audience member who identified as a member of an extinct species, a “Rockefeller Republican”; from another who said he used to work for a Republican senator but hasn’t voted Republican since 2016; and from a woman who introduced herself by saying, “I’m a Democrat, and you intrigue me.”

Recent media coverage of the No Labels bid has been skeptical, but if Christie were the No Labels candidate, the coverage would immediately turn extremely positive, because, as The Atlantic's David Graham notes, the liberal commentariat loves the big lug:

Chris Christie is the hottest candidate in the Republican presidential race right now. Oh, not with Republican voters. He’s still polling in the low single digits among the people who will actually choose the nominee. But among liberal pundits, Christie’s reputation is on the rise.

... If the primary was held entirely among members of the chattering class, he’d win in a stroll.... they love that he speaks fluently and bluntly and delivers witty retorts.

... Christie’s appeal relates to an Aaron Sorkin–style theory of politics, in which the way to defeat Trump is to get onstage with him in a debate and say just the right thing—that with a verbal slap that is clever and cutting enough, Trump will deflate. Soaring music rises, the credits roll, and everyone returns happy to a pre-2016 world.

I learned about Graham's piece from Frank Bruni's latest column. Bruni praises Graham for "an observant and witty analysis," but Bruni's column is precisely the kind of gushy, swoony essay Graham is talking about. ("...what [Christie]’s doing in this Republican primary contest is very, very important. It also couldn’t be more emotionally gratifying to behold.")

Far too many left-centrist and moderate voters are susceptible to a standard-issue right-winger who agrees with liberals on one or two things. A year ago, liberals' favorite conservative was Liz Cheney. Now, apparently, it's Christie.

There's nothing wrong with appreciating a right-winger for isolated good deeds -- I read and quote The Bulwark's writers regularly, though that doesn't mean I'd trust them to run the country. Liz Cheney did good work on the January 6 committee, but I'd never vote for her because she's a down-the-line George W. Bush-era Republican. So is Christie -- and yet a Democrat at his campaign appearance says, "you intrigue me."

I think Christie is committed to this GOP primary campaign -- but if he ever changes his mind, I suspect he could help No Labels achieve precisely what it's setting out to do.