Bill Maher on Chris Christie

Appearing on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno, Bill Maher gave Ann Romney a lot of credit for her August 28th speech at the Republican National Convention: “She had a tough assignment. She had to warm up Mitt Romney.” Maher did object to her appeal to the country’s economic problems, specifically referring to when Mrs. Romney said “We all feel the pain.”

He also said it was weird that the everything she said was contradicted by the next speaker, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, “Governor Fat Fat.” Maher got that one off pretending it was a gaffe, and said he thinks it’s really “Governor Crisco.”

Ann Romney’s whole speech, he explained, was about love – “all you need is love.” Then Christie came out and said: “eff love.” (It was bleeped).

“Isn’t this sort of emblematic of the whole Republican party?” Maher asked. “A woman says something. We all agree with it’s reasonable and then a meathead white guy comes out and tells her to shut up.”

Jay Leno thought that Chris Christie’s body language speaks to being a Democrat and “blue collar.” Maher said it was very personal to him because he actually grew up in New Jersey and got a pretty good public school education there, even though the state has been the butt of stupid jokes like forever.

Sometimes, Maher continued, he likes Chris Christie because he says things that are real in a way that most politicians don’t. But, Maher pointed out that Christie was asked last year what he thought about evolution and the Governor’s reply was “None of your business.” Maher said “This is what you say when you make a baby with the maid,” referencing another well-known Governor.

Ha! There went his chance to educate Jay Leno on his “blue collar” observation and the pecking order in New Jersey. He could have pointed out that he grew up in River Vale and Chris Christie grew up in Livingston (where Snooki just had her baby), neither of which are remotely blue collar.

River Vale was ranked #29 on the 100 Best Places to Live in a 2007 CNN-Money magazine survey. Current demographics in wikipedia list River Vale as over 88% white and Livingston as 76% white, but when Christie and Maher were growing up there, it’s a pretty safe bet both towns were a lot closer to 100% white than that. When the 1967 Newark riots were going on, Christie was going on 6 years old and Maher was 11. Neither were anywhere near the “economic pain” or inequality that sparked the rioting.

Now don’t you agree that what’s really weird is for Bill Maher to be referring to Chris Christie as a “meathead white guy”?