Is it Bullying, if the Person is the Governor?

Governor Christie, as he appeared on the Piers
Morgan show on February 21, 2012.

Governor Chris Christie’s appearance on the David Letterman show set off another round of public discussion aimed squarely at, ‘should he or shouldn’t he?.  Lose weight, that is.  I recorded Letterman’s’ show on the DVR.  Pris and I viewed it the following day at an earlier hour.

I like Christie.  I admire and respect him as the CEO of New Jersey, and I would like him to get into better physical shape.  There is no question that the man is very, very large. I wish that he would shed some pounds

But I’m not going to hound him over it.  The fabricated expressions of concern over the size of his waist are beginning to sail out of control.  They border on harassment.

Without mincing words, any school administrator In the Garden State will tell you that if a student were to be assailed over the size of her or his body in the manner by which the Governor has been, there would be hell to pay, as the machinery of the state’s anti-bullying law would quickly move into high gear.
Just try it within the Bridgewater-Raritan School District and see how far you get.

Yet Chris Christie has become a pseudo-legitimate target because he is a popular governor with a high approval rating, as well as a man who has garnered significant attention in the national political arena. 

Dr. Connie Mariano, former personal White House physician to President Clinton, is the latest neo-luminary to take aim at Christie’s weight.  Surprise, surprise!  No one in Arizona, where Mariano now caters to CEO’s, bothered to advise her that Christie is not a soft target. 

The Guv, in typical Christie-speak fired back, calling her “a hack” who should “shut up.”  My. My.  What impoliteness on the governor’s part.  Geez, Guv, would you please tone it down a little? 

Now you’ve gone and done it.  The lady from Arizona is “shocked” and all atwitter, thinking that you are not “gracious” and certainly not “appreciative” of her unsought-for advice.

When a physician like Dr. Mariano fires away in the public forum about the Governor of New Jersey’s weight, thereby prompting the man’s 12-year old son to apprehensively approach his father, asking, “Dad are you gonna die?,”  the tipping point has been reached.

Such an egregiously unsolicited public diagnosis by a former White House physician is an insult to the integrity of the medical profession -- no matter how large our governor is.