(IBD) Chris Christie was Wrong, John Boehner Right On delaying Pork-filled superstorm Sandy bill

[Daniel John Sobieski]

A pork-barrel feast of goodies for federal agencies to fix museum roofs in  D.C. and aid fisheries in Alaska, cooked up in the middle of the night, is not  the way to aid hurricane victims or run a government.

As if the fallout from agreeing to a bad deal that raises the debt by $4  trillion and accepts a 41-1 ratio in tax hikes to spending cuts weren't enough,  Speaker of the House John Boehner has New Jersey's Chris Christie on his  case.

"There's only one group to blame," the New Jersey governor said of the Sandy  relief bill that was not included in the fiscal cliff deal, "the House Majority  and John Boehner."

Christie, the man who hugged President Obama during his post-hurricane  photo-op for doing a "good job," can't understand why Boehner, in a brief moment  of fiscal sanity, decided the pork-laden Sandy relief bill might need a tad more  examination before we rush to fix the roof on the Smithsonian Institution and  subsidize fisheries in hurricane-ravaged Alaska.

"The House majority failed the most basic test of leadership," Christie said  Wednesday, as the new year dawned, "and they did so with callous disregard to  the people of my state."

Except the Sandy bill wasn't just about providing relief to directly impacted  areas such as New Jersey and Staten Island.

Democrats had expanded the legislation during a markup to include not only  areas affected by Sandy, but also to provide money for all "storm events that  occurred in 2012 along the Gulf Coast and Atlantic Coast within the boundaries  of the North Atlantic and Mississippi Valley divisions of the Corps that were  affected by Hurricanes Sandy and Isaac."

This was done to get red state Republican senators from Alabama, Texas and  Mississippi on board, old-fashion vote-buying.

Read More At IBD:  http://news.investors.com/ibd-editorials/010313-639198-christie-sla...