Obnoxious is as obnoxious does I suppose.

The guy who yelled and cursed at constituents, the guy who slipped out of the Bridgegate debacle like a well-oiled hippo, the guy who used Island Beach State Park as his personal playground closed to everyone else during a state shutdown is now about to cost taxpayers $85,000 for a painting of himself.

It's a tradition to have an official portrait painted when a governor leaves office to hang in the Statehouse. Jim Florio drew a lot of heat for having such an expensive one done when he left. His was $58,000. That was bad enough and a lot of people called him out on wasting so much of taxpayer's money. But Chris Christie's will cost a whopping 46% more than that.

Why so much?

Because His Pompousness insisted it be done by Australian artist Paul Newton who has done portraits of royalty and major celebrities. Because this is how Christie thinks of himself. It is being commissioned through Sewell Fine Portraiture. Well, la dee da for him. What a hypocrite. He often spoke of the selfishness of public workers for wanting their pensions they were promised when they started or for wanting satisfactory healthcare for their families. Yet he has no problem with costing taxpayer's $85,000 for his bloated ego. If he truly believed in fiscal conservatism he'd be the first former governor to suggest either ending the practice or replacing oil paintings with well done professional photographs for a fraction of the cost.

Here's another interesting thing to note. The three governors before Christie paid less for all three of their portraits combined than what Christie is paying for his. Corzine, Codey and McGreevey paid a combined $74,500. Still too much of course but nowhere near the obnoxious amount Christie's will cost.

Want to get really angry? Consider the total cost of the portraits for Florio, Whitman, DiFrancesco, Codey, McGreevey, Corzine and Christie. It adds up to $280,500 of our tax money. More than a quarter of a million dollars, our dollars, for their self-aggrandizement. It's sad that these power mongers really feel like royalty that need to be celebrated.

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