By Star-Ledger Editorial Board
February 1, 2010, 5:33AM
If timing is everything in politics, then Gov. Chris Christie is starting to look like one lucky fellow.
Because in the last quarter of 2009, the economy grew at a faster clip than it has in six years. Even Ford Motor Co. turned a profit sooner than anyone expected.
Governors like to think they are masters of their own fate. But their popularity tends to rise and fall with the economy. Gov. Tom Kean presided over the 1980s boom. Gov. Jim Florio ran for re-election during a recession. We liked Gov. Christie Whitman during the boom in the 1990s, and we soured when it started to slow.
Poor Gov. Jon Corzine. First Carla Katz, and then the Great Recession.
Now comes Christie. By 2013, the national economy under President Obama may just make him look like a genius.