Pufferfish

The real political junkies out there shouldn't miss The Hunt for Pufferfish, the story of the Romney campaign's vice presidential candidate decision-making. Pufferfish was the campaign's code name for New Jersey Governor Chris Christie.

Based on their junk-food-saturated vetting diet, they called their undertaking Project Goldfish (after the crackers)—ultimately giving each of the VP finalists an aquatic code name. Myers’ plan was to have Project Goldfish completed by Memorial Day. In April she presented Romney with a list of two dozen names, which he whittled down to 11: Kelly Ayotte, John Cornyn, Chris Christie, Mitch Daniels, Bill Frist, Mike Huckabee, Bob McDonnell, Tim Pawlenty, Rob Portman, Marco Rubio and Paul Ryan. 

Within a month, the vetters had assembled preliminary research books on the 11, which Romney perused and then rendered his short list: Christie (Pufferfish), Pawlenty (Lakefish), Portman (Filet o Fish), Rubio (Pescado) and Ryan (Fishconsin).

In the nine months since Christie’s endorsement of Romney in October 2011, Boston had formed a mixed view of the governor who George W. Bush had once nicknamed Big Boy.

Hate to say it (no, really, I do) but, if true, the code name thing is a pretty good indication of a low level of professionalism on Romney's staff.  Surprise, surprise.

Turns out Christie has a lot of baggage.