First, expect a flood of stories for several weeks in the traditional media about how Christie’s dominant win “proves” that Republicans must “move back to the middle,” forget the social issues and abandon the Tea Party.

As usual, the conventional wisdom will be wrong largely because that analysis misses the key to understanding why Christie is quite likely the most credible politician in America, at least for now.

People believe Christie even if they don’t agree with him. He is not seen as a double-talking, spin-crazy, self-serving professional politician. When public trust in government is at an all-time low, believability is the sine qua non of political success.