I don't see why this guy is suddenly the darling of the right. He's like the Yankee version of Haley Barbour (substitute rudeness for racism).
he is the public face (and best public communicator) of those on the frontlines in a key battlefield of the class war: the battle to destroy the existing labor union infrastructure, where it is strongest (or, increasingly, the only place it exists at all), the public sector. obviously the business press will fawn over him, and thus so will the people that internalize the stories thrown at them.
This, also many Republicans don't realize that Christie won largely due to Corzine and would have lost against, say, Codey or Pallone.