Prudently setting priorities and adhering to them are essential to living a contented life. The acts provide for establishing parameters, setting goals and laying the pathways to tread. Absence of all of that breeds chaos; chaos wreaks havoc, and havoc erases focus.

Responsible people work at positively designing their lives, but smart priority setting is not found in politics or the people who play that game with ill will at best and malice at worst. That corruption seeps down into the daily lives of the rest of us; therefore, we must be judicious and recognize the smoke and mirrors.

I’m speaking specifically of the George Washington Bridge lane closures five months ago in New Jersey and the attendant publicity with the state’s governor, Chris Christie.

On its face, it’s seen as a lot of inconvenience from traffic jams. Los Angeles drivers experience that every single time Barack Obama takes one of his whimsical and frequent money-hunting trips to the city. Angelenos are quite familiar with the snarl of streets being blocked off, closed intersections, grounded planes and incalculable delays.

Many would ask what all of the fuss is about.

The bigger picture is the abuse of power. That’s where Christie comes in.

His former chief of staff, Bridget Anne Kelly, was an instigator of the fiasco; emails prove that. Christie acted judiciously and promptly fired her. That’s smart priority setting. He then spoke to the media and took questions for nearly two hours – but it wasn’t enough. The blood’s in the water and the sharks quickly circled. It’s the Democrats’ famous line of convenience: What did he know and when did he know it?

There should be no problem in anyone’s mind with investigating abuse of power by an elected official or any appointed person. What is flabbergasting is that this event is The One to earmark for an abuse-of-power issue.

This matter’s investigations are a great demonstration of overkill with proctological political examinations. It’s the smoke and mirrors I mentioned earlier: Keep Christie in the news, and it’s a multi-pronged aim for gain. Democrats get to taint a popular Republican, the scandal boosts Hillary’s image, and focus is off of the many disasters of the Obama administration.

Clogging up traffic profoundly pales in comparison to the deceit and lies perpetrated upon our country’s citizens, and it certainly blanches when stacked next to American deaths.

America, but for liberals and many Democrats, would be far better served with timely, finite and truthful details of the targeting of specific Americans using the IRS; targeting Americans in general with the NSA; and at least five American deaths between Eric Holder’s botched Fast and Furious gun-running operation and the Democrats’ Benghazi horror. And there’s so much more.

At least all of those affected people weren’t stuck in snarled traffic on a bridge.

After all, what difference does it make?

Betty Arenson has lived in the SCV since 1968 and describes herself as a conservative who’s concerned about progressives’ politics and their impacts on the country, her children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren. She says she is unashamed to own a gun or a Bible, couldn’t care less about the color of the president’s skin, and demands that he uphold his oath to protect and follow the Constitution of the United States in its entirety. Her commentary publishes Fridays.