Just Like Rob Ford
Rob Ford is the conservative mayor of Toronto, Ontario, Canada who has been in the news lately concerning his problems with chemical dependency. Few people know that his problem with dependency was first noted in South Florida.
Looking at the train wreck that Rob Ford has become, it isn’t surprising that chemical dependency is a problem with South Florida politicians.
Trey Radel, Congresscritter for district that includes Fort Meyers got busted buying cocaine, and like Ford, he claimed it was because he was an alcoholic, not a junky.
Get real, Radel was a Tea Party conservative talk-radio host when he ran for Congress. Does anyone really believe that any of those people could do that sober?
Of course, they will all head for rehab and come out ‘all better’, because that’s what conservatives do since it’s ‘not their fault’.
Oh, the apology to the family is gratuitous theater. If they are really a family they already know about the problem.
8 comments
One commenter over at TPM offered the observation that to do cocaine, one needs some coke, a razor blade and a Trey.
Hey, for once, I’m not to blame…
I will add that most of the Treys I have known (or, more likely, known about) have been Republicans… the obsession with naming three or more generations of males in one family with the same given names seems to be a conservative trait.
He just announced the rehab, and made his call for forgiveness and redemption. He was nowhere near as good at it as Jimmy Swaggart, but he won’t resign.
Jon Stewart has (of course) been having a great time with Ford the past couple weeks! They kinda concluded that almost everyone in Toronto must be a) On drugs; b) complete idiots; c) too gutless to admit they screwed up electing him! (or a combination) 😆 Of course, they gave him the “Gift the keeps on giving” award. 🙂
Actually it is a lot like Chicago under the first Daley. He has a following among a certain segment of the population, and those that oppose him haven’t been effective in mounting a real campaign with a decent candidate to oppose him.
His family has money, and he spends a lot of it on high school football, which makes him popular with the local football fans. These are people who don’t see anything wrong with getting drunk and being obnoxious. Despite being a millionaire, he has convinced the working class that he is one of them, and is being hounded by the elites in Toronto. You really can fool some of the people all the time, and if there are enough of them, you can be elected even if you are an obnoxious jerk like Rob Ford or Chris Christie.
Kryten, *everybody* has been having fun with Rob Ford recently. That crazy video of him careening around the council chamber like an overeager puppy on crack and knocking over the elderly council-lady was comedy gold. Another friend of mine who lives in Australia now but just moved (back) there from Canada keeps getting asked by Aussies about Rob Ford since, having lived in Vancouver for a couple of years, clearly that makes him an expert on Toronto politics :twisted:. The man has made a world-wide laughingstock of Toronto, and I can’t think that this is good for his re-election chances.
As for the Ford family being rich, yes, but there’s rich, and there’s rich. Let’s just say that the Fords are well known in the pharmaceuticals business… and I ain’t talkin’ the *legal* pharmaceuticals business. Kinda like Joe Kennedy pushed his boys into politics after making his fortune as a bootlegger… the fact that he made his money not quite on the up-and-up pretty much took the sting out of the whole son-of-a-rich-father thing.
Badtux, when some group dig in, you need a united front to get rid of them. If the opposition in Toronto is no better organized than the opposition in Ottawa, Rob Ford can hang around as long as he wants.
The media is now comparing your Repug congresscritter Trey Radel to Rob Ford, which given what I’ve heard (and given that Radel posted on his blog that his fave vacation spot is Cartagena Columbia), is a fair comparison. 😆
Oh, and I’ll add Radel to my very large list of Major US Hypocrits (which does include almost all Repugs anyway, and not a few Dem’s) as this is the guy who supported legislation to force food stamp recipients to pass a drug test before receiving benefits. *shrug*
Repugs get their ‘welfare checks’ from their corporate owners, so they don’t care if they beat up poor people.
That drug testing was implemented in Florida and has cost the state a hell of a lot of money as it turns out that one of the things that poor people can’t afford to buy are drugs, so the state has been paying for drug testing that shows that poor people are more drug free than the population in general.
We should be testing elected officials for drugs. They really would save the state some money.