During an election year in which the GOP Clown Car is chock full of nuts, delusional psychotics, schizophrenics, paranoid moonbats, compulsive liars, and village idiots, it’s easy to overlook some of its more spectacularly and dangerously insane passengers. Case in point: Governor Paul LePage of Maine, who is calling for public beheadings of convicted drug dealers. Specifically, LePage wants to resurrect a device employed by his French ancestors: the guillotine.
It is absolutely true, and his statement is on record. During a recent interview on a local radio station, he called for the death penalty for drug traffickers, stating that “We should give them an injection of the stuff they sell.” But LePage didn’t stop there: “What we ought to do is bring the guillotine back…we could have public executions.”
Earlier, LePage made racially-charged comments characterizing all drug dealers as inner-city blacks from New York and Connecticut with names like “D-Money, Smoothie [and] Shifty,” with comments such as “half the time they impregnate a young white girl before they leave.” That’s not all; over the years, the Governor of Maine has continued to exhibit all the indications of acute foot-in-mouth disease, the primary symptom of which is constipation of the brain and diarrhea of the mouth. Among some of the more memorable bon mots to emerge from this intellectual rival of Homer Simpson:
“[State] Senator Jackson claims to be for the people, but he’s the first one to give it to the people without providing Vaseline” – from a 2013 interview with a reporter from Portland television station WMTW
“Everybody looks at the negative effects of global warming, but with the ice melting, the Northern Passage has opened up” – made in 2013 at a transportation conference, suggesting that trade routes across the Arctic Ocean would be good for commerce
“Tell them to kiss my butt” – in response to a 2011 invitation to speak before the NAACP
“If you take a plastic bottle and put it in the microwave and you heat it up, it gives off a chemical similar to estrogen. And so the worst case is some women might have little beards” – defending his 2011 attempt to roll back state environmental laws that prohibit the manufacture and sale of plastic bottles containing toxic bisphenol A
“As your governor, you’re going to be seeing a lot of me on the front page, saying, ‘Gov. LePage tells Obama to go to hell’ ” – made during a 2010 campaign speech
LePage’s outrageous statements (of which the above are only a small sample) are just the beginning. Over his term, LePage has used his office to intimidate government officials and lawmakers, as well as non-profit organizations, and his many opponents in order to impose his warped agenda on the people of Maine.
To be fair, Paul LePage had a rather difficult childhood. He grew up in an impoverished French-speaking household – English is his second language, and did not come easily to him. His father was a physically and emotionally abusive alcoholic and his mother was a timid soul who lived in terror of her husband. After leaving home at age 11 (following an incident in which his father beat him and broke his nose), he lived on the streets for two years. His limited English was a barrier to many opportunities during his younger years. Much to LePage’s credit, he eventually mastered the English language, enrolling in college (where he became the editor of the campus newspaper) and going on to earn both a bachelor’s degree in accounting and an MBA.
His difficult beginnings do not excuse him from being a complete and total a**hole, however. Many people who overcome adversity to achieve success learn and develop qualities such as compassion and understanding for those who are less fortunate. LePage apparently learned compassion from his abusive father; it is a concept utterly alien to him. Instead, Maine’s governor has become a thoughtless, inconsiderate, racist boor with delusions of grandeur.
Earlier this month, Maine legislators decided that they aren’t going to take it anymore. They introduced a measure to investigate Governor LePage and introduce articles of impeachment if warranted. Representative Ben Chipman of Portland said,
“People have really had enough, all across the state…they’re tired of the governor’s behavior and they’re tired of the legislature not doing anything about it. I thought, yeah, they’re right, we do need to do something about [it].”
Hopefully, they will. LePage’s achievement in rising from poverty to become a successful businessman and politician is admirable, on the surface. However, somewhere along the way, he lost both his heart and his mind. He is an embarrassment to the people of the Pine Tree State and to the nation. It’s time for LePage to go.
