This Man Legislates isn’t even a year old but it already has 102 posts documenting some of the most outrageous behavior from elected officials across the nation. I started this blog after years of frustration over legislators doing and saying things that should disqualify a person from holding an elected office, but somehow don’t. And I’m glad to see that it’s caught on. We’ve had more than 20K page views and nearly 10K notes!
Outrageous statements and actions will always garner some media attention, but no one seems to cover this broadly. These aren’t isolated incidents, and while I enjoy poking fun at terrible legislators, what I’m really trying to show is that these individuals are merely symptoms of a much bigger problem with our electoral system. My hope is that those who visit this blog come to laugh but leave outraged that our tax dollars pay their salaries.
Below are my top 10 favorite posts from 2015. Enjoy!
10: NH State Rep: Women Deserve Less Pay Then Men
“Men, by and large, make more because of some of the things that they do,” he said. “Their jobs are, by and large, riskier. They don’t mind working nights and weekends. They don’t mind working overtime or outdoors.”
9: Idaho Rep: ‘Slave Owners Were Good People Who Made Bad Decisions, Like Gays’
“Slave owners were very good Christians and good people,” he said, adding that he disagrees with slavery itself. “They weren’t terrible, rotten, horrible people. And that’s how I see gay people.”
8: New Hampshire Legislators Kill Fourth Graders’ Bill, Dreams In Front of Them
But the nine and ten-year-olds were in for a brutal lesson in realpolitik. At the start of the day, legislators turned and applauded to children for coming to the statehouse. When lawmakers began to consider the bill, however, Republican Rep. Warren Groen—who has devoted his career to combating abortion and marriage equality—took the floor to denounce the Red Tail Hawk. “It grasps [its prey] with its talons then uses its razor sharp beak to basically tear it apart limb by limb,” he explained as the children watched. “And I guess the shame about making this a state bird is it would serve as a much better mascot for Planned Parenthood.” (Slate, emphasis mine)
7: Texas Legislator Doesn’t Want Texas to Take Syrian Refugees Because it’s too Easy to Get a Gun in Texas
It should be noted that Tony Dale is a Republican and a proud recipient of an “A” rating from the National Rifle Association!
6: Wisconsin Senator: The Lego Movie is Part of an “Insidious Propaganda Campaign Against Business Owners”
“I actually called a gentleman, it was a couple months ago, he was so upset, he took his children to an animated movie … guess who the villain was? Evil Mr. Businessperson. It’s insidious. That propaganda starts very early,”
5: California Assemblywoman Shannon Grove: Abortion Causes Droughts
“Texas was in a long period of drought until Governor Perry signed the fetal pain bill,” she told the audience, presumably referring to HB 2, the omnibus Texas abortion bill that included a 20-week ban based on junk science. “It rained that night. Now God has His hold on California.”
4: Oklahoma Rep. Kevin Calvey Threatens to Set Himself on Fire over Abortion
He loudly said that if he were not a Christian, he would go across the street to the state Supreme Court building, douse himself in gasoline and set himself on fire to “protest the evil in that building.”
3: North Dakota State Rep. Randy Boehning Votes for Anti-gay Bill, Gets Caught Sending Dick Pics on Grindr
“Scrolling through the conversation, however, Smith found more than sexually suggestive messages. He found an unsolicited picture of the public servant’s not-so-public parts.” (WaPo)
2: New Mexico State Rep. Ken Martinez: Rape Is Sometimes 'Just Drunken College Sex'
Thanks Ken for being one of a small, but real, minority of Democrats who’ve made this tumblr. You are proof that horrible legislators are a bipartisan phenomenon!
1: Texas State Representative Matt Schaefer Wants Women to Carry Deceased Fetuses To Full Term
With 8,754 notes, this was our most popular post of 2015 by a wide margin. You might ask yourself, why would Matt Schaefer want to legislate this? Of course he has an answer.
Schaefer said that suffering is “part of the human condition, since sin entered the world.”
There you have it. Thanks so much for reading, supporting, and sharing this tumblr in 2015. Can’t wait to see what our favorite elected officials do next year!
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