What people are talking about in politics
By Chris Ingram
Kottkamp’s Follies
Last week in one of my columns I referred to some of the scoundrels in the Florida G.O.P. leadership mentioning that they were “the kind of guys who make Jeff Kottkamp look honest.” Kottkamp, who is Florida’s do-nothing Lieutenant Governor best known for hundreds of thousands of dollars in expenses on state-owned aircraft to attend football games and concerts, apparently took issue with the column. Shortly after it was posted he e-mailed me and asked for my phone number. I provided my number but he never called. It’s no wonder. What would he have said? Reports came out this week that the RPOF spend over $47,000 for Kottkamp to attend lavish dinners and take trips to Disney World – with his kids no less…
I e-mailed Kottkamp this afternoon and told him he should be ashamed of himself. He replied back that I shouldn't believe everything I read in the newspapers. I would add, I shouldn't believe anything coming out of the mouths of career politicians.
The state of politics is the worst I have ever seen it. Politicians like Jeff Kottkamp, Charlie Crist, Marco Rubio, Jeff Atwater, today are unaccountable, have a sense of entitlement, and refuse to admit wrong doing – even when their hands are caught in the cookie jar. Oh, and to my Democrat friends, your party is full of them too – I just don’t care about your party enough to make mention of them.
Slick Politicians Loath Oil Slicks
It’s pretty funny watching all the politicians squirm over drilling in the Gulf of Mexico following the BP oil spill disaster. While Charlie Crist was for it before he was against it, Marco Rubio is sticking to his original position in favor of exploration. Kudos to Marco for being honest – wish he’d done the same with his Amex card charges.
As for oil, the computer you’re reading this column on is petroleum based, as is the packaging of most any product you’re going to use to cook dinner tonight, and pretty much at least ninety percent of the products in our daily lives are a derivative of oil in some way or another.
A lot of Floridians selfishly don’t want drilling in the Gulf – just like the liberal tree hugging snobs in Cape Cod don’t want wind turbines off their coast. They preach environmentalism so long as it’s not in their backyards. This is hypocrisy at its finest. The oil spill is unfortunate, but whether it happened in the Gulf of Mexico or the Persian Gulf, environmental damage is bad either way. Personally I’d rather it happen here as I think we’re more financially, technologically, and morally equipped to do the right thing than some Arabian kingdom.
This is porn?
The Sunshine State News had a report earlier this week about State Senator Mike Bennett looking at “porn” on his computer while on the State House floor during debate about an abortion bill. I watched the video and in my humble opinion it was not pornographic in the least. You’ll see more skin on broadcast TV, and more than likely during any trip to a public place like a shopping mall these days.
I don’t know Mike Bennett well, but I know him. We shared a meal together once (he had tomato with peanut butter on it for breakfast – and it’s actually good!), and when I used to smoke I bummed him a cigarette a few times, and we’ve spoken on the phone on a couple of occasions. I’m not one to defend politicians very often, but in this case I’ll go out on a limb and say from what I do know of Sen. Bennett he’s a solid guy.
The Sunshine State News should be ashamed of itself for suggesting what Bennett was looking at was pornography. You be the judge. View the video and read the story here.
Chris Ingram is the president and founder of 411 Communications a corporate and political communications firm, and publisher of www.IrreverentView.com. Ingram is a frequent pundit on Fox News and CNN, and has written opinion columns for the Washington Times, UPI, Front Page Florida, and National Review online. E-mail him at: [email protected].
