Joe Arpaio says Obama's birth certificate forged

You wonder how much Arpaio's investigation of this has helped contributions to his "Cold Case Posse." Seems like taking private donations to fund actual law enforcement investigations is a recipe for disaster, legal problems or a comfortable retirement.

 

In a sane world, yes. But honestly, on a list of Arpaio's ethical and legal shortcomings, that wouldn't even crack the top 25.

Putting aside the grandstanding hatred of Latinos and abuse of jail inmates, this is a guy who intentionally misspent $100 million dollars in his department.

 

Maybe his mechanic listens to Rush Limbaugh.

 

Arapaio. Brewer.

At least we now know where two of the Three Stooges were reincarnated as. Stay classy, Arizona.

 

It says volumes about the citizenry there that it keeps re-electing him, assuming it's an elected office.

 

It is.

He's always been a shithead, but most of his career it's been the "I'm so tough on prisoners" act that people eat up. The "I hate Mexicans" act is semi-recent, and may well be wearing thin. The state ringleader of the anti-Latino crowd, Russell Pearce, was just recalled from the legislature, so the tide seems to be shifting.

Here's the thing about Arpaio: some of his most egregious stuff never gets any attention. His racial profiling is finally getting national attention thanks to the federal investigation (which he claims is retribution from Obama, ignoring the fact that it was started under the Bush administration). But that's the tip of a spectacularly corrupt iceberg.

This is a guy who arrests his political rivals -- and I don't mean just the protesters. He used to get funding to track down fugitives, but he used that money to set up checkpoints to look for Latino drivers. The county supervisors voted to take the money away, since he wasn't using it for the correct purpose. So, he arrested the county supervisors who voted against him, and raided the homes of their friends. When a judge threw out the case against the commissioners he raided the judge's office and home, announcing that he was shocked to learn how far the conspiracy against him was extending.

He did all of this with the backing of the then-County Attorney, who as a result is now in the middle of a disbarment hearing.

If people actually paid attention to what Arpaio does versus his ridiculous posturing, he'd be out of office and probably in prison.

 

Please don't take this the wrong way, but I'm constantly amazed by the American appetite for the crazy. We have lunatics in Canuckistan but they don't have a patch on yours.

 

No apologies necessary, HC. Rivaling our lunatics is a frightening goal.

 

Arpaio further proves the theory most Americans are idiots.

 

What PC said.

 

I'm not an Obama fan but why the fuck does anybody give a shit what this guy says?

 

I'm a fan of a Scottish writer named Barry Graham (http://dogobarrygraham.blogspot.com/) who is now based in Phoenix.

Anyway, Graham is a very harsh critic of Sheriff Joe, and whenever Joe pops up in the media I can't help but be reminded of a (long) piece that Graham wrote about him. It appeared in Harper's Magazine in April 2001. It's over ten years old now, but I still think that is is relevant.

It's available on Barry Graham's website.

http://barrygrahamauthor.com/arpaio