Arizona Schools Chief Super Busy Penning Anonymous Blog Comments About Poor People, Lazy Pigs (Same Thing)

Well here's a variation on a theme: A Republican official has been caught posting rude crap to the internet, but for a change, it's not pictures of watermelons in front of the White House. Which is a step up, maybe, except that it turns out that the official, Arizona state schools Superintendent John Huppenthal, has been leaving a whole bunch of anonymous wingnut comments on blogs; and lots of them have been about what a great job Arizona state schools Superintendent John Huppenthal has been doing. Oh, and also stuff about how people on welfare are "lazy pigs," Franklin Roosevelt caused the Great Depression and helped bring Hitler to power, and Margaret Sanger personally aborted 16 million black babies. Among other things. And yes, of course, he posted a lot of those comments from his work computer, because obviously slagging on welfare moms is part of the mission of the Arizona Superintendent of Public Instruction. Can't have effective schools if Poors are buying crab legs on the public dime, right?

Just to prove he was a Serious Person, Huppenthal posted his comments under Big Thinker pseudonyms like "Thucydides," "Socrates," and the somewhat less classical "Falcon9." You know, just like in Ender's Game, where adolescents using classical pseudonyms shape the course of history with their pithy essays on the interwebs. There is no evidence whatsoever that Huppenthal was also the commenter behind the accounts "FloppyTittyman6969," "ObamaOsamaTheSameA," or "Princess Twilight Sparkle." Unfortunately, the anonymous commenter seemed to be just a little too intimately interested in protecting the reputation of his favorite Arizona leader, John Huppenthal:

Writers for the Democratic Blog for Arizona have been suggesting for several months that all signs pointed to Huppenthal as the author. Huppenthal remained silent on the accusation until Wednesday, when he spoke exclusively to The Arizona Republic.

"I love talking about public policy, and I have a passion for engaging in debate," Huppenthal said on Wednesday. "I probably have 300,000 words out on the Internet, and 100 of them are getting me in trouble. When all of your missteps are there all together for people to see, it's not a pretty picture."

Much though we imagine it might be so, it doesn't appear that those "100 words" were just a single post repeating the n-word over and over. But hey, everything's just fine now, he apologized, so what more do You People want?

In an earlier statement released to The Republic, Huppenthal apologized, saying, "I sincerely regret if my comments have offended anyone."

There are of course a whole bunch of serious ethical issues about the propriety, and even the legality of a public official trolling blogs on his work computer, especially when he's doing it to promote himself. But mostly, you just have to appreciate the full-on stupidity of posting comments like these under the name "Thucydides":

• "It was Darwin, not Hitler who named the Germans the master race. It was Darwin who expressed approval of eliminating both Jews and Africans. Hitler worked to eliminate the Jews. Margaret Sanger, founder of Planned Parenthood was given the job of eliminating African Americans."

• "Our successful small businessmen/job creators are being taxed to death. At most, they should give up 40 cents on the dollar to expanding government burden. But, Obama demands 63 cents. Meanwhile, Obama is rewarding the lazy pigs with Food Stamps (44 million people), air conditioning, free health care, flat screen TV's (typical of "poor" families).

• "As for Huppenthal hating public education and hispanics, that's not going to wash. Huppenthal grew up in south Tucson, all of his friends were Hispanics. He was the only Caucasian in his social group. Jimmy Ortega, Manny Gonzales, Luis Rodriguez, Charlie Praciado, Marcelino Lucero. Just because he won't support the "we hate Whitey" curriculum of extreme Chicano activists doesn't mean he can't do well among Hispanics."

This idiot isn't just in trouble with minorities and the state of Arizona. He's going to have to answer to a lot of pissed off Classics professors.

[ AZcentral / AZcentral again]

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