I Don't Need That Wuh-Wuh

David Weigel | September 14, 2006

For all you haters who don't understand why I, or anyone, would follow partisan politics so closely: This is why. Decrepit Maryland Comptroller William Donald Schaefer, a former Baltimore Mayor and MD Governor who refused to retire at age 84, was demolished in Tuesday's primary election. His long, sexist battle against rival candidate Janet Owens - whom he called "fat" and compared to "Mother Hubbard" - led to a victory by long-shot candidate Peter Franchot. Schaefer commemorated the event with a press conference that reads like a cross between a David Mamet play and Dutch Schultz's famous last words.

Q: What are you doing next?

Schaefer: Well, I thought I'd go to lunch. I'm gonna have a baloney sandwich.

Q: Is this the end of your political career?

Schaefer: Are you gonna raise age again? Are you raising age again?

Q: No, no.

Schaefer: Yes, you did. You raised the question of age. I've had that dirty fight all through my life. I was either too young or now I'm too old.

Q: Do you think you'll run for public office again?

Schaefer: Wuh, wuh, wuh.

Apropos of nothing, here's the website of U.S. Term Limits.

Comments

|9.14.06 @ 9:15AM|#

The other hilarious exchanges in that press conferences are when Schaefer is asked who he;ll endorse in the govnernor's race. I'm torn between thinking he's being deliberately evasive, or maybe sincerely hard of hearing (suspiciously only in regards to this question) or just batshit crazy. Probably some combination of the three:

Q: Who will you endorse in the governor's race?

Schaefer: Yes!

Q: Who will you endorse?

Schaefer: Yes sir.

Q: Will you endorse Gov. Ehrlich?

Schaefer: I have a heck of a time hearing.

Q: Will you endorse Gov. Ehrlich?

Schaefer: Now what was that again?

Q: Are you gonna endorse Gov. Ehrlich?

Schaefer: What was that again. I gotta get me ear? Yuk, yuk, yuk.

[snip]

Q: Who would you like to see become the next governor of Maryland?

Schaefer: Yes, I really do.

Q: Do you like Bob Ehrlich?

Schaefer: Who?

Q: Bob Ehrlich?

Schaefer: Bob Ehrlitch? What did he say?

Q: What about Martin O'Malley? Do you like Martin O'Malley?

Schaefer: I love everyone. I haven't an enemy in the world.

Q: Who are you gonna vote for?

Schaefer: [To photographer] Take the damn picture! Who am I gonna vote for? I think a real tragedy is how messed up the voting was in the state. There's no reason for that. You had plenty of time. You had plenty of money. And then to have a disgraceful election like that where people can't get into voting booths, people aren't there, I think that's bad. So I hope they rectify that. They should. They got enough money to do it.

|9.14.06 @ 10:02AM|#

When I was growing up, they had term limits....they were called elections.

|9.14.06 @ 10:33AM|#

I'd just like to take this moment to thank the folks at Reason, and here, for convincing me to do a 180 on term limits. I used to be dead set against 'em. Then again, I've also vowed never to vote again, so... not sure where that leaves me.

|9.14.06 @ 10:40AM|#

I've always like Donald Schaefer, ever since he started an open war with that pencil-neck, boneless, bag of crap git that was our former governor.

Because people got so sick of Glendickhead and his annoited successor (a Kennedy, no less), they actually voted in a Republican, who is arguably the closest thing we have to a libertarian at this level of government.

But I think this was just a fluke. Come next election, people here are going to mindlessly pull the "D" lever as they always do in this state.

|9.14.06 @ 12:18PM|#

I think that was possibly the most amazing bit of long form, free-verse poetry I've ever read.


"There was a sign I used to put behind my head. The word was 'people'."

I'm not gonna have a tombstone. I'm gonna be put in a mausoleum next to Hilda Mae. There are two words: He cared.

What I said I either said it because it was deliberate or it just ran out my face or whatever it is. No, I don't apologize. I might be sorry I said some things, but I'm not gonna apologize

Q: She considered you a friend. Schaefer: When? Q: A few months ago.

There's dirty politics and there's filthy politics and I don't know which is which.


I dont think i've ever read bullshit that had quite as much truth in it as this.

JG

|9.14.06 @ 1:53PM|#

What's the backstory to the picture of Schaefer brandishing a gun? The look on the other guy's face is priceless. (I'm immediately thinking of Chris Rock's line in Jay & Silent Bob Strike Back: "Crazy crackers with guns!")

|9.14.06 @ 4:35PM|#

Here's my favorite quote:

"The comptroller's job is a job that nobody knows the importance of the job because we never tried to make it into something that it wasn't."

Well that certainly cleared it up.