One would think that Florida Democratic Congressman Joe Garcia can only get so many free passes from the national press before they'll have to acknowledge his serious problems. We'll see.
Back in January, the Associated Press and the rest of the national establishment media managed to limit their coverage of the arrest and ultimate guilty plea of Garcia's chief of staff for illegally plotting to obtain absentee ballot to local outlets. They did this even though — or perhaps because — the Congressman excused the man's attack on election integrity, for which he received a wrist-slap sentence of 90 days in jail, as "a well-intentioned attempt to maximize voter turnout." A week or so ago, there was an ear wax incident, which I'd rather skip. Earlier today, America Rising posted a far more important video, wherein the congressman bizarrely claimed — he says he wasn't serious, but it doesn't sound like it to me — that additional money spent on Mexican border security proves that "communism works."
Mark Caputo at the Miami Herald's blog has coverage of the story, including the video and full transcript (bolds are mine; paragraph breaks added by me):
Transcript (edited slightly from the Herald's version to improve accuracy):
It's when you attract people that you are the dominant culture, that people want to emulate and copy what you’re doing because it works.
And in America, we are, we are doing, we are doing a huge disservice to ourselves by not understanding how powerful of a driver in the economy an immigration system that works can be -- uh, and continues to be -- and by not having an immigration system that works.
And let me give you an example of the kind of money we’ve poured in: So the most dangerous—sorry, the safest- city in America is El Paso, Texas. It happens to be across the border from the most dangerous city in the Americas, which is Juarez, right? And two of the safest cities in America, two of them are on the border with Mexico.
And of course, the reason is that we’ve proved that Communism works. If you give everybody a good government job, there’s no crime. But that isn’t what we should be doing on the border. The kind of money we’ve poured into it, and we’re having diminishing returns. So while we’re doing, we’re spending all this money here, we have border problems in Puerto Rico that we haven’t been able to set up a system that’s safe there. People are finding alternative routes.
The opportunity to get this right and the mistake that Republicans make -- and I say Republicans because it’s Republicans right now -- I’m no one to say that Democrats were also possessed by Xenophobia in 2008 and particularly after 9/11 and the economic crisis, but today we’re in a much better place as a party. And the problem that Republicans have is that they’re fighting a battle they cannot win.”
Garcia doesn't change his tone of voice in any way as he says: "We've proved Communism works."
The Herald's Caputo also pointed out that "El Paso is one of the safest big cities in the U.S. (not the safest city of any size) and it looks like San Pedro Sula, Honduras is more dangerous than Juarez."
Matt Drudge currently has Garcia's sentiments as his top headline, and several center-right blogs, recognizing a legitimate controversy, have also pounced. But as of just before 2 p.m. Eastern Time, in searches on "Garcia communism" (not in quotes), the Associated Press had no story at its national site, while both the Politico and the New York Times had nothing relevant.
Perhaps they're awaiting instructions from Dear Leader or the Democratic National Committee as to how they should handle this serious faux pas — or should I say "honest revelation"? More likely, they're waiting for a Republican or conservative to react so they can break the news in their customary fashion: "Republicans attack poor, innocent, angelic Democrat for saying something obviously innocuous."
Cross-posted at BizzyBlog.com.
