Crazy Candidate of the Day

Today's Crazy Candidate is Arizona's Jesse Kelly.

Jesse Kelly is a teabagging Libertarian running for Congress from Arizona's 8th District. Jesse don't like no government regulations, and if a few people have to get Salmonella, well that's just their problem.

Via C&L:

During a question-and-answer period, a voter asked Kelly about the recent salmonella outbreak, which led to recall of more than half a billion eggs.The voter asked if Kelly, if elected, would he help pass a law that would allow the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) and other government agencies to shut down companies that have too many safety violations, such as the companies that allowed millions of eggs that sickened people to be sold to the public.

Sounds reasonable. Sounds more than reasonable, it really sounds like a no-brainer. Why aren't we able to shut down companies like Massey Energy, Deepwater Horizon, and Farmer Bob's Salmonelleggs when they have demonstrated repeatedly that they don't give a shit about safety?

Kelly responded that he doesn’t “believe what we’re lacking right now is more regulations on companies,” complaining that “you could probably spit on the grass and get arrested by the federal government by now.”

We don't need any dang guvmint reg'lations, and to prove it, here's a blatantly untrue scenario I just thought up!

When the voter followed up by asking, “Who’s protecting us?” Kelly responded, “It’s our job to protect ourselves.”

Seriously, if you don't have the scientific acumen to be able to test your food for salmonella before you eat it you really have no business eating eggs!

And when the lady asks “Am I supposed to go to a chicken farmer and say I’d like you to close down because all of your birds are half dead?” Kelly first demonstrates a stunning level of ignorance saying "I don't know much about chicken farmers or salmonella outbreaks. I really haven't heard much about that" (paraphrase) as if that's a defense. Then spouts some ridiculous completely untrue bullshit about regulations:

But I know this: Every part of our economy that is regulated by the government doesn’t have fewer disasters, it has more”

Does he have any evidence, any statistics to back this up? No. He does have a bizzare interpretation of the recent oil spill to offer as support for his stupid bullshit argument.
Kelly claims that the BP oil spill was the fault of the government because they wouldn't allow the oil companies to drill directly in the offshore fisheries. Never mind that BP consciously decided to violate safety procedures. Never mind that their penny-wise approach led them to omit a blowout valve that might have prevented the disaster. No, the real problem is that they couldn't just set up an oil derrick next to Bubba Gump's shrimp boat.

Check out the video:



This is what we're going to get if, as predicted, the teabaggers and their allies in the "mainstream" Republican Party retake the House and/or Senate this year. No regulations, if you get salmonella it's your own fault. Better a few people die of food poisoning than our libertarian ideals be compromised! No rules for oil companies, they can drill wherever they want and we'll just trust that they know best. And no matter how fucked up things get, we'll just wrap ourselves in the comfortable delusion that government interference would make it even worse.