Replace Marion Barry With A Houseplant--It's Not as Dumb as it Sounds

Another day, another addition to "Marion Barry's Greatest Hits". Just nominated Tuesday for the Democratic Party nod for yet another term to represent Ward 8 in the D.C. City Council, Barry decided to take to Twitter and make a series of racist remarks targeting Asian-American businessfolk who have the nerve to try and do business in his poverty-stricken part of the city. Curse those small entrepreneurs, daring to provide goods and services at agreed-upon prices for the community and help improve the tax base at the same time!

But enough has been said about how Barry is a vile bigot--no need to waste additional pixels on that. It's quite obvious to anyone who isn't an idiot (sorry, Ward 8 voters, but you'd have to collectively solve cold fusion before anyone's going to give you the benefit of the doubt on not being morons from here on out) that Barry needs to be retired. Every day he sits there representing his ward, he gives ammunition to the anti-D.C. Statehood forces who say "if that's the sort of trash you put in office, maybe you're not ready to govern yourself!" (Yes, I realize that Rod Blagojevich and Eliot Spitzer are good counterarguments to this--and of course every state should have the right to make their own bad decisions by electing scumbags--but Barry still doesn't help any cause for self-determination). Plus, it might be nice for the poorest part of the city to have a competent person representing them, who might actually be able to do some good for the community. An ignorant thug who ridiculously blames nonblack businesspeople for the community's ills is only part of the problem.

But keep this in mind--Barry has not been reelected yet; he only won the Democratic nomination. Who says the Ward can't redeem itself by electing an Independent in November? At this point, putting a houseplant in Barry's current seat would be a step up. And we'd just have to water the damn thing a couple times a week.