Track-A-’Crat: The Roll Call of Democratic Delinquency

Featuring the all-star duo of Herman Thomas and Hiram Monserrate!

You may recall that these two pieces of human slime are competing for the title of least-suitable-for-public-life and most-detestable-crime.

In the blue corner (top pic) is Herman “The Judge” Thomas, who, despite being a circuit judge in Alabama, liked to spank and rape male prisoners in his office (plus he gets extra points for claiming racism to be behind his arrest, as opposed to the 57 indictments against him, ranging from ethics violations to kidnapping, assault, extortion, sex abuse and sodomy – sodomy’s still a category of crime?  Is this for cases of male rape?  Any lawyers here to explicify?).

And in the red corner (bottom pic) is Hiram “The Slasher” Monserrate, the personification of modern chivalry, who, during a fight – by which I mean an actual physical fight, as opposed to a more routine lovers’ tiffs of screaming insults and slamming doors – with his girlfriend, slashed her with a broken bottle.  After which he proceeded to drag her through his apartment lobby while she was bleeding from a cut around her eye and to her skull.  Deniability is difficult once people have seen you publicly hoisting around a battered woman, genius.

If convicted of the most serious charges, Herman faces from 20 years to life in prison.  Hiram, on the other hand, has been found guilty of misdemeanor assault but not felony assault, without which – you guessed it – he can retain his seat in the New York State Senate and collect his $79,500 salary.  Something tells me that Herman is likely to receive a similarly lenient sentence.

This would not be tolerated in the workplace, nor within (most) families.

So why must we put up with it in politics?

State Senator Hiram Monserrate (D-Queens) was today charged with three counts of felony assault and three counts of misdemeanor assault for attacking his girlfriend with a broken glass during a fight at his apartment in Queens.

Because, Lord knows, this stripling of a man must have been so physically outmatched by Karla Giraldo that beating her up wasn’t enough – he also needed a weapon to make sure that his blows were having their full impact.

She, however, now claims that he tripped and fell.  Awfully clumsy of him.

And the glass just ended up embedded in her face, while he was thrashing about on top of her, after having fallen so badly.

This is going to be a hard one to pin on conservatives/Christians/the “vast right-wing conspiracy”/George W. Bush.

Doesn’t mean he won’t try, though…

Hiram Monserrate, a member of the New York State Senate, was arrested in December 2008 for smashing a glass into his girlfriend’s face.

Which obviously makes him perfect material for politics.