Bob Hill - Courier-Journal April 8, 2004
I had hoped by now U.S. Sen. Jim Bunning of Kentucky would be man enough to admit his comments made about his likely Democratic opponent, Dan Mongiardo, were wrong, offensive, bigoted and not in keeping with the (presumed) dignity of the United States Senate.
On the other hand, they were made by Jim Bunning.
Bunning, speaking at the Republicans' annual 4th Congressional District Lincoln/Reagan Day Dinner in Florence on March 20, said Mongiardo "looks like one of Saddam Hussein's sons ... and even dresses like them, too."
Bunning has a reputation as a real tough guy, a sometimes surly Hall of Fame baseball pitcher who would stick a fastball in your left ear if that's what it took to win. Yeah, Bunning is so tough and forthright — a regular John Wayne kind of guy — that he let his media flack, David Young, do his talking for him.
AT FIRST Young denied Bunning had said anything of the kind about Mongiardo, and then he fessed up and tried to waffle at the same time by admitting Bunning had made the comments as a joke.
"We're sorry if this joke, which got a lot of laughs, offended anyway," he said.
Bunning is so tough that his wife had more to say on the subject than he did. She explained that her husband's comments might have been related to the fact that he had just been in Iraq and had flown over the site where Saddam's two sons had been killed.
"It just came out," Mary Bunning said. "He doesn't feel that way about him at all. It was something, I think, that was on his mind."
So let's all hope Bunning never flies over New York, Chicago or Los Angeles — cities of immense diversity that also happen to be part of the United States. Who knows what ethnic groups Bunning could go after? Who knows what he might say about the wife of fellow Sen. Mitch McConnell, Labor Secretary Elaine Chao, who came to the United States from Taiwan?
MONGIARDO, for the record, is of Italian heritage. His grandfather landed on Ellis Island in 1902 and worked in Eastern Kentucky coal mines. His father fought in the Korean War. Mongiardo was the first in his family to graduate from college. He went on to medical school, opened a practice in Hazard, started a free health clinic in Eastern Kentucky, and was elected as a state senator in 2000. What's any of that got to do with how someone looks?
This latest mistake only adds to Bunning's record of saying stupid things, ducking the truth, refusing to accept personal responsibility — or knowing much about Louisville.
In 1997 he mistakenly told a Cincinnati radio audience that downtown Louisville was devastated by flooding because the city hadn't closed its floodgates in time. In February he stood before a Greater Louisville Inc. luncheon and announced that Louisville would have to decide which of two proposed Ohio River bridges it really wanted because the second would have to be delayed so his Northern Kentucky constituency could have a new bridge. He repeated it in a television interview — and then denied saying it, as John Wayne guys often do.
U.S. REP. Anne Northup, a longtime supporter of the two proposed Louisville bridges, then gave us the obvious: Bunning was "confused." So tough guy changed his mind, saying, yeah, he actually was a supporter of two Louisville bridges.
The tough guy is facing re-election. So maybe you're Italian, or maybe your grandparents came to this country via Ellis Island. Maybe you don't believe people should be judged by physical appearance, but by accomplishment.
Maybe you believe that it's totally inappropriate for a U.S. senator to be using someone's looks for cheap laughs. Maybe you believe the ideals and promises of this great country — for which our troops of all ethnic backgrounds, religions and cultures are now dying daily — should stand for more than that.
Maybe you should vote that way.