I truly do not wish bad things to happen to Michelle Bachmann, the loony Minnesota congresswoman who at one point during the 2012 Republican presidential primary campaign actually was thought to have a chance of being nominated for the highest office in America.
The Office of Congressional Ethics is investigating her campaign for allegedly transferring campaign money illegally.
Her people say she’s done nothing wrong. I’ll give her the presumption of innocence until the OCE proves otherwise.
What is kind of a shame, although I do support the First Amendment guarantees of free speech and expression, is that she can’t be investigated for some of the absurdly stupid assertions she made during her brief time under the presidential spotlight.
Such as the time she asserted that a presidential trip to India was costing taxpayers $200 million a day; or when she accused more than 80 percent of congressional Democrats of being communists; or when she – along with Sarah Palin – said the Affordable Care Act would produce “death panels” to determine who lives or dies.
Bachmann’s rhetorical idiocy hasn’t stopped since the election. She recently went before the Conservative Political Action Conference and accused the White House of paying a WH staffer to “walk the president’s dog.” She omitted some key information, of course, which was the staffer happens to be the White House groundskeeper, the guy who keeps the “people’s house” in tip-top shape.
Bachmann has been a lot of fun to watch in recent years. Prior to the 2010 off-year elections, few Americans outside of her Minnesota congressional district even knew who she was. But she’s made a big splash, especially with her stump-speech goofiness.
Sometimes, though, these so-called serious public officials need to be called to account for their outrageousness. I guess we’ll have to settle on determine whether her presidential campaign misused campaign cash.
I suppose I’m hoping she comes out clean on this OCE investiation, if only to keep her available for political comic relief.