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I see no possible difficulties whatsoever with this fool-proof plan.

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Infrastructure week. at last.

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Pessimism assures that nothing of any importance will change.

Sadly, there is no cure for stupid.

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Hard Time for Harding?

Hard Time for Harding?

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God I hope so, anyway. Not Warren G., who’s still dead, but beady-eyed, Nazi-coiffed FL State Rep. Joseph Harding. From The Tampa Bay Times:

One day after being indicted on charges of money laundering and wire fraud, Republican state Rep. Joe Harding of Ocala announced his resignation from Florida’s House of Representatives.

Harding was the sponsor of the Parental Rights in Education law, which opponents nicknamed the “don’t say gay” bill. The legislation prohibits classroom instruction and discussions about sexual orientation and gender identity in kindergarten through third grade. Gov. Ron DeSantis supported the measure and signed it into law in March.

In a statement Thursday, Harding said he was resigning because he wants what is best for Floridians “and I believe their leaders need not be encumbered by distractions that are mine alone.”

He “wants what is best for Floridians” unless they’re Floridians who are LGBTQ, Floridians who support equality or Floridians who needed a small business loan due to the pandemic but found the till empty thanks to crooks like Harding hoovering up all the cash. According to the feds, Harding claimed he had two businesses that needed loans to stay afloat and keep employees onboard when in fact they were dormant businesses with no employees and no revenue.

Harding claims he paid back “every penny,” which may be so, but it was illegal to fraudulently obtain the loan in the first place. This part of Harding’s statement made me snort so hard I scared the dogs:

“If my time in the legislature was meant, by Providence, to only be two years, I can say with confidence that I left it all on the field for those two years.”

Harding is a thieving bible-humper who got caught stealing from a fund meant to sustain the country during a national emergency, and “Providence” had fuck-all to do with it. Unfortunately, Harding’s resignation won’t improve the composition of the Florida statehouse because he’ll be replaced by another raving wingnut. But maybe the next corrupt backbencher will have a less Hitlerian hairdo, which could marginally improve the statehouse aesthetic.

Open thread.

Reader Interactions

119Comments

  1. 1.

    oldster

    Why do he and Gaetz have that same weird head-shape, like Gumbi mated with a cinder-block? Is this the result of steroid abuse?

  3. 3.

    bbleh

    Well, what do you expect a red-blooded American Entrepreneur™ to do when there’s all that sociamalist gummint cash sitting around?  Just let some less Family-Oriented type get their dark-hued immigrant hands on it?

    If you look at it the right way, he’s a patriot!

  4. 4.

    trollhattan

    Money laundering sounds so quaint, like taking nasty, dirty old bills and making them fresh and crisp. Why is this a-gin the law?

    Sounds like good riddance to bad trash. Too bad Florida Republicans have such a vast bullpen.

  13. 13.

    lowtechcyclist

    Harding claims he paid back “every penny,” which may be so, but it was illegal to fraudulently obtain the loan in the first place.

    As someone pointed out in a thread yesterday, whether or not you pay it back, you’ve still committed the crime.  He can be congratulated on doing his restitution prior to his prison term, so he’ll be able to vote in Florida when he gets out of the slammer.

  16. 16.

    Frankensteinbeck

    @bbleh:

    Well, what do you expect a red-blooded American Entrepreneur™ to do when there’s all that sociamalist gummint cash sitting around?

    This is exactly how the harder conservatives and especially evangelicals see it.  It’s not cheating, it’s the deserving taking their due and making sure a little less is stolen from the deserving and given to the undeserving.

  18. 18.

    rikyrah

    Harding claims he paid back “every penny,” which may be so, but it was illegal to fraudulently obtain the loan in the first place

     

    REALLY?

    So, it’s supposed to be ok?

  19. 19.

    jonas

    I can say with confidence that I left it all on the field for those two years

    …says the player who spent those two years stealing from the equipment locker.

  20. 20.

    jonas

    @rikyrah: “Really, officer. As soon as the victim here realized I had stolen his wallet and chased me down, I gave it right back. So we’re good, right?”

  23. 23.

    comrade scotts agenda of rage

    The thing that shocks me is that he actually resigned.  I thought Repubs never resigned unless they’re physically being carted off to jail or some law specifically forbids them from holding office.

  24. 24.

    TriassicSands

    I am absolutely shocked — shocked, I say — that a Republican might be a crook. This is some kind of bizarre aberration.

    I mean, they’re all such nice, generous, civic-minded people.

  25. 25.

    Captain C

    @lee:

    There is also a picture of him with a sex cult member that is he trying to squash.

    He wants the photo suppressed or he’s on top of the sex cult member?

  27. 27.

    GibberJack

    Harding’s got a bit of a Kim Jong-un ‘do going on there too. But still fashie. And thuggie. I hope he gets 20 years.

  31. 31.

    West of the Rockies

    Well, Florida’s political landscape may not change with this loser’s resignation, but at least and his party and supporters may feel some pain, humiliation, and loss of income.

  32. 32.

    Betty Cracker

    @Scuffletuffle: Maybe a little? We’ve just got our program underway and will have to be patient. I was just laughing about a warning on one of the dog’s Rx bottle — it says to use caution if operating a vehicle, vessel or other machines, lol!

  33. 33.

    P Thomas

    New Florida Bill Introduced Today: “Don’t Say Fraud”.  “Fraud” is a woke concept made up of people who think one little crime should shame you for the rest of your life.

    Besides, how can we steal your money if people are going to be watching.

    /s

  36. 36.

    Ruckus

    @TriassicSands:

    Really hard to pull that type of comment off in this day and age, where we see shitheads like this on a regular basis and at least a majority of federal politicians on his side of the fence aren’t any better than he is. May have different issues but they like SFB for a reason and it’s because when they look in a mirror the reflection they see is so unreal that Mickey Mouse would seem more human.

  37. 37.

    Elizabelle

    But wait, there’s more.  Family values being what they are.  From website Florida Politics:

    Harding’s indictment follows a September guilty plea from his brother-in-law, Patrick Walsh. As reported by Fresh Take Florida, Walsh pleaded guilty to wire fraud and money laundering charges connected to his receipt of nearly $8 million in disaster relief loans.

    Walsh, an international blimp magnate, had used the money on a series of land buys, including the purchase of a private island in the Gulf of Mexico near Yankeetown. He is scheduled to be sentenced at the end of January.

    International blimp magnate.  You cannot make this shit up.  It’s true, though.  More from the Gainesville Sun  (paywall USA Today property), referred to as Fresh Take Florida (column) in item above:

    Among other expenses, Walsh used some of the money to buy a private two-acre island in the Gulf of Mexico off the coast of Yankeetown, Florida, prosecutors said. He also put a downpayment on a luxury ski lodge in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, and paid off the 78-acre farm where he lives south of Gainesville, according to court records.

  39. 39.

    Elizabelle

    @P Thomas:  I know.  And he’s just “an.”  There might be more!

    Of course, hard not to see International Blimp Magnate and not think of something fetid living at Mar a Loco.

  41. 41.

    Leto

    @Elizabelle: guess just showing my dirigible ignorance, but outside of the Goodyear blimp and the blimps the military use (static ISR devices), I didn’t know they were still a thing. Can’t wait to hear about the whale oil magnates and how they’ve been misappropriating money.

  42. 42.

    Gvg

    I would bet he did not pay it all back.

    Not that it would make it all right, just a reminder we are talking about a liar.

  51. 51.

    Miss Bianca

    I gotta say, this thread is one of the funniest things I’ve read here for a while. I am so glad I finished my coffee before reading all you snarksters on top of your game this morning!

  52. 52.

    LeftCoastYankee

    Apparently, “Providence” is an old English term for “Money, our One True God”.

  53. 53.

    Leto

    @Matt McIrvin: yeah. If you follow the Airship link, it’s mainly hyping 1) the advertising ability and 2) the ISR/military/police aspect. So far Walsh’s name hasn’t been stricken from the site either.

  54. 54.

    Elizabelle

    @Leto:   They’re advertising blimps.  AirSign Aerial Advertising.  Discovery Channel had one outfitted as a shark (pretty cool) for Shark Week; Chik Fil A used one; they hover over sporting and other events.  They do banners and skywriting too; one stop shop for aerial advertising.

    And:  Patrick is a father of ten or eleven children, depending which source.  He is 41.

    Family values:  He did some of the defrauding using his “beautiful” wife’s name.  She did not know, allegedly.

    And:  he has a kind of moribund Twitter account, but it does show the shark blimp. https://twitter.com/patrickdirect?lang=en

    And:  there’s no longer a webpage for “leadership” at AirSign.  Surprise, surprise.  But here was the earlier page for Patrick.

  55. 55.

    Elizabelle

    @LeftCoastYankee:  I saw that news alert from the Miami Herald yesterday, and Harding’s use of Providence leapt out.  Jesus!

    And then:  leaving it all on the field.  Good lord!

    In mammon we trust.

  58. 58.

    Roger Moore

    @Leto:

    guess just showing my dirigible ignorance, but outside of the Goodyear blimp and the blimps the military use (static ISR devices), I didn’t know they were still a thing.

    I don’t know about other applications, but there are more brands than Goodyear using blimps for advertising.  I live near enough to some big sports venues that I get to see blimps fairly regularly, and there are numerous different liveries.  It sounds as if there are a couple of companies in Florida that own blimps and will dress them up for any company that wants to use them for advertising.

  59. 59.

    P Thomas

    The International Man Of Mystery Blimp Magnate runs this company:

    https://www.airships.com/

    Whole bunch of airship photos at the link if you scroll down.  They are fairly small, and very easy to just put a new wrap over them to re-brand as necessary.

  60. 60.

    Boris Rasputin (the evil twin)

    @lee:There is also a picture of him with a sex cult member that is he trying to squash.

    Which is he trying to squash, the photo or the member? If it’s the latter, “Squash” sounds.. unwholesome, if not unnerving.

  63. 63.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @Leto: …outside of the Goodyear blimp and the blimps the military use (static ISR devices), I didn’t know they were still a thing.

    Non-rigid airships (which move) and aerostats (which don’t) have been of interest for awhile to anyone with a need to put radar a few thousand feet up with a loiter time measured in days or weeks. At Westinghouse in the late 80s I worked (peripherally) on a Navy project to stick a radar in a large airship to accompany battle groups without carriers and detect sea-skimmer antiship missiles for weeks at a time. (I developed the maintenance concept for the radar. It was interesting.)

    Two problems with airships: the ground crew needed to launch and retrieve, and a troubling vulnerability to bad weather including high winds. The first can be greatly reduced with steerable ducted-fan propulsion; the second (which sent many an airship crew to its demise in the interwar years) is still a sticking point.

    (A third problem is that as large as they are, airships really can’t lift very much. The project I worked on, for a nominal 400-foot airship, had a weight allotment for the radar of 8000 lbs total – and it took some damn innovative design to meet it.)

  64. 64.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @Paul in KY: ​

    @Leto: Count Graf Von Zeppelin was an International Blimp Magnate. I’m sure this guy…not so much.

    Um, no – der Graf (FTR the German term for “Count”) was an International Dirigible Magnate. Dirigibles like the Hindenburg have rigid frames, blimps do not. Know your airship types!! ;^D

  65. 65.

    Shalimar

    @Andrew Abshier: The Florida legislature when Gaetz was there functioned as a fraternity for adults, down to a contest where you got points for different women you slept with (female legislators were worth more points than lobbyists).

  66. 66.

    Amir Khalid

    @Paul in KY:

    Excuse me.

    The man’s name was Ferdinand von Zeppelin. He was titled Graf (Count). I think his family nickname was Led, but I could be wrong about that.

  67. 67.

    WereBear

    @Spanky: I have heard rumors. Still, pretty people who get along with others can leverage an oversized head into a fortune by turning letters on television.

    The prodigal in question is the other kind. He shows a lack of cunning remarkable in a right winger. He was likely sheltered, so to speak.

    As in still never having to deal with consequences.

  70. 70.

    Cameron

    Only in wingnut-speak does “left it all on the field” translate to English as “put it all in my pocket.”  Icing on the cake, though, is the relation to Airship Godfather.

  71. 71.

    Leto

    @Uncle Cosmo: we had them in Iraq and Afghanistan at the major bases for ISR and comm purposes, specifically aerostats. They’re tethered in place and will stay up for very long periods of time. Lockheed Martin is doing interesting things with them, specifically using new materials to make them lighter, more rigid, as well as capable of carrying a larger payload. Material technology has come quite a ways since the late 80s. Regarding weather, LM is looking to deploy these at 60-70k feet so idk what effect weather will have on something near the edge of space.

  73. 73.

    Amir Khalid

    @Amir Khalid:

    Also, zeppelins had a rigid internal framework — see videos of the Hindenberg on fire — whereas blimps are basically just big balloons.

  75. 75.

    raven

    One of the most iconic images of the D-Day invasion was taken shortly after the initial invasion itself. The image features several LSTs (Landing Ship, Tank) beached along the coast of France while dozens of military vehicles drive off them and thousands of pounds of supplies and equipment are unloaded in order to support the continuation of the invasion. Floating above most of the ships, stretching into the distance, are silver oval shaped balloons. These balloons, known as barrage balloons, may seem at first glance out of place in a major military invasion. They were, however, vital to the operation, and were brought ashore in the invasion’s first wave by the brave men of the 320th Barrage Balloon Battalion, the only unit comprised entirely of African American soldiers to storm the beach that day. They provided critical protection to the ships and soldiers below them from attacks by enemy aircraft, and continue to provide us a glimpse into the U.S. military’s use of balloon technology.

  76. 76.

    Mathguy

    “I left it all on the field for those two years” and the smell was unbelievable . Had to call the EPA.

  77. 77.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @scav: I think I’m not gonna say things like “I flew to Vegas last week” anymore, I’m gonna say “I traveled by airship”.

    Maybe, “I traveled to that modern Gomorrah by airship….”

  83. 83.

    Anoniminous

    Warren G., who’s still dead

    Are we sure? Has anyone poked him recently to see if he twitches?

  94. 94.

    Expletive Deleted

    @Amir Khalid: The Zeppelin company is still around and building airships to this day.

    There was a SF Bay Area company called Airship Ventures ten years ago or so that operated a sightseeing airship called Eureka out of the big hangar at Moffett Field. It was pretty cool to spot it flying around.

  95. 95.

    Kay

    Harding claims he paid back “every penny,” which may be so, but it was illegal to fraudulently obtain the loan in the first place

    He didn’t say when he paid them back. It would be ordinary for Harding’s lawyer to advise him to pay back the loans prior to Harding’s lawyer trying to make a deal with the prosecutor. “Have paid” is always better than “will pay” and this is no exception.

  99. 99.

    Betty Cracker

    WC post up now. I swear to Christ, I don’t know why WordPress pretends to have a “schedule post” function if someone has to be there to push the button half the time. Kind of defeats the purpose.

  100. 100.

    JML

    @Dangerman: ref has been shite today, lost control a couple of times, so it doesn’t matter any longer. they’re all barking about everything…

  104. 104.

    Uncle Cosmo

    @Amir Khalid: I think his family nickname was Led, but I could be wrong about that.

    With brothers Eyern and Zink, twin sisters Chloreen and Floreen, and the black sheep of the family, first cousin twice removed ArseNick…

    (NB well played!)

  105. 105.

    raven

    Athens-Clarke County police have no idea why someone recently placed a decapitated sheep at the base of the Tree That Owns Itself, one of Athens most famous and odd landmarks.
    The dead sheep was reported by a person walking in the residential neighborhood at the corner of South Finley and Dearing Streets shortly after noon on Dec. 3.
    The beheaded sheep was placed inside the fence that surrounds the tree, according to the report that was not released until last week. The officer noted the head was placed near the body, which did not show any other signs of injury.

  106. 106.

    Fleeting Expletive

    @WereBear: I’ve only been in Florida a few times, one of which involved a spontaneous decision to get a tattoo in a strip mall (I was in the company of young and irresponsible persons at the time).

    My yellow rubber duckie tattoo is, if anything, more discreet than I’d wish in reckless old age.

  107. 107.

    Betty Cracker

    Remember when Republicans were dumping on the student debt relief plan and the Biden team labeled a bunch of them for taking PPP loans? This may be controversial, but I don’t think anyone in government should be eligible for those loans. No members or immediate family trading stocks, and none taking taxpayer-funded loans. No one makes them run for office.

  108. 108.

    JaySinWA

    Florida is texting me, and I can’t make it stop. I just got a new number and I am getting trouble ticket texts from a Florida health care IT company. I tried blocking the texts and they are still trickling in.

    Probably some employee or contractor phone number got recycled and they haven’t cleared the system.

    I see requests for sudo access for a specific account (can’t be good for security). I see network outages on the 4th floor, I see warnings of SLA outage limits being reached. Branch offices have lost contact.

    I tracked down the company, and left a message on their webpage. I contacted the support number and they opened a ticket.  No joy yet. I can change the number so I don’t get them anymore I suppose, but even the small trickle will exhaust my text allotment, (small for reasons having to do with my service provider).

    So if your healthcare provider is having problems with their computers and can’t get them resolved, they’ve got my number, apparently.

  109. 109.

    kalakal

     

    @Gin & Tonic:  There’s Hybrid Air Vehicles Group – I actually saw this one, my brother lives not far away. It was ginormous. They used the same sheds where the R101 was built.*

    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hybrid_Air_Vehicles_Airlander_10

    And you’ll be pleased to know Zeppelin are still making… you know*

    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zeppelin_NT 

    I want International Blimp Magnate on a business card

    *Technically not blimps but it was pretty impressive

  117. 117.

    geg6

    @raven:

    I did.  He grew up in a tough neighborhood for a Jewish kid.  He’d have been better off living in Squirrel Hill, where it has always been a Jewish enclave.  But his family simply wasn’t wealthy enough to live there.  It’s not a super rich neighborhood but it isn’t lower middle or blue collar either.  But in truth, Pittsburgh loves him and he loves the Burgh.  He comes back occasionally and does one-man shows at a small theater.  Generally, a memoir kind of thing.  It’s always impossible to get tickets.  I have to say that I was kind of surprised he wasn’t involved with the HBO documentary about the Tree of Life Synagogue that Michael Keaton, Mark Cuban and Billy Porter produced.

  118. 118.

    sab

    @geg6: Weird. Only people I ever met  from Squirrel Hill were the children of a Presbytrrisn minister growing up in dire poverty in Dublin Ireland.

  119. 119.

    JAFD

    I have known a goodly number of people with oddball interests in my time, and, IMVAO, there is no group of fans more fanatic than the aficionados of lighter-than-air transport (Present company excepted, of course !)
    In September ’89, ’twas a big parade in Philadelphia, 200th anniversary of the Constitution. There were three blimps circling overhead that day, most I’ve ever seen in one place and time.

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