Mo. Sen. Engler defends his comments
Engler
JEFFERSON CITY — I spoke to Sen. Kevin Engler, R-Farmington, about a joke bill he sponsored that would reward littering with the death penalty.
But Engler said the response from people from his district has been positive.
To those who called his remarks offensive, he said, “It’s your personal self-worth. People in my area understand.”
He added that it is not a racial epithet, and that people of all races can be “white trash.”
And for the record, Engler is white.
Engler also made an impassioned argument against littering. He said he’s glad the issue stirred up some controversy, because the trash is a real problem in his district.
“My people are tired of it,” he said.
When a people are about to litter, he said, he wants them to think, “Am I white trash if I throw this out?”
Engler added that he practices what he preaches. He has paid workers $10/hour to clean up his campaign signs, and he cleans up trash in a park in his district on Saturday mornings.
Commenters also said they dislike his use of Senate time for a joke. But he said he was hoping to address the underlying issue with a sense of humor and maybe stir up some controversy at the same time.
If you want to weigh in on the race discussion, we blogged about the issue on our A Conversation About Race blog.
Of all the people that we WANT to speak the Truth(for a change) the Number 1 should be a Politician … And now, when Engler DOES it, Freedom of Speech and Truth get trampled on by Politically Correct, Light-in-the-Loafers Guilty White Liberals … Lets bring back the Constitution … not some Interpretive Rendering from the already too Liberal Supreme Court, but the True meaning of it just the way it was oroginally written … Let the man speak … if you don’t like what he says, don’t listen … If you are so thin skinned that your little feelings get hurt by the truth, then not only are you part of the Problem, but you need to go to some other country and live, or … go do a hitch in the Army … that will either fix you or kill you … either way, we won’t have to listen to your whining anymore …
I HAVE A BULLET FOR PEOPLE THAT THINK THEY CAN GIVE THE DEATH PENALITY FOR SOMETHING AS TRIVIAL AS LITTERING, if you want to do something good give the death penality for all child molesters the first offence.
I work in the media and we gave senator Engler our endorsement for the state senate. As I person he is a very nice man, but as a senator I think we need to do some re-thinking. Somebody who would actually take the time to draft a bill about something that angers him and actually submit it definatley needs to rethink his priorites. Yes we do live in a beautiful district, BUT if the litter really angers you that much isn’t it time you should actually do something as a senator and not as a civilian. We gave him the power to something abou tthis problem and this is what he does? Makes a joke out of it? Insults his constituents? Senator Engler those dumb rednecks and white trash put you where you are at. You’re district is not chocked full of the hoyti-toyti Bushwood Country Club type. It is full of hardworking blue collar Americans. When you sober up from this drunkeness of power I think you owe your dumb red neck constituensts an apology for these comments. For the record I voted democrat.