Ken "Crazy Eyes" Cuccinelli

While recently watching one of his campaign ads, it occurred to me that our friend Mr. Cuccinelli exhibits a physical feature that could be referred to as "the crazy eyes." See photo at left, or for that matter any ad wherein he looks directly at the camera.

Now, normally I wouldn't make fun of a candidate's physical features. Unless of course we're talking about Joe "Judas" Lieberman and his striking resemblance to Droopy of Looney Tunes fame. What would prompt me to such a hurtful course of action, you ask?

Why, none other than Mr. Cuccinelli's remarks to the editorial board of the Virginian-Pilot, as quoted in their endorsement of Steve Shannon for Attorney General. Now, somehow I missed this when the endorsement came through on Monday, but better late than never. Kenny, let's get this crazy train a-rollin! Excerpt:

He declined to commit to a nondiscrimination policy against gays and lesbians observed by former Attorney General Bob McDonnell: “ My view is that homosexual acts, not homosexuality, but homosexual acts are wrong. They’re intrinsically wrong. And I think in a natural law based country it’s appropriate to have policies that reflect that. ... They don’t comport with natural law. I happen to think that it represents (to put it politely; I need my thesaurus to be polite) behavior that is not healthy to an individual and in aggregate is not healthy to society.”

Wow. So he's basically okay with using sexual orientation as a criterion for employment in the state's law firm? And this guy actually has people convinced that he's a moderate, to the point where he has a substantial lead in the polls? Oh, another little gem from the article:

He sponsored a bill to waive unemployment compensation costs for companies that fire workers for not speaking English on the job. The measure would have affected only legal workers because illegal immigrants don’t qualify for unemployment benefits.

Wonderful. The editorial concludes by saying Cuccinelli would be an embarrassment to the state of Virginia. Usually I think it's a bit of a stretch to call someone an embarrassment; even if I disagree passionately with a candidate or an officeholder, "embarrassment" just seems a bit excessive. For example, I don't necessarily think McDonnell would be an embarrassment...just a bad governor. But when a man who thinks the state should hire based on sexual orientation is on the verge of getting elected, that's pretty damn embarrassing.