Alert! Alert! The state of Maine is in trouble!
No one knew it was this bad, but the northeasternmost state in the union, typically synonymous with beautiful autumns, lighthouses and Acadia National Park is apparently under threat from characters of ill-repute who have menacing nicknames.
During comments at a town hall meeting in Bridgton on Wednesday, Gov. Paul LePage warned his audience of drug dealers from out of state entering Maine. But that’s not the worst of it.
They also are apparently (gasp) getting White girls pregnant!
“These are guys with the name D-Money, Smoothie, Shifty – these types of guys – they come from Connecticut and New York, they come up here, they sell their heroin, they go back home,” LePage, a Republican, explained to the crowd. “Incidentally, half the time they impregnate a young White girl before they leave, which is a real sad thing because then we have another issue we have to deal with down the road. We’re going to make them very severe felonies.”
Which is the felony? Drug dealing or knocking up White girls?
LePage is no stranger to controversies of this type. In 2013, he reportedly told a group of Republican supporters that President Obama “hates White people,” a statement he later denied. Going further, in 2011, he told a group of NAACP leaders they could “kiss my butt” when he was questioned about a pattern of declining their invitations – and then pointed out his adopted Black son to prove he was not a bigot. That’s part of a list of other acrid things that have come out of his mouth…we won’t even go into the Vaseline comment.
Despite these gaffes, LePage was re-elected to the governor’s office in 2014, perhaps because of his shoot first, apologize later manner. Indeed, he has issued an apology (sort of) for the scary drug dealer comments.
“I was going impromptu and my brain didn’t catch up to my mouth,” LePage said. “Instead of Maine women I said white women. … If you go to Maine, you can see it’s 95 percent white.”
Actually, that is true according to U.S. Census numbers. Maine is one of the Whitest states in America. But it is also an übermarket for dope. The Portland Press Herald reported last April that someone slinging smack can get a triple markup for a gram compared to New York. Translated to layman’s lingo, there is a tremendous demand for it there among – you guessed it – White people.
So yeah, if LePage is so worried about D-Money, Smoothie, Shifty coming into his pristine state, it’s totally understandable. What with their sagging pants, gold fronts, cornrows and worst of all, White girl-hunting phalluses, they are liable to upend the entire way of life in Maine, and possibly New England and then Quebec.
But what might prevent that is actually treating drug dependency among his constituents, thereby reducing and possibly eliminating demand for narcotics in the first place.
All I’m really saying here is that an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of heroin stopped at the border. But then again, volatile politicians and their racially charged rhetoric rarely listen to reason and populism seems to be a key way to win elections.
So if you’re from New York or Connecticut and you deal dope in Maine, you have been warned. Gov. Paul LePage is on to you and is hiding his woman as we speak
Madison J. Gray is Managing Editor of Ebony.com and he’s keeping his street nickname to himself because he’d like to go to Maine one day. Follow him on Twitter @madisonjgray
