Hey, Miami, You're Stupid

Miami has always had its share of buffoons and dolts, but last week was especially noteworthy in its level of boneheaded stupidity. First, Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen hung up on Barack Obama when he called her, figuring the president-elect was a South Florida DJ playing a prank. Obama's notoriously bad-ass chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, promptly called back — presumably with some choice four-letter words in mind. So she hung up on him too. According to CNN, when Obama finally got the Miami rep to stop slamming down telephones midconversation, "she told him he was either 'very gracious' to reach across the aisle by contacting her, or 'had run out of folks to call, if you are truly calling me.'" The whole thing could have been kept in the realm of Beltway gossip, but in a truly curious move, Ros-Lehtinen issued a press release about it, ensuring it would get coverage everywhere. ABC News was in utter disbelief and simply reprinted it with the title "An Actual Press Release from the Office of Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, R-Florida." Somewhere, Annette Taddeo is wondering how she lost to this lady.

Then there's O.J. Simpson, the former Kendall resident who was sentenced last week to 15 years in prison for his part in a 2007 armed robbery in a Vegas hotel room. The Juice, as he tells it, was simply taking back sports memorabilia that was already his, from his friends, or something like that. Shortly before he was sentenced, a confused-looking Simpson offered a rambling five-minute apology. "I was stupid," he said. "I'm sorry. I didn't know I was doing anything illegal. I thought I was confronting friends. I thought I was retrieving my things. I didn't mean to hurt anybody and I didn't mean to steal anything."

And finally, we have Jeb Bush, who after two totally forgettable terms as governor, wants to become our senator. What, your brother hasn't done enough? We're a couple of trillion dollars in debt, unemployment is through the roof, and we're still fighting a war with no clear purpose. Can't we just get a little breather here?