Marco Rubio and Pitbull may be the two Cuban-American Miamians who, more than anyone else, have shot to national prominence in their own ways in the past few years, but don't expect the two to be hanging out anytime soon.
Rubio is a well known lover of rap and hip-hop. Just a few months into his Senate career he revealed his favorite new artists was Nicki Minaj. His iPod playlists certainly don't seem like something we'd expect from a Tea Party wonderboy, and in GQ he espouses his love of N.W.A., Tupac, Afrika Bambaataa and Eminem. Apparently, though, he doesn't have much respect for Pit.
"You know you've got the guy from Miami, Pitbull, who's on TV selling a car and then he's advertising for Dr. Pepper," he tells GQ totally unprompted.
GQ decided to mine a little further, and asked "So, Pitbull's too cheesy?"
"His songs are all party songs," Rubio says. "There's no message for him, compared to like an Eminem. But look, there's always been a role for that in American music. There's always been a party person, but he's a young guy. You know, maybe as he gets older, he'll reflect in his music more as time goes on. I mean, he's not Tupac. He's not gonna be writing poetry."
Shots fired!
Yeah, Pitbull errs on the cheesy, party song side, but give the dude some credit, Marco. He's got stuff in the back catalog that goes a little bit deeper than that horrible Men In Black III theme song he churned out this summer.
Rubio also claims that Eminem is the "only guy that speaks at any sort of depth," which, you know, means maybe Rubio should listen to a little bit more rap before going off on it.
Anyway, Rubio also addressed other topics besides music (yeah we tricked you with the celebrity lead, and now we're gonna talk about, you know, boring, important stuff).
Rubio claims that aside from his wife, his best friend is Tea Party superstar Sen. Jim DeMint. He doesn't appreciate people opposed to gay marriage being told to shut up all the time, and he's not exactly sure how old the earth is.
Accepted science holds that the earth is about 4.5 billion years old, but Rubio isn't sold.
"I think that's a dispute amongst theologians and I think it has nothing to do with the gross domestic product or economic growth of the United States. I think the age of the universe has zero to do with how our economy is going to grow. I'm not a scientist. I don't think I'm qualified to answer a question like that."
Well, actually one of America's growing economic problems is the fact that we're not turning out students who have an education in science at the rates that we should be, so a sitting U.S. Senator who can take sides on rap battles and gets all wishy washy when it comes to science is a bit troubling.
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