Call it the Press Conference From Hell.
Toledo mayoral candidate Ben Konop, an earnest young liberal, thought it would be a great idea to conduct a press conference in front of the home where his mother grew up. Little did Ben know that Maxwell the Heckler, the next door neighbor, would completely destroy his press conference and forever burn that incident into the public memory of Mr. Konop. To get the full hilarious flavor of how Maxwell destroyed the press conference, take a look at the video.
Most of the heckling consisted of "Boo! LIAR! BOOOOO!"
The first reaction of your humble correspondent when watching that video was that Maxwell the Heckler was some sort of anarchist bent on destroying Konop's press conference in a humorous way just for the sake of fun. However, upon investigation, it turns out that Maxwell the Heckler was actually "speaking truth to power," a favorite leftwing slogan.
Yes, Maxwell was right. Ben Konop is a liar. Bigtime.
As the Law of Reason blog and many other sources have pointed out, Konop blatantly broke a written pledge he signed not just once but twice when he ran for Lucas County Commissioner:
Ben promised, on multiple occasions, and twice in writing, that he would serve his full 4 year term as County Commissioner before running for any other office.
He signed an "Ethics Pledge" on February 9, 2006 and again on May 15, 2006. He said that he would serve his full 4 years. But what has Ben actually done? He served a little over two years and then announced that he was running for Mayor of Toledo. And what reason did he give for his breach of his Ethics Pledge? He said, "I am the best candidate to take our community in a new direction...That was my calculus in evaluating my pledge. It was an equation. What is in the best interest of the community?"
Oh, it was "an equation." Well that explains it. His ethical pledges, his promises, are always subject to an ever-changing equation that only he knows. I see.
What's even more ironic about this supposed pledge is that when Ben called on his opponent, George Sarantou, to sign the pledge, Ben surmised that it was Sarantou's intention to simply "use the Commissioner's office as a springboard to run for Mayor?"
Okay, it is pretty well established that Konop is a self-serving liar (Boo! LIAR! BOO!) and after a bit more research it wasn't long before I came upon the Ben Konop Wikipedia entry. Guess what? Even though that Press Conference from Hell is the only way that 99.9% of the people out there who have heard about Ben Konop know him, Wikipedia has no mention of it except for a Ben Konop caves to heckler link in the external links section at the bottom of the entry.
Just as bad is the fact the Wikipedia makes absolutely NO mention of the broken pledge that Konop signed twice. In fact, there isn't even mention of that broken pledge in the Discussion section. A clue as to who has been purging that section of unfavorable Konop material is given in this entry:
What is the policy of the subject of a biographical wikipedia article making updates to the article about them? Checking the history, a user "BKonop" is repeatedly removing a "Controversies" section of the article. Someone keeps coming back to replace the section so the subject matter of the section is maintained in the article. It just seems a bit unseemly that the possible subject of the article is repeatedly removing a "Controversies" section, particularly because the reason that "BKonop" is giving to change the article is non-factual information, even though each item in the subsection is linked to sources. 72.241.2.141 (talk) 12:16, 5 September 2008 (UTC)
It remains absurd for Wikipedia to both not refer (other than a link) to the heckling incident whose video is currently featured on CNN, Comedy Central, and MSN as well as not mention his broken pledge.
Oh, and if you think it was Maxwell the Heckler wearing the beerhat who was a loon when compared to the cleancut Ben Konop, then take a look at this Konop quote from a couple years ago on the subject of using federal funds to give away fuel cards:
Better to give these fuel cards to Lucas county "working families" than to have them fall into Dick Cheney's hands or, some big oil company.
Somehow I know which "loon" I prefer.
So break out the popcorn, pour yourself a beer, and enjoy the video. Tell it like it is, Maxwell!
Boo! LIAR! BOOOOOO!!!
(UPDATE: Wikipedia has now added a "Media interest" section to their Ben Konop entry which references the heckling incident. However, Wikipedia has still NOT made mention about Konop breaking the pledge that he signed twice to serve his full term in office.)
(UPDATE #2: Despite the fact that this video has gone viral on both the web and on cable TV, bringing more attention to Toledo than it had in years, the Toledo Blade newspaper still has not made mention of the booing incident except for a cryptic reference on June 29. The world wants to know more about Maxwell the Heckler but from the Blade, nothing. Hmmm.... I wonder which candidate the Blade will be endorsing for mayor?)
(UPDATE #3: Wikipedia has finally gotten around to mentioning that Ben Konop broke his campaign pledge to serve out his entire term as county commissioner.)
