Correction: Rep. Jack Kimble Isn't Among 14th Amendment Repealers
BY Nancy Scola | Wednesday, August 4 2010
The Twitter page of Rep. Jack Kimble, who is not an actual person.My friends, Rep. Jack Kimble has just entered the surreal zone.
Now, for months now, it's been amusing to watch the Republican from California mix it up on Twitter. Set against a NASCAR-esque Twitter backdrop of corporate logos from companies like Cargill, Denny's, and Publix Super Markets, Kimble drops such gems as "I join John Boehner in congradulating [sic] our troops in Iraq and urging the ones in Afghanistan to try harder." I myself have enjoyed slyly slipping a Kimble joke into our Clearing the Cache posts here and there. Most recently, I lamented that he was somehow overlooked by Twitter's list of verified world leaders.
That said, there's always a twinge of guilt when you see the ocassional citizen respond to Kimble on Twitter like he's an actual person -- as is hopefully clear to you by now, he's not. Hey, though, sometimes comedy has its victims.
But this, this just kinda has to make you a little sad or something. On Monday, the Huffington Post ran an unsigned piece reporting that Arizona Senator John Kyle had joined a growing chorus of Republicans calling for the reconsideration of the provision of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution that conveys birthright citizenship to babies born in the United States. Reading it last night, what jumped out was that tucked at the bottom of the HuffPo's political analysis now is this note:
An earlier version of this story, echoing previous reports at other sites, listed Rep. Jack Kimble (R-Calif) as a co-sponsor of House legislation. Kimble is a fictional person. His name, obviously, has been removed.
As danah boyd would say, le sigh. Some other tweeted gems from Kimble:
Growing up, my dad was in The Robery Baird Society. They used to call Birchers ENOs (Extremists in Name Only)
People look at recess as vacation, but there's a lot to do. I spend a lot of time finding out what Dems want so I can oppose it.
And perhaps, most relevant in this context:
We need courts that will strictly adhere to the Constitution and those amendments we like.