Don Roach: Blind Faith in Cicilline is Reckless

Don Roach: Blind Faith in Cicilline is Reckless

Yet another Democrat is shilling for Congressman David Cicilline. This time it’s Cicilline predecessor, Patrick Kennedy. You can meet the “Honorable Patrick Kennedy” on September 9^th at a Providence fundraiser for the former mayor. Last week Kennedy published a statement supporting Cicilline in which he said: “In Congress, David (Cicilline) works hard for his constituents […] With some of the wild and reckless allegations we have seen this week serving only to distract from the serious issues facing Rhode Island, Democrats need to stay focused on winning in November.” Reckless? Kennedy believes Gemma’s accusations are reckless. Go ahead and laugh at that for a second so you don’t spill your coffee, hot chocolate, Vitamin Water, or whatever your drink of choice is after reading Kennedy’s comments.

You know what’s reckless, the state’s leading Democrats swarming to back Cicilline like flies on shhhhugar cubes. Gordon Fox, Angel Taveras, and Gina Raimondo have each backed Cicilline in his bid for reelection despite his admitted mistakes in Providence. Heck, even the no-horse-in-this-race Governor Chafee is supporting the former mayor.

Are you kidding me? Do these Democrats forget what Cicilline did to the city of Providence? Do they realize that his approval numbers are bad as a result? Would they be supporting Cicilline if he was the same man, having done the same deeds, but with and R next to his name?

GET THE LATEST BREAKING NEWS HERE -- SIGN UP FOR GOLOCAL FREE DAILY EBLAST

Not…a…chance.

If you listen to mayor Taveras, he who liken the fiscal financial situation in Providence to a weather phenomena, he has forgiven Cicilline. Oh, that’s so cute that he can forgive him for nearly driving the state’s capitol city into financial ruin. It’s cute that he can let bygones be bygones while promoting a man who has no right to represent Rhode Island’s first district much less be trusted with the neighborhood paper route. And yet still, Taveras believes Cicilline is the right man for the job because he has done some good things for the city.

Rhode islanders consider your own places of employment. What if you raided the companies budget while telling your superiors that everything was ok so that you could parlay the work in your current role into a larger one. Let’s say you get that larger role and immediately thereafter your comments about the budget are exposed as a sham and a vein (yet, successful) attempt to get that larger role. One would think that because you pilfered the budget you’d get fired, right? Well…let’s say a bunch of your colleagues who aren’t stupid decide to come to your aide because you did a lot of good in your old role and why should your budget raiding misdeeds cast a pall over your entire time in your old position despite the fact that the what you did nearly cost the company its largest division?

You can see where I’m going with this. It makes no sense to me how these Democratic ‘leaders’ can blindly follow wherever Cicilline plans to lead them. It’s completely reckless and reeks of the worst kinds of political cronyism. Democratic leaders had an opportunity to step up and stand for something – stand against politics as usual and cast out a man who nearly drove Providence to financial ruin. Instead, they’ve rallied around him and continue to ignore his actions in Providence.

Many have called Gemma’s voter fraud allegations against Cicilline reckless. The truth of the matter is, we can’t trust politicians who blindly follow other politicians simply because they wear the same letter next to their name. Yet, that’s what our Democratic leaders are doing with Cicilline. As voters, we need to send a message to him and his supporters that this is not acceptable. If we don’t, then we get exactly what we deserve and have no one to blame but ourselves when we’re swindled again.

We teach our kids not to learn from our mistakes. When you vote in the Democratic primary, please take your own advice.

Don Roach is a member of the RI Young Republicans. He can be reached at [email protected].