Saturday, January 19, 2008

School Super's War on Truth

Yesterday, Escambia County school superintendent Jim Paul opened a second and a third front in his continuing war on the truth. The PNJ's Michael Stewart was embedded to report on it.

Along the old battle line -- did-he-or-didn't he? -- Paul managed to imply simultaneously that he had only one glass of wine before getting collared for drunk driving and that he might have had three or four, too.
"If you have one drink a day, does that mean you have a drinking problem? It might mean that.
* * *
"Maybe it was three drinks," Paul said Friday, adding that the amount doesn't matter. "Whether it was two drinks or four drinks, I did something wrong."
At the same time, Jim Paul launched a new frontal assault on the breathalyzer results:
He chastised those who questioned his account of events — particularly the .128 reading after two glasses of wine.

"How terrible would it be to everybody if we found out, 'Oh my God, the breathing machine was out of whack,' " he said.
This is reminiscent of Paul's earlier insistence that it wasn't his fault; it was the fault of the arresting officer. As first concocted, the officer "asked me to walk the line, and I thought I walked it perfectly, but he didn't."

Confused by the fog of this war? No doubt that's what Jim Paul, who's up for reelection this year, is hoping for.

Just in case the pincer movement in this war on the truth doesn't work, it sure looks like Paul is preparing to buy more time with a surge of the Ready Reserves. That would be the regiments of reformed alcoholics and Born Again proselytes who are always in abundance in Northwest Florida.

Local businessman Quint Studer told Stewart he's already "talked with Paul about his own experience in recovering from alcoholism." And Paul got the message:
"I'm going to meet with a counselor. I've got to talk to people who are in the business of counseling. They diagnose these kinds of things."
If the 12 steps are waiting just ahead for Jim Paul, can the Army of Jesus be far behind?

It doesn't take "people who are in the business of counseling" to diagnose Jim Paul's real problem: he's a serial liar and a hypocrite.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

When will they learn? It's not the crime, it's the cover up.