What took so long? Politician calls for ouster of fire district chairman who compared firefighters to ISIS
On May 29 when I first published the story about Fred Gralinski I asked, “How can anyone trust the judgment of a leader who compares the displaying of an American flag on a fire engine to ISIS?”
I also wrote on Facebook the same day, “How does a fire district keep a chairman stupid enough to compare firefighters displaying the flag to ISIS?”
In case you’ve forgotten, here are Gralinski’s exact words:
“They look like a bunch of yahoos. Like in the paper, like ISIS is Syria going to take over a city. I don’t think they need that big flag on the back of the truck. That’s not America to me. Those are a bunch of terrorists. So, I’m going to ask you to take the flag off the truck.”
Gralinski made his ridiculous comments last year at an open meeting. His words didn’t get national or even local attention until the run up to Memorial Day Weekend this year. Somehow, it has taken all this time for the political leadership in Rhode Island to figure out Gralinski is a problem that needs to be dealt with. Yesterday(Monday) at 12:30 p.m., Rhode Island State Rep. Robert (Bobby) Nardolillo, (R-28) finally called for Gralinski’s resignation via Twitter:
— Rep.Bobby Nardolillo (@bobbytherep) June 6, 2016
What was everyone waiting for? Why couldn’t Rep. Nardolillo or any other politician in the area realize when this was first in the news that Gralinski needed to go? Why didn’t they speak up then? Could it be that just a very few hours before this tweet the story was featured on “Fox & Friends” or was that just a coincidence? Did they really need Steve Doocy to confirm that this was wrong?
My apologies for being so damn cynical and negative. I know I should be happy that a politician has spoken up against this idiocy. But there should be at least a minimum amount of leadership required if you’re going to be an elected leader. How come I could size this up instantly, even though I live 400 miles away in Falls Church, Virginia?
If you have to wait to see which way the wind is blowing before speaking up about something as clearly wrong as comparing firefighters to ISIS, maybe you should be in another line of work.
