Fresno's own lieutenant governor, Cruz Bustamante, (well, actually he ditched us for the Sacramento suburbs, but we claim him anyway) did a couple of stupid things the other day: He sat down for a lunch-time interview with Steve Lopez, the Los Angeles Times columnist who makes a living making fun of politicians and other self-inflated people, and then he complied with Lopez's request to step onto the scales that Lopez brought to lunch. Here is the Lopez column.
Bustamante is running for insurance commissioner, and he's using his weight-loss plan as a vehicle to get publicity. It was good bit for a time, but is that the entire campaign? What about the insurance companies ripping us off on our auto insurance, or the health care insurers refusing to cover people who are sick?
As Lopez puts it, Bustamante has become the "Richard Simmons of state government." OK. Right now I'm picturing Cruz in that Richard Simmons tank top and short-shorts. Oh, my.
Anyway, Lopez caught Bustamante fudging about his weight loss, and that is making news in L.A.
The irony is that Bustamante has dropped a lot of weight, starting the year at 278 pounds. But he said he weighed 233 pounds at the Lopez lunch and the Lopez scales said 240.5 pounds. Even then, Bustamante has lost almost 38 pounds, but isn't getting credit for it because he exaggerated his weight loss.
Anyone know Richard Simmons' phone number?
I think it's good our outgoing Lt. Governor is starting to get health conscious. Now if only he would get his head examined.....