DC, or the District if you’re old enough, is in our backyard. theSync’s offices are in Annapolis, but our souls lay just minutes outside the Kenilworth Ave border. National news often times is our local news. Policy, scandal, and the politics that surround our Nation’s capital becomes BBQ fodder and is intermixed with conversation at the kid’s bat mitzvah or sneaker ball.
I received a text message the other day with the salutation, “Hi, I’m George Santos and I’d like to talk.” It took me a few milliseconds to come off the dopamine hit. I thought I had scored the scoop of the year until I looked at the ID in Signal. My crazy ass friend knows how to spin a yarn and with all the nonsense going on, it’s hard to tell what’s actually real.
The simulated congressman, George Santos, is a goldmine. He’s spun so many lies and feints that it’s keeping the journalistic gears rolling in this town on full tilt. The latest in the Santos Saga is his ex-boyfriend’s emotional out pouring of shock and surprise.
Pedro Vilarva, Santos’ ex, has gone on the record to FOX 5 NY (via FOX 4 DC) in disbelief that George Santos is, “the psychopathic liar that he’s showing to be right now.” Vilarva said he met George Santos as Anthony Devolder when he was 18 years old. Devolder/Santos was 26 at the time. Before all of the lies and red flags, Vilarva said Anthony Devolder was sweet and very caring. At the time, it wasn’t until months later that Pedro discovered Santos (Devolder) [Anthony/George?] was married to another woman. Santos got divorced in 2019.
Here’s the deal. Us denizens of the nation’s capital and its surrounding areas are a very cynical lot. Many of us work or report on the Hill, and it’s hard to get past 6 degrees of separation between you and your representatives. Through all of this cynicism however, there’s a certain amount of class when it comes to lying. Fibs are fine. Stretches of the truth are normal. Rhetoric is standard operating procedure, and the vast majority of us know there’s a game being played. There’s a whole Pinocchio system devised for DC’s lies.
Most of us however, don’t like to be played, and look upon those who play upon the unsuspecting with disdain. Santos’ own constituents want him gone, and the web of unreality makes it exceedingly difficult for the citizen’s in New York’s 3rd Congressional District to get solid representation. The local parlor game is eying who’s going to work in this fool’s office. DC is a town where people arrive, get intoxicated with the proximity to power, and stay. Folks who work for Santos will find themselves in the same condition as folks who went down with the SS Trump in the final days. Having difficulties finding work. That means, New York’s 3rd District will have incompetents, grifters, and clowns working on their behalf.
And while many of us point and laugh, and lament how the current Republican Party is a joke. (I regret how many times I’ve voted Republican now.) The joke’s really on us. Because, we’re the ones who have allowed this to happen.
When I grow up, I want to be like Robin Givhan. She wrote an excellent article on George Santos and his love for crewnecks.