The Konk Life Political Questionnaire:
Conducted by Mark Howell
Konk Life has invited each and every candidate in the upcoming elections to answer the following 20 questions about themselves and their candidacy. In fairness to all, the questions are the same for all.
Q: Sloane Bashinsky, tell us your age, what office you’re running for and any previous offices held.
A: 71 Earth years of age; Mayor of Key Far West of Weird; no previous offices held.
Q: Explain your platform and why you are running:
A: I am running because angels of the Lord told me to run if I knew what was good for me. As for my platform: Key West needs a great deal more affordable rental housing (and if a waitress can’t afford it on her wages, it’s not affordable); Key West needs a lot more affordable elder housing (and if an elder can’t afford it on his/her income, it’s not affordable); ban cruise ships from Key West, they pollute the sea with their wastes and silt the channel; all new development and redevelopment should be solar-powered to the maximum extent possible; mandatory recycling rules with teeth (yard waste composted and reused locally; treated wastewater recycled for irrigation); scrap the Truman Waterfront plan and turn the land into community gardens and affordable rental housing — and pay Bahama Village market rate for the acreage the city swiped; lower Duval Street should become pedestrian mall at mid-afternoon; revamp Tree Commission; revamp HARC to allow solar panels and construction materials that termites do not ravage; keep ever in mind Jesus in the Gospels was homeless and told his disciples, as they did to the least of the people around them, they did also to him.
Q: Detail how you differ from your competing candidates.
A: I’m doing that above.
Q: Tell us your personal history: education; professional career; family life and how long you’ve lived in the Keys or the county; your relationship to the Florida Keys and/or Key West:
A: B.A., Economics, Vanderbilt University; University of Alabama School of Law. Practiced law in Alabama 1973-1985. Wrote maybe 20 books, non-fiction, fiction, verse. Born and grew up in Birmingham, Ala., in prominent family, had a younger brother and sister. In 1964, married my Vanderbilt sweetheart, had a son who died in infancy and then two daughters. Seven marriages in all, now single. My family drove to Key West in 1952 when I was 9; in 1956, we spent spring break at Ocean Reef Club on Key Largo where I got hooked on flats fishing. Came back the next spring vacation and stayed in Islamorada. Back again in August 1961, stayed at private home on Lower Matacumbe and became hopelessly in love with the Keys. In early 1962, my father bought that home and owned it until 2001. I came to Key West to live in late 2000; en route was told in a dream I was going to get into politics; was homeless, lived on the street. Ran for mayor in 2003, 2007 and 2009. Ran for the County Commission in 2006, 2008 and 2010, ran for the School Board in 2012. Valentine’s Day 2006, I received an inheritance from my father, who died the previous August, and was relieved from homelessness.
Q: Touch on your personal passions in addition to the above:
A: Today, my passions are trying to keep happy the angels who abducted me in early 1987 and turned me inside out and upside down and every which a way but loose for a long time and with no end in sight.
Q: Describe where, in your view, we are going wrong in the Keys and/or Key West:
A: Insular thinking, cronyism, greed, massive over-development, widespread water pollution, widespread addiction (booze, street and pharmacy drugs).
Q: Tell us the political flash points you expect to encounter if elected:
A: Homelessness, police brutality, public corruption.
Q: Tell us anything you feel you need to explain or any misapprehension you believe voters may have of you:
A: I imagine many people in Key West and the Keys who know or know of me have apprehensions about me. People do not like hearing me say that angels tell me what to do and get onto me when I mess up. Nothing I can do about that.
Q: Give us your view on the partisan divisiveness in politics today and any solution to it you might have:
A: This is a political joke, OK? I would make belonging to a political party a capital offense punishable by being chopped up into small pieces and fed to baby sharks in an effort to stem the extinction of that endangered species, the loss of which major sea predator will wreak havoc in Mother Nature’s oceans. Fortunately, the Key West city races are non-partisan.
Q: Given that gender equality, income parity, voting rights and sexual preferences continue as big political issues nationwide today, tell us on which side of the aisle you stand:
A: Equal rights based on ability and willingness to work; equal pay for everyone, regardless of skin color or ethic background, sex, sexual orientation, religious preference or lack thereof. (You left out women wishing to terminate their pregnancies. I say, in the early stages of pregnancy, that’s their decision alone. As for the religious argument, it says at the beginning of Genesis that Man became a living being when God breathed the breath of life into his nostrils. Before the first breath, Man was not a living being.)
Q: And how about immigration, gun control and capital punishment:
A: Native Americans are best qualified to answer the immigration question. I doubt guns can be controlled. Ask Jesus how he feels about capital punishment (I would prefer to be executed, than spend the rest of my days in prison). You did not ask where I stand on stupid ruinous American foreign wars. I’m against.
Q: Name your favorite movie:
A: Triple tie: “To Kill a Mockingbird;” “Dead Poets Society;” “Man Facing Southeast.”
Q: Your favorite TV show:
A: The Golf Channel
Q: Your favorite TV talking head:
A: None.
Q: Your favorite newspaper columnist:
A: Tie: Naja and Arnaud Girard, Key West the Newspaper: they deserve a Pulitzer for breaking and covering the KWPD conduct unbecoming toward Charles Eimers case.
Q: Your favorite book:
A: A tie: “The Spear of Destiny” by Trevor Ravenscroft;” “Mutant Message Down Under” by Marlo Morgan and I kinda like the last novel to fall out of me, “Heavy Wait: A Strange Tale” (Mark Howell told me he liked it).
Q: Your favorite character in American history:
A: Abraham Lincoln.
Q: Your favorite person in Florida Keys and/or Key West history:
A: A tie: Capt. Tony Tarracino and Saint Dorothy Sherman, who started the soup kitchen.
Q: Your favorite quote or proverb:
A: “Fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom.”… and how about: “There are no fig leaves in Paradise, nor any secrets.”
Q: Is there any secret strength you’d like to reveal about yourself at this point:
A: If I discover it, I’ll let you know.
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