More on Melvin’s coffee shop tantrum (or, The Wrath of Melvin, Part 3)

by David Safier

The story of Melvin storming out of a coffee shop after yelling at its owner for carrying the Weekly has legs. Now it's in the Capitol Times' Yellow Sheet (courtesy of R Cubed):

Now, Melvin’s hissy fit has been picked up by the Yellow Sheet. The best part is that they found a few “railbirds,” as they call them, who confirmed that this sounds a lot like Melvin. Also, this humble blogger got a mention. Money quote:

One lobbyist told our reporter that “Captain Al is starting to lose it,” while another railbird said the senator’s actions in the restaurant are indicative of the way he regularly treats people. “I think Tedski [the blogger who runs Rum, Romanism and Rebellion] is right to characterize him as Hank Hill’s father, Cotton Hill [from the animated TV series “King of the Hill”]. He’s just a grumpy old man who always looks like he’s going to kick the kids off his lawn,” the political veteran said. [Sure, Tedski, I'm happy to include your shameless self promotion. You're welcome.]

My take is, Melvin is mixing his drugs, always a dangerous idea. He's drunk on power at the same time he's mainlining ultraconservative ideology. Bad mix.

Back to the Weekly, which first broke the story. From Jimmy Boegle's editor's note this week, headed, This Week in Crazy.

Last week, a woman called and left me a message—sadly, without a name or a phone number to use to call her back—and ranted that we shouldn't be complaining that state Sen. Al Melvin called us a leftist newspaper. (See "Al Melvin Doesn't Want You to Read This," The Skinny, Nov. 25.)

If I would have had the joy of talking to this caller, I would have informed her that we weren't complaining that Melvin called us a leftist newspaper; we were noting that he had a snit at a restaurant because the place dared to carry the Tucson Weekly. That's all. Trust us; we've been called worse than "leftist newspaper."

Then she went into Crazytown, ranting about canceling her advertising with the Weekly because we're so damn liberal … and then claiming that we know Jesse Kelly really beat Gabrielle Giffords, and that (County Recorder F.) Ann Rodriguez's office just flipped the results.

By the way, did I mention I have a guest column in the Weekly? [See Tedski, I can shamelessly self promote too.]