Presented for Your Consideration...(updated)

A report about lawn sign theft is not uncommon at this time of year. People of all political stripes are both the victims and the perpetrators and attempting to assign virtue or vice to one party or another when it comes to stuff like that is kind of silly I think. What's remarkable about what follows is not simply that signs were stolen, but that the perp is a narcissistic college professor named Phil Busse who blatantly posts his "confession" on the Huffington Post:

Highway 19 is a busy six-mile stretch of meandering road that links to main interstate artery in southeast Minnesota. More interestingly, the road connects rural, and often conservative, Minnesota to the liberal college town of Northfield. Rolling through pumpkin patches and apple orchids, the highway is postcard beautiful. This summer and autumn it was speckled with McCain signs, their cobalt blue squarely set against the gold and red of fall foliage.

By early October, however, there were no McCain-Palin campaign signs on the eastbound stretch of Highway 19. It wasn't because loyalties had switched, but because I pulled them out.

What follows is a bizarre muddle of admissions that he knows that what he did was wrong, and lame attempts to justify it:

If I need to justify my actions, I could argue that I was trying to achieve some great public service for rural voters. In his 2004 book, What's The Matter With Kansas, Frank Rich explains that working class and family farmers, like these in Minnesota, increasingly vote conservative and against their own interests. By pulling out the McCain signs, I was hoping to curb the impression for passing motorists that family farmers in Minnesota supported McCain. Or, at least that's the most high-minded explanation that I can offer.

That folks, is the epitome of an arrogant little prick. I'm sure my relatives in rural Minnesota are eternally grateful that there are professors like Busse around to keep them from expressing any misguided political speech. Not.

In this Northfield News story Busse admits that what he did was "immature and impetuous”. He goes on to say:

“Writing the essay was an opportunity to explore and talk about political speech and the desire that most of us have to express our politics — both in mature and immature ways, and sometimes a mix of the two,” Busse said in the e-mail. “I’m disappointed that most readers seem to have focused on the thefts, and not on the larger thoughts.”

I'm not sure what is more bizarre there; the notion that people wouldn't focus more on the thefts, or the oddly disconnected notion that Busse has that he can commit such immature acts and then be considered a legitimate source of "larger thoughts" on their meaning. That's not to mention that the local county attorney may take an interest in him now and his employer, St. Olaf College, can't be too happy to have such a blatantly public "immature and impetuous" professor on staff.

I sense a follow-up post from Mr. Busse in our near future.

More (11/4): In news that is not exactly shocking, but does reinforce my sense that decency and fair play still lives, the Northfield News reports that Professor Busse has attracted the attention I thought he would:

St. Olaf spokesman David Gonnerman issued the following statement Monday afternoon:

"The St. Olaf College administration first learned of Phil Busse's self-admitted theft and destruction of campaign signs on the morning of Oct. 31 as a result of his posting on the Internet.

"The St. Olaf administration immediately referred the matter to local law enforcement authorities and commenced an investigation of its own.

"Mr. Busse has tendered his resignation and is no longer affiliated with St. Olaf College.

"In a statement issued on Friday, the administration made clear that Mr. Busse's actions were in direct conflict with the college's values and mission and that the college did not in any way condone them."

And this:

Busse was also charged with misdemeanor theft after confessing to the Rice County Sheriff’s department that he took three McCain/Palin yard signs, said Sergeant Dave Stensrud of the Rice County Sheriff’s Office.

Enough said.