Why won't Joe Gergley go away?
A failed mayoral candidate is now running social media for the biggest losers in the Ohio House.
The haters and losers, of which there are many, like to think that I’m an unscrupulous scumbag. My only response is that I wish that were true because I’d be a lot richer.
One job I would love to have, if scruples were no longer a thing, would be that of a right-wing social media operator. It’s not as if Republicans at the Statehouse are social media mavens, nor are their voters, who are already programmed to digest a diet of 100 percent red meat.
Guns. Fetuses. The King James Bible. And to Hell with any Democrat; Joe Biden can be a senile grandpa or a criminal mastermind orchestrating a global plot—depending on what kind of boogeyman you need at that particular time.
When it comes to campaigning, all you need to know is this comment from ultra-conservative Congressman Thomas Massie (R-Kentucky), who reflected on what Republican voters wanted when they sent him, Senator Rand Paul and former Representative Ron Paul to Congress.
Via Jesse Walker of reason.com:
"All this time," Massie explained, "I thought they were voting for libertarian Republicans. But after some soul searching I realized when they voted for Rand and Ron and me in these primaries, they weren't voting for libertarian ideas—they were voting for the craziest son of a bitch in the race. And Donald Trump won best in class, as we had up until he came along."
I could do crazy. That would be no problem because, again, I’d be shameless enough to throw Republican voters the dog meat their souls crave.
I’d certainly be better at it than Joe Gergley.
“Who the Hell is Joe Gergley?” You’re probably asking yourself. That’s a fair question.
When The Rooster last visited Gergley, he was being called “a date rapist” in a deposition by failed Republican State Senate candidate Melissa Ackison, which led to this sterling exchange:
Q: Fair to say you hate Mr. Gergley?
A: I don’t hate anyone. It’s against my Christianity. I’m not going to go to Mr — go to hell for Joe Gergley.
Q: Okay. As recently as Mr. Gergley’s deposition, did you stand up and scream at him that he’s a fat ass mother fucker?
A: No. That was in deposition after seven hours and him laughing across the table and yeah, I lost it.
Q: I asked if you did it.
A: I did.
Q: Yes.
A: Not proud of it but certainly did.
Q: You called him a sick fuck.
A: I do believe he is.
Gergley, for those new to The Rooster, ran for mayor of Gahanna in 2015 as a 26-year-old. Gergley made the classic mistake of not deleting his old tweets, which were heinously racist, misogynistic and homophobic. His opponent immediately outed them.
Some of his greatest hits:
"The Easton Walmart might as well be Ferguson.”
"The hungover girls on college campuses who go to Planned Parenthood are really just getting their breasts examined. Thank God for Komen!"
"If I saw Kurt from ‘Glee’ in real life, I would bully him and tell him ‘It gets worse...’"
“Why are Sesame Street characters all of a sudden speaking ebonics? Did I miss something?”
Gergley was also charged with giving alcohol to a minor, which he attributed to a misunderstanding at a football tailgate. There was also this gem from the deposition when Ackison accused him of attending a high school prom as an adult:
Years later, Gergley was visiting a girl he had taken to one of the proms. When Gergley was leaving, her younger brother was outside, smoking marijuana, and asked Gergley for a ride to his girlfriend’s house. As soon as the two entered Gergley’s vehicle, a police officer pulled up next to them. The officer advised Gergley that he had pulled him over due to some thefts in the area.
Weird how this guy kept finding himself around mind-altering substances and minors. But that’s not my problem. As you might imagine, voters of Gahanna soundly rejected Gergley.
In a normal state, a guy like Gergley would leave politics and go work for his cousin’s distribution company as a nepotism hire. But this is Ohio, so you know what that means.
While Gergley has gotten the hint that he’s not electable, he is still heavily involved in Republican politics despite his history and dust-up with Ackison, a former client.
Gergley currently operates several conservative Facebook groups like “Ohio Conservatives PAC” and “Licking County Conservatives,” where he posts stuff like this for the hogs that get their political news from Facebook groups operated by asocial weirdos like Gergley:
(Note: Casey DeSantis, the woman in the top right, has never been the First Lady. And thanks to her god-awful taste in men, she will never be First Lady, either. But it’s hilarious that Gergley has hitched himself to a doomed wagon like DeSantis in the first place. Losers of a feather flock together and all that.)
Again, this is the tripe you expect to be digested by the racist uncle that is a caricature in American Thanksgivings. (Personally, I have zero racist uncles, but my family is built different.)
But Gergley also operates Hypermetrics LLC, which runs social media for numerous Republican State Representatives of the holy roller persuasion.
Here’s an expenditure from Rep. Thad Claggett (R-Newark), a guy destined to serve in the Ohio House when he got christened with the name “Thad Claggett.”
Other paychecks, via opensecrets.org:
$6,000 from State Senator Michele Reynolds (R-Columbus)
$5,000 from State Rep. Angela King (R-Celina)
$2,500 from State Rep. Scott Wiggam (R-Wooster)
$1,600 from State Rep. Scott Ferguson (R-Wintersville)
$1,000 from State Rep. Jennifer Gross (R-West Chester)
Also of note, 2022 Republican State Representative candidate Kim Georgeton raised $33,072 in her run. She spent $15,500 on Gergley’s services.
She lost her primary by 17 points.
Gergley, meanwhile, has been pushing the “Blue 22” narrative on Facebook about the 22 Republicans who had the sense to put State Rep. Derek Merrin (R-Monclova Twp.) in the dirt during the last Speaker’s race.
These are the kinds of memes he’s still producing, which have garnered a whopping three reactions in three days from its 11,000 followers.
Again, it’s hilarious that Gergley thinks the freaks who follow “Ohio Conservatives PAC” (not a real PAC, by the way) are terminally online enough to see the humor in a meme about the lady who went viral for screaming, “That mother fucker isn’t real” on an airplane and also know the inner workings of the Republican civil war in the Ohio House?
Well, the results speak for themselves. Despite that, Gergley has earned over $85,000 for his tepid social media work in the last two years. That’s not bad, considering the median salary in Ohio is $47,456 for jobs that are a lot more mentally and physically taxing than shitposting god-awful memes to the Facebook groups of some of the dumbest people in the state.
Are you tired of your job? Do you not mind if you play a key role in furthering Ohio’s slide into national irrelevance? Then, buddy, there is a fortune to be made working social media for these gremlins. The only catch is having to sleep at night.
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I think all the skin crawled off my body. I’m surprised paste eaters like Wiggam pay for these services, but the folks pulling the strings that make him a real boy know who to employ.