One man's demons is one world's problems
So this story (from my former home city) serves to buttress a theory I've had for a long time now: conservatives who don't practice what they preach aren't hypocrites, they're terrified that the world is full of people just like them, plagued by evil temptations on all sides at all times. "The world needs a strong illiberal hand because if everyone gave in to their ever-urging dark side, like me, we'd have sheer anarchy!"
That's why it's OK (to their public) to be a closeted homophobe, or to preach about the sanctity of the family when you have five ex-spouses, or, as in this case, be a tough-on-drugs mayor while also (allegedly) a crack-smoking member of a long-time drug-dealing family. It's not viewed as hypocrisy; it's a viewed as a battle lost to the demons that plague us all, the same demons who will destroy society as we know it if unleashed, because a world full of people actually acting on all their desires and doing what they want to do would of course be unthinkably awful and doomed.
Globe investigation: The Ford family’s history with drug dealing
That's why it's OK (to their public) to be a closeted homophobe, or to preach about the sanctity of the family when you have five ex-spouses, or, as in this case, be a tough-on-drugs mayor while also (allegedly) a crack-smoking member of a long-time drug-dealing family. It's not viewed as hypocrisy; it's a viewed as a battle lost to the demons that plague us all, the same demons who will destroy society as we know it if unleashed, because a world full of people actually acting on all their desires and doing what they want to do would of course be unthinkably awful and doomed.
Globe investigation: The Ford family’s history with drug dealing