Mayor Pete Buttigieg — part of the clown car of Democrat presidential candidates — wants you to think he’s moderate. After all, he’s the mayor of South Bend, Indiana, and you can’t get much more down-home than a Hoosier.

But the more Mayor Pete talks, the more his progressive side leaks out. And he revealed this dark side on Friday when he said that Thomas Jefferson’s name needs to be struck from the public eye.

Appearing on “The Hugh Hewitt Show” on Salem Radio Network, Buttigieg explained it this way:

“You know, there’s a lot to, of course, admire in his thinking and his philosophy. Then again, as you plunge into his writings, especially the notes on the state of Virginia, you know that he knew that slavery was wrong.”

“Now, we are all morally conflicted human beings. It’s not like we’re blotting him our of the history books or deleting him from being the founding fathers. But, naming something after somebody confers a certain amount of honor.”

He also boasted that Indiana is currently scrubbing Jefferson’s name from the public because “it’s the right thing to do.”

Actually, the Hoosiers who’ve obliterated the name of Thomas Jefferson are members of the Indiana Democratic Party. In 2016 they joined with other self-righteous state Democratic parties who have also renamed their annual “Jefferson-Jackson Dinners.”

As for the rest of Indiana — eh, not so much.

For example, there’s a Thomas Jefferson Elementary School in Valparaiso, Indiana, and another Thomas Jefferson Elementary in Hammond. Plus, there’s a Thomas Jefferson Elementary in. . . wait for it. . . Jeffersonville, Indiana. Yes, Jeffersonville was named after Thomas Jefferson.

And get this — Mayor Pete Buttigieg’s own South Bend boasts a magnet middle school called “Jefferson Traditional School.” Imagine that — the name of Jefferson and the word “traditional.”

Yeah, that scrubbing of Thomas Jefferson’s name throughout Indiana is working really well, isn’t it?

Now one reason why Buttigieg’s shenanigans piss me off is because I was born and raised in Northwest Indiana. I grew up in a charming old town sandwiched between cornfields and the steel mills of Gary, with Chicago looming over us like a big brother. Our major media came from Chicago, too, and we tended to identify more with the Windy City. It was a unique childhood.

But there’s one thing I can tell you about the Hoosiers I know — they’re Midwesterners who love their state. Right now more people are moving into Indiana than moving away, especially Chicagoans who want a lower cost of living and relief from Illinois taxes.

Plus, Indiana is just so gosh darn cute.

An Indiana Court House. Credit: jaygannett @ flickr. CC BY-SA 2.0.

So when I see a phony-baloney like Mayor Pete Buttigieg (our Marta has a particularly colorful spin on his name) try to pass himself off as an Awshucks-Small-Town-Hoosier-Mayor, my eyeballs roll back into my noggin. This is a guy who also threw shade at VP Mike Pence on Hugh Hewitt’s program, claiming he “advances homophobic policies.” Never mind that Mayor Pete previously called Pence “affable, even gentle.”

Mayor Pete Buttigieg may be young, good-looking, and a soft-spoken politician. He may say some of the things that might lull the ears of those who aren’t paying attention. But he’s really a progressive Democrat who endorses single-payer healthcare, abolishing the Electoral College, and thinks the Green New Deal is a “sound framework.”

And now he wants to throw the legacy of Thomas Jefferson, one of America’s Founders, under the bus. Take it from a native Hoosier — this Indiana mayor has no business being President.

Featured image: cropped from jimmcintosh @ pixabay.