Mayor Quimby’s Top 6 Scandals on ‘The Simpsons’
If only John F. Kennedy’s cover-ups and missteps were as comical as those of his impressionist on The Simpsons, Mayor Joe Quimby. As a concerned voter, I’d take rat milk over the Bay of Pigs in a heartbeat.
Throughout the world, governments large and local are often steered by greased palms — in The Simpsons, the only difference is that the palms are yellow and attached to only four fingers. Mayor Quimby is as crooked as the day is long, and, between his mob ties, his misuse of public funds and his outrageous extra-marital exploits, he’s exactly the leader that Springfield deserves. Sporting his mayoral sash to slush fund payments and seedy motel rooms alike, everywhere Quimby goes, a thin trail of slime follows — though that might just be some spilled chowdah. Quimby’s mayoral seal bears the Latin phrase, “Corruptus in Extremis,” easily translated as “extremely corrupt,” a descriptor he deserves in his every appearance.
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Over 34 seasons, Quimby has occasionally been removed from his seat of power by some embarrassing blunder, but Diamond Joe has always found a way to worm his way back into office. Though once seen as a caricature, a certain recent presidency has shown that Quimby’s ability to squirm out of any scandal unscathed is relatively tame compared to the real world. Nonetheless, here are Mayor Quimby’s greatest moments of “-gate”-worthiness in ascending order of absurdity…
This is pretty run-of-the-mill shady politics stuff — the hot-headed young buck of a powerful political family gets into trouble, and his big-shot uncle has to step in to sweep the whole thing under the rug. However, in “The Boy Who Knew Too Much,” unlike how it works everywhere in the real world, Quimby both fails to sway the jury with dirty money, and, against all odds, Freddy Quimby is rightfully innocent. That’ll teach that Frenchie to say “chowdah” weird.
Spending the Town’s Street-Repair Fund on His Secret Swimming Pool
It’s a strange world where the only investigative reporter talented and tireless enough to expose the mayor’s misuse of public funds is Homer Simpson. In “The Computer Wore Menace Shoes,” Homer becomes a Pulitzer Prize-winning internet sleuth after breaking the story of Quimby’s swimming pool and forcing the mayor to return the funds to their rightful place in the pothole repair account. Again, it’s not unusual for a public servant to spend taxpayer money on his own pad, but it’s exceedingly rare for him to ever give that money back.
Stocking School Cafeterias with Mob-Produced Rat Milk
Of all of Quimby’s quack schemes, this one came the closest to getting the mayor killed — twice. “In Mayored to the Mob,” Quimby recruits Homer to be his personal bodyguard, unaware that the Simpsons patriarch’s occasionally unflinching moral compass would threaten to blow the lid off of one of his most calcium-rich criminal conspiracies. Quimby ends up shutting down his business partner Fat Tony’s rat-milking operation, prompting Springfield’s seedy underbelly to put out a hit on the mayor, which Homer also foils. The Springfield mob should have learned from the real-life pros and hired a second gunman.
His 27 Paternity Suits (And Counting)
Wherever Quimby lays his head, a pack of bikini-clad women are there to cushion it. His high-profile affairs with Miss Springfield and Cookie Kwan make up just a portion of the sex scandals he’s accrued in his long and fruitful career of philandering as his ever-suffering wife Martha remains dutifully by his side with a sizable string of pearls to clutch.
Nearly Destroying the Town with the Monorail (Twice)
Every Simpsons fan knows that Quimby was squabbling with Chief Wiggums while Marge was saving the town from certain single-track destruction, but that wasn’t even Quimby’s biggest Marge-related monorail scandal. No, years later in the Season 29 episode, “The Old Blue Mayor She Ain’t What She Used to Be,” Marge beats Quimby in the mayoral election after his disastrous project to turn the old monorail into a “sky park” ends in destruction. The punishment of spending more time with his wife and kids does turn Quimby into a better partner to Martha, but he returns to his old ways after Marge’s off-screen impeachment puts him back in the sash.
Murdering Political Opponents Using Taxpayer Funds
What can he say? He’s just a “bad wittle boy.” How could you not vote for such a lovable scamp?
