Picture of mayoral candidate not as bad as people think
There is a picture circulating on the Internet of Steve Hunt, a candidate in next month’s Oklahoma City mayor’s race, which might raise some eyebrows. 
I’ve included the photo with this post. Everyone who sends me this picture seems to think it’s really damning, but if you understand what you are looking at, it really isn’t that bad.
Hunt is smoking out of a hookah pipe. He’s not smoking illicit drugs out of a bong. Hookah is a a traditional way of smokng tobacco that originated in India and is popular in the Middle East. You might remember it from cartoons when you were a kid.
Hookah has become trendy in the United States, with bars offering flavored tobacco to smoke with your friends. I know of two such hookah bars in Oklahoma City.
I should point out that I tried hookah once at a bar in Dallas a few years ago. I’ve never smoked so much as a cigarette, but I gave “strawberry fields” tobacco a try. It wasn’t really my cup of tea, but I’m told it’s far less harsh than regular tobacco.
Steve Hunt is an interesting character. He’s certainly not an experienced politician, and he doesn’t have the background you’d expect from a mayoral candidate. But anyone using this photo against him should at least understand what he’s actually doing.
Smoking any tobacco obviously carries with it health risks. But smoking out of a hookah pipe is really no different than smoking a cigarette or a traditional pipe.
I have no idea whether Mayor Mick Cornett has ever smoked, but I’ve never seen any photos to that effect.
- Staff Writer Bryan Dean
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Comments
Makes you think some people are nervous having someone running against Mick. Democrats were up 30% in Mass. for Senate and lost. Mick and his cronies will spend lots of money keeping him Mayor of the Chamber of Commerce.
Who are the ignorant unworldly uncultured ‘tards trying to imply there’s anything illicit about this photo? Hookah pipes are revered in social settings in many cultures.
My mayor can smoke all the hookah tobacco he wants if he’s going to fight against things like $777,000,000 windfalls for contractor buddies.
I’d say the people of Oklahoma City could do worse than voting for a guy who can pull a girl that looks like that. Man, that should be enough in itself!
Alcohol destroys many lives and destroys families. I have never known a family that was pulled apart by the Hookah pipe. Have you?
This whole deal just makes me yawn. Ooh, i also heard that he uses his late Grandfather’s ash tray when he smokes his rare cigar!
Wait… that’s kind of sweet. Yeah, i got nothin’.
I don’t care what he’s smoking – that guy is a moron. Ask him to tell you about YouTube sometime. Be prepared to listen – not discuss – for hours.
Hunt’s political role models are anarchist/socialist Noam Chomsky and Amy Goodman of ‘Democracy Now!’ If you are also a fan of Chomsky & Goodman, definitely vote for Hunt. Don’t know who they are? Maybe you should read up on them before you decide how you will vote.
Remember in the movie Matrix how Keanu Reeves’ character had an internet alterego he called ‘Neo’? Hunt has an internet alter ego also that he calls o0xst (that is lower case ‘o’ – number zero – xst). Want to know more about Hunt? Just do a Google search on o0xst and you will find his MySpace page, blogs, videos, comments and much more.
BE AN INFORMED VOTER!
I don’t think “o0xst” is a big secret, John. On the MySpace page it says “Steve Hunt for Mayor”, and it comes up as the 4th result on a Google seach for “‘Steve Hunt’ Oklahoma”. Thanks for playing, though. I’m sure Mick Cornett is MUCH better at deception on a bad day than Steve Hunt will ever hope to be.
I’ve smoked hookahs before, and they are harmless. You are not supposed to inhale the smoke, just like cigars, you just puff on it. So in reality this is probably much safer than smoking cigarettes, and the two hardly equate.
If someone is really trying to sell this photo as representing something more “damning”, I see it as the first desperate arrow in a mudslinging campaign against a candidate who, though not a pillar of the community, certainly represents the vast majority of Oklahoma City residents.