Rep. John Olumba’s 4,930-word, 29-minute, rambling, delusional, insult-laden farewell speech Wednesday on the floor of the Michigan House of Representatives was a low point for the institution, and it’s a damn shame House leadership allowed Mr. Olumba to go on and on and on, Zach Gorchow writes on his Gongwer News Service blog.

Gorchow writes that Olumba, a Detroiter and Independent who won office as a Democrat, knocked fellow Democrats, talked about his life and riffed on jazz at various part of his speech. Then, Gorchow reports, "Mr. Olumba launched into a tirade against Asians and Chaldeans, playing up a major stereotype, in blasting merchants of Asian and Chaldean descent for purportedly taking advantage of African-Americans in Detroit."

“Asians and Chaldeans should have a Black Misery Appreciation Day, they are selling fake hair, gas, and loose cigarettes to people all across Detroit that are hoping to catch a breath of fresh air. And making a fortune doing it,” he said. “I want African Americans to get back to our principles of once being an honorable and spiritual people, who wanted most to be right in front of God. When we have him, we won’t need the Chaldean to sell us loose cigarettes or the Korean to sell us weave or the media and Hollywood and the music industry to sell us toxic rap music.”

In a final insult, Mr. Olumba took a shot at transgender people, voicing umbrage that their push to be included in the Elliott-Larsen Civil Rights Act has been compared to the act’s original purpose to protect African-Americans from discrimination. “To me seeing a guy dressed up as a girl is either going to be really funny or really sad,” he said. “But I mean let’s make the observation and move on, but don’t offend me by comparing his journey to wear panty hose to work because he feels more secure in them to Martin Luther King being assassinated or to my wife’s father being sprayed with hoses or bitten by dogs, or to my great uncles being jailed multiple times. Or to millions of people losing their lives to forced bondage and servitude.”

Olumba, whose attendance record is one of the legislature's worst, earlier caught the attention of Fox 2's M.L. Elrick. He reported in April that the lawmaker apparently lived outside his district.