If Whoopie Goldberg Can Talk About Michael Phelps, So Can I

Also, Jane Velez-Mitchell can also kiss my ass. If you watch this video, you'll know why.

http://www.cnn.com/video/#/video/podcasts/showbiztonight/site/2009/02/03/sbt.phelps.mishap.cnn

Let's get some things straight here.

• Michael Phelps is not a kid. He's 23 years old. 23 years old is not a kid. If he was 9, and he got caught having a messy room, being a kid may be an excuse. When you're a 23 year old millionaire, probably not.
• Smoking pot is certainly not the worst thing in the world for a regular person.
  
• Michael Phelps is not a regular person. Michael Phelps is the most successful Olympic athlete in history.
  
• Michael Phelps does not make a living swimming. Michael Phelps makes a living endorsing products. He's an amateur athlete. He's not getting paid to swim. He's getting paid to be, you guessed it a ROLE MODEL (Sorry Charles).
• By taking that money, Michael Phelps agrees to take on that responsibility of being a role model. Part of that responsibility, though not WRITTEN anywhere, is to not have pictures taken of you while smoking weed out of a bong.
  
• Believe it or not, this is not validation for anyone who does drugs, as proof that successful people do drugs. It is not redemption for the pot-smoking world. I'm relatively certain that Michael Phelps does not regularly smoke marijuana, especially while training. Michael Phelps is not on your side, Mr Pot Smokey. He didn't come out and say "Yeah brother, just a little weed ain't hurtin' anybody!" He was embarrassed by his behavior.
  
• Michael Phelps actually handled this the right way. He said he was sorry, he said it wouldn't do it again. Pretty much end of story. He probably shouldn't be crucified for it. However he should understand, once again, that youth stops becoming an excuse when you start living in the grown-up world.
  
• Finally, Michael Phelps should find whatever person took that picture, and set that person on fire. I would take that person's digital camera and shove it clean up their ass. Someone could have cost him millions of dollars because they thought it was funny. Seriously. I wouldn't stop shoving things up that person's ass.

Thanks, have a great day. Stop talking about this now. Let's discuss more important things, like Kobe vs. Lebron.