SATURDAY, APRIL 29, 2023
The person who died in jail: Jerry Springer died last week. He was one of the most monumental frauds in all of American history.
In fairness, as of today, so is (almost) everyone else! For the most part, Jane Coaston avoids discussing the actual sweep of this problem in this morning's New York Times, in a column which carries this headline:
We Are All Guests on ‘The Jerry Springer Show’ Now
Springer hailed from Cincinnati, where he once served as mayor. As it turns out, Cincinnati is Coaston's hometown, and Coaston's a good, decent person.
Growing up in Cincinnati, Coaston watched the former mayor "gain a foothold in local cable television." In this passage, she describes (one small part of) where that foothold took us:
COASTON (4/29/23): Mr. Springer, who died on Thursday, saw his show become a huge hit in the 1990s despite being largely loathed by people who thought of themselves as cultured. Because the show definitely wasn’t that. It was a show about people who have sex with animals. And people who engaged in incest with siblings. It featured so many fist fights between guests and even between guests and the audience that you can easily find Jerry Springer fight compilation videos on YouTube, if you’re so disposed.
It was a show in which an episode might be titled “Freaky Sex Fetishes” or “I Married a Horse.” It was also a show that habitually portrayed being gay, bisexual or transgender as the “freakish” equivalents of a woman who had sex with 70 men in 10 hours or someone called the “the Kung Fu Hillbilly.”
And there was Mr. Springer, always wearing a suit and finishing every episode by imparting a “final thought,” followed by, “Till next time, take care of yourself, and each other.” He was a calm, bespectacled flight attendant on a plane headed directly to hell.
[...]
[Springer] once claimed that he wanted his television show to be serious, with serious interviews with serious people. But the ratings seemed to soar when the guests on his show spent less time debating the Iran-contra scandal and more time debating whether women with [Sorry. You'll have to go see what it says yourself].
As Springer learned and showed the world, sex with animals sells, as do the fistfights which follow! Meanwhile, Springer himself was a (likeable) master fraud—a likeable fellow who pretended to be dispensing "final thoughts" as he raked in millions of dollars by going as dumb and as low as it can possibly get.
That said, (almost) everyone (who matters) is Jerry Springer now! In this passage, Coaston discusses one (relatively minor) part of that deeply destructive story:
COASTON: [H]is particular brand of tabloid television gave way eventually to a landscape littered with reality shows in which people can brazenly broadcast their lives without the filtering mechanism of a studio talk show. There’s a direct line from the Springer show—which peaked in 1998 as the most-watched daytime television program in America, entertaining and horrifying nearly seven million Americans every single day—to the semi-staged mayhem of reality TV, which exploded following “Big Brother” and “Survivor” in 2000 and continues today with shows like “Real Housewives.”
Good God! As of 1998, Springer was hosting "the most-watched daytime television program in America!"
In Coaston's telling, this led on to the stupidified "reality" fare which now dominates basic cable.
What the heck happened to basic cable? Let us count (a few of) the ways:
Coaston mentions Real Housewives. That sprawling, braindead franchise dominates Bravo, a cable channel which, per its name, was originally intended to focus on the fine arts.
The pattern proceeds from there. To cite one example, The Learning Channel was originally supposed to be devoted to learning!
According to the leading authority on the topic, the channel "mostly featured documentary content pertaining to nature, science, history, current events, medicine, technology, cooking, home improvement, and other information-based topics."
That's how it got its start! In 1992, The Learning Channel's corporate owners changed its name to TLC. The channel is now built around such dumbnified "reality" programs as 1000-lb Sisters, 90 Day Fiancé and Dr. Pimple Popper.
Not to mention this year's thoughtful new TLC program, MILF Manor.
The stupidification which made Springer a star now dominates the remnants of basic cable. Eventually, Coaston even makes this claim about us the American people in this, the age of social media:
COASTON: [T]he social media era has smashed that barrier between performative awfulness and its audience. Mr. Springer’s more insidious legacy is that we’ve all been lured through the glass and, just like his guests, we’ve all been egged on to perform our cruelest, worst, most vice-signaling behavior, all while gawking at the same behavior in others. With “The Jerry Springer Show,” we were still just the audience. Now, we’re both the audience and the guests.
According to Coaston, in the way "we" behave on social media, we're "all" Springerspawn now!
Stating the obvious, that's an absurdly sweeping claim about us the American people. That said, Coaston leaves her analysis of our nation's Springerfication right there.
As such, she's telling a story without an end. She's ignoring the most insidious part of this sprawling development.
In fairness, the dumbnification of American culture wasn't caused by Springer alone. If his program had never appeared, corporate owners of media properties would have learned that they could maximize profits by dumbing their product way, way down, as they've relentlessly done.
That said, (almost) everyone is Springer now! Or at least, almost everyone who matters.
Tucker Carlson is Jerry Springer. So of course is Donald J. Trump.
But so was Maureen Dowd, with her seven (7) columns bult around Candidate Gore's bald spot. So was Chris Matthews, rubbing his thigh as he told Gennifer Flowers what a smokin' hot babe she was, then as he trashed Hillary Clinton in ways so dumb that they defied belief.
Our blue tribe managed to sleep through all that. We then slept through a great deal more. How much more have we managed to miss?
In our view, our blue tribe is left with a basic question as we review the cultural drift Coaston (almost) discusses:
For starters, how about Joe and Mika (but mainly Joe)? Yesterday morning, were they Jerry Springer as they discussed one particular aspect of the Trump rape trial?
How about Nicolle Wallace, as she pretended to discuss the same topic on yesterday's Deadline: White House?
The things they said were highly novelized. The things they said were very familiar and pleasing.
That said, did their presentations make any sense, as judged by any traditional journalistic standard? Plainly no, they didn't.
Meanwhile, how about the person who died in prison, down in Georgia, in the astonishing circumstance described in the (online) Washington Post?
Colin Kaepernick has agreed to pay for an autopsy. Why haven't we blue tribe viewers heard even one word about that?
On Monday, we'll start addressing such questions. In our view, though, this whole "cable news" press corps is basically out of order. They're (pretty much) all Springer now, or they're at least Springer-adjacent.
Jerry Springer was a likeable person and an undisguised fraud. He gave us fistfights about sex with animals, then offered "final thoughts."
His behavior was baldly fraudulent. But at this point in the dumbnification which has emerged from the "democratization of media," how many of our multimillionaire cable stars aren't part of that same destructive culture?
Not to mention their endless array of sidekicks, dear friends and hangers-on! Are they all Jerry Springer now? If they aren't, why not?
Are they all Jerry Springer now, or was it only Tucker? We'd call that a very good question. We're glad you've finally asked!
“Tucker Carlson is Jerry Springer. So of course is Donald J. Trump.”
ReplyDeleteWas Jerry Springer disordered? Did his mom leave him when he was 9? Is he mentally ill and deserving of pity?
What Somerby calls "dumbnification" is actually greed. It is the pursuit of advertising dollars by building up audiences. The people watching such shows are gratifying a voyeuristic urge but not necessarily stupid. People have an interest in how others behave, how they live, because such info instructs our own behavior, but it also shows us what not to do, what the consequences are of choosing other paths. And there is a satisfaction to seeing that no matter what we do wrong in our own lives, at least we aren't as bad as the people we watch on TV. Is that stupid or is it human?
ReplyDeleteI am not condoning Jerry Springer and I did not watch him, but I also think Somerby is a bit hard on people's interest in other people, which extends to the bios Obama and Michelle wrote, the focus on the royals, and ultimately to all fiction about people, histories of famous figures, and the most highbrow TV shows (Downton Abbey).
Oddly Somerby highlights this sentence: "It was a show about people who have sex with animals." but he doesn't highlight the one immediately following it: "And people who engaged in incest with siblings." Why? Does he think sex with animals is more or less deviant than incest? Or more or less serious? Springer explored the fringes of behavior, but according to the Kinsey Report, deviant behavior is less fringe than we all think. Perhaps that is why so many people watched such shows? But why does Somerby distinguish sex with animals as kinkier than incest? He should ask himself that question.
Somerby dings Coaston for stopping too soon, not broadening her exploration of Springerism to more of the political sphere. But recall that she has one single column and that limitied space prevents how broadly one can make one's topic while still presenting sufficiently specific arguments to convince people of the premise. It is grossly unfair to complain that she didn't write a book-length treatise in an opinion column.
ReplyDeleteBut Somerby needs to find some criticism. She is, after, black, female and a journalist. And given the proclivities of people on Springer's shows, and the fact that these were everyday people with very odd behaviors, and "we are all Springer now," how can Somerby know whether she is good and decent and not someone who does something odd with animals or relatives?
If Somerby is going to complain about lifestyle articles in the NY Times and Washington Post, of course he will hate Springer and anything else that everyday people find interesting.
ReplyDeletehttps://twitter.com/charles_lipson/status/1651609912315904000?s=42&t=oYvKLjVc8YzJIvwKoQTYBQ
DeleteWhy exactly is that funny to you?
DeleteIt’s ironic.
DeleteIt's moronic. FTFY
DeleteLipson is just bashing protesters. No one on Springer was protesting anything. Further, the Stanford Law students heckled and shouted down the speaker -- there were no fist-fights, no violence.
Right. Stanford law students behaved like the average Jerry Springer audience members.
DeleteLeftwing street protesters behave like Springer audiences that make the highlight reels.
…and right wing protesters storm the Capitol, bear spray cops, threaten to hang the VP, rummage through private offices…so funny!
DeleteWhat part of no violence, no fistfights did you not understand? Springer had security guards because there WAS violence on his show. 95% of the BLM protests were nonviolent. That Stanford protest involved shouting but NO violence. So, no, they didn't behave like the Springer guests -- the brawls were on stage, not in the audience.
DeleteYour ignorance perhaps makes life more entertaining for you, but distorting what happened on Springer in order to lie about what happened at Stanford bears no resemblance to reality, not even reality TV.
Don't forget that those right wing "protesters" also defecated and smeared feces in the Capitol building. No one did that at Stanford, BLM protests, or on Springer. If you find that funny, there is something really really wrong with you -- Somerby will be begging us to pity you.
I think hate has seriously warped your sense of humor.
The anonymouse outrage quotient is off the charts.
DeleteIt’s outdone only by the anonymouse reflex for revisionism.
What was revised? Lipson took a cheap shot that relied on distorting both Springer and those Stanford Law protesters. Are you seriously claiming he was right? And how does it look when the right, once again, mocks its own base for being violent Springer-watching cretins?
DeleteI am calling you and Lipson liars. That is business-as-usual for Republicans. My outrage concerns Somerby and his defense of Trump who admitted grabbing women by the p*ssy, but just not E. Jean Carroll or any of the others who have come forward, because he likes to brag about what he does to women, but doesn't want to be prosecuted for assault. So he lies, just like you and Lipson. Yes, that demands outrage, against both Trump and Somerby for defending him.
Shouldn't you be in church? They will tell you important things there, about what is right and what is wrong.
Anonymouse 11:34am, you must have missed out on the anonymouse comparison of Jerry Springer as being like the NYT lifestyle section in that it is yet another source for “everyday people” that Bob mocks.
DeleteOh, yeah, I do think Jerry Springer and the NYT Lifestyle section are for niche audiences.
I’m not a partisan political operative so I don’t have to move forward or knock it into reverse depending upon the direction Bob’s essays are headed.
There is no reason to appoint ourselves judges of pop culture. Watch or don’t watch, who cares? Somerby’s essay is ridiculous and Cecelia is worse.
DeleteIn the defense of Republicans who bear-sprayed cops, tried to overthrow the Capitol and defecated in Congressional offices, they were very upset about black people's votes counting in the 2020 Presidential election.
DeleteThe second amendment is evil.
ReplyDeleteThis happened today:
Delete"A man killed five people, including an 8-year-old boy, with an AR-15-style weapon Friday night in an angry response to his neighbors’ request that he stop shooting in his yard while their baby was trying to sleep, Texas authorities said Saturday.
Instead of heeding the request, the man allegedly took the gun, went to the neighbors’ house and killed half the people inside. He then fled, sparking an overnight manhunt around Cleveland, Tex., that was continuing Saturday afternoon.
The mass killing of a family in their home was the latest act of retaliatory gun violence to traumatize an American community. The shooting renewed calls from gun control advocates for a federal ban on assault weapons, which have a unique ability to destroy the human body. It was at least the seventh incident this month in which an armed American shot people in response to regular, everyday interactions."
This kind of thing will be happening more often given the greater access to guns and the ability to carry them around everywhere. Plum is a small community, but it could be where you live. This guy is a Republican, of course:
Delete"A man who ran for Allegheny County Council two years ago is accused of threatening several people with a gun at a Plum Borough Republican Committee meeting Thursday evening, according to authorities.
Eric Phillip Casteel, 62, was arrested at his Plum home Thursday and charged with three misdemeanor counts each of endangering another person, terroristic threats and simple assault.
He was being detained in Allegheny County Jail in lieu of a $25,000 cash bond and faces a preliminary hearing May 10, according to court records.
According to a criminal complaint, Casteel began yelling shortly before 8:15 p.m. during the Republican Committee meeting at Plum Community Center on New Texas Road.
He then walked out of the building, saying he would be back.
Three others attending the meeting — Jerry Purcell, Paul Dern and Michael Doyle — followed Casteel outside to try to deescalate the situation, the complaint said.
Purcell is a candidate for Plum Council in the spring primary. Doyle is president of Plum Council and a candidate for district judge, while Dern is council’s vice president.
They, along with the borough’s GOP committee Chairman Steve Schlauch, did not respond to requests for comment about the incident.
Lisa Buckiso, vice chair for the Republican Committee of Allegheny County, issued a statement Friday afternoon saying the incident began because Casteel was upset about the vote for a new vice chair.
The three men Casteel is accused of threatening told police they saw him put what appeared to be a firearm in his waistband, police say. They tried to retreat to Purcell’s truck but said Casteel approached them with the firearm in his hand, according to the complaint.
Police said Casteel then aimed the gun at Dern and said, “I’ll shoot you,” according to the arrest papers. Casteel fled the scene after one of the alleged victims called 911, authorities said.
When police arrested Casteel at his home in the 100 block of Valley Fields Drive, they found a gun in the trunk of his son’s car with a loaded magazine and a live round in the chamber, according to the criminal complaint.
Plum police Chief Lanny Conley on Friday said the gun used in the incident is registered to Casteel, who has a permit to carry a concealed firearm.
Casteel failed to win a seat when he ran for Allegheny County Council in 2021."
I have twice tried to post a link to Digby's blog but both times my comment was deleted. It was an article by Tom Sullivan listing a series of shootings in everyday life, illustrating the problem when there are too many guns in people's hands and someone gets drunk or mad.
DeleteWhy is Somerby censoring this?
Somerby appears to be removing all links to Digby, perhaps because of the troll who just kept repeating that name. Inefficient filtering.
DeleteEric Phillip Casteel, 62, was arrested at his Plum home Thursday and charged with three misdemeanor counts each of endangering another person, terroristic threats and simple assault.
DeleteDamn! Does Gym Jordan know about this? This type of benign first amendment speech is acceptable at school board meetings targeting school board members, school administrators and teachers.
Digby.
DeleteWell, a lot of rather obvious problems spring up here.
ReplyDeleteFirst, WHY does Jane Coaston have to be identified as a good, decent person? Her points about Springer are rather academic. Bob deplores Coaston's "absurdly sweeping claim" and a few lines later he's agreeing it's basically true.
Translation: It's O.K. to say some people are dumbed down but let's not dwell on the right wingers about which this is true.
Bob extents this, most offensively, into the E. Jean Carroll case. It's hard to tell if Bob is offended by the case itself, or by the way Morning Joe is covering it. But speaking of Carrol in the context of the staged antics on "The Jerry Spinger Show" is ugly almost beyond belief. We don't know what Bob really has to say on this subject, because he won't enlighten us beyond this trashy innuendo, but it's all in a piece of Bob's refusal to take any complaints about Trump seriously, no matter who Trump is cheating, insulting, abusing or getting killed.
Was Jerry Springer someone who should rightfully be called a "fraud?" True, there was always the silly disclaimer at the end, but it was hard to say He was presenting a smoke screen in front of his intentions (to keep you watching at all costs). Springer defended his show by saying "it's very rare for people with no money appearing on TV ever." And while his purpose was to humiliate them, he might still have a point. Does Bob Somerby present himself more honestly than Jerry Springer?
Some of us oldsters can remember a time when people joked derisively about "The Beverly Hillibillies" being the number one show TV show in the Country. Some argued that it illustrated TV itself was a brain numbing waste of time for morons. I remember my Dad explaining that, to his people in the south, "Hillbilly" would be a very derisive and insulting term. But he still thought it was funny.
This might be part of our problem. People who should have known better laughed off Trump for years. The New York Times never much went near his shady business dealings they started investigating when he became President. Was he some low profile New Yorker? The much parodied (and imitated) "Jerry Springer Show" was watched in jest by some who only tuned in on rare occasion or when Jiffy Lube was changing the filter (guilty as charged.).
Springer bled into the Kardashians. The bestsellers for grown ups are now children's books. Bill Maher kisses the ass of the worst billionare trash and markets himself as common sense liberal. Nope, it's not looking too good. Take a deep breath and get ready for Bob going after Ms. Carroll.
Somerby implies Carroll is a grifter and con artist like Stormy Daniels. The people on Springer’s show were paid. Somerby buys Trump’s non-defense (that Carroll is seeking attention) because he mistrusts women in general. It is very offensive but this isn’t the first time he has defended an accused rapist.
DeleteThis is way too much to dump on Jerry Springer. I would blame The widening of media access beyond tabloids via technology that enabled people to make money off depravity.
ReplyDeleteSomerby is curiously hypocritical when his own family fortune was built off of sideshow acts. We weren’t allowed to see the sideshow as children because it isn’t nice to gawk at people’s oddities. But this is an unpleasant aspect of capitalism, not Springer’s invention. Oprah did it too, and Barbara Walters and Dear Abbie & Ann Landers.
People do behave badly when paid to do so. There is nothing new about that. Look how Somerby uses this blog to say nasty things about others.
Dear Abbie and Ann Landers were identical twins.
DeleteI don’t consider myself cultured, but I never watched Jerry Springer. Not even once.
ReplyDeleteCoaston wrote: "It was a show about people who have sex with animals. And people who engaged in incest with siblings."
ReplyDeleteIn the old days, the NY Times would never ever use a sentence fragment in an article. This is literary style, not traditional news reporting style. Well, today's Times is more like a work of art and not so much like a dispassionate news organ.
This was an opinion piece, not a news report.
DeleteSentence fragments. Why not?
DeleteI don't blame Springer for the dumbnification, I blame Mao.
ReplyDeleteRepublicans should support statehood for Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia.
ReplyDeleteWhy does Bob say dumbnification instead of dumbification?
ReplyDeleteThere are some other people also saying dumbnification, but google corrects the spelling. It is common to put a consonant before a vowel to make it easier to pronounce, so maybe it is because the vowel "i" starts the second syllable. But it still works if you say "dum-mi-fi-cation" even if it isn't spelled like that. Somerby's spelling isn't the preferred one.
DeleteSo Bob has dumbnified the spelling.
DeleteFirst Somerby blames Coaston for not pursuing her theme far enough, for being too limited in her scope:
ReplyDelete"For the most part, Jane Coaston avoids discussing the actual sweep of this problem in this morning's New York Times"
But then later, he contradicts himself and accuses her of making too sweeping a generalization:
"According to Coaston, in the way "we" behave on social media, we're "all" Springerspawn now!
Stating the obvious, that's an absurdly sweeping claim about us the American people. That said, Coaston leaves her analysis of our nation's Springerfication right there.
As such, she's telling a story without an end. She's ignoring the most insidious part of this sprawling development."
Ultimately, this is not a matter of going too far or not going far enough. Somerby is critical because she doesn't say what he wants her to say about his own pet peeves. He wants her to criticize his own favorite targets:
"But so was Maureen Dowd, with her seven (7) columns bult around Candidate Gore's bald spot. So was Chris Matthews, rubbing his thigh as he told Gennifer Flowers what a smokin' hot babe she was, then as he trashed Hillary Clinton in ways so dumb that they defied belief."
And finally we get to the main gripe, that Coaston didn't call E. Jean Carroll a manifestation of Springerism, someone seeking publicity by promoting a lurid story without merit. But this is a step too far.
As Carroll stated in her court testimony, she came forward because of the #metoo movement, which brought home the importance of women coming forward with their stories of rape and assault -- to prevent the same thing from happening to others and to support women who were being attacked for daring to accuse rich and powerful men.
What is the difference between a Springer guest and E. Jean Carroll. First, her story is more likely to be real. Second, she is getting no money for what she is doing. Third, it IS important for women to come forward so that men can understand the scope and nature of the problem women are facing. Fourth, she deserves justice for what she has suffered. Fifth, we know from Trump's own mouth that he has done this to other women and he needs to be held accountable for assaulting women with impunity. "They let you do it" Trump says -- but E. Jean Carroll is saying no to that, women do not let Trump do whatever he wants to their bodies, and neither will she.
Somerby doesn't stand with women. He stands with their abusers. Just as he stood with Kavanaugh, who we are finding out was never investigated. Is there a difference between a crime and a publicity stunt for TV? Of course there is, and E. Jean Carroll is not appearing on reality TV but in a courtroom, because this was serious and it was involuntary and she, an accomplished 79-year old author, is not seeking publicity but justice.
Trump is the one trying to destroy Carroll on social media. Carroll went to the courts for redress. Somerby surely knows the difference between a court of law and a reality TV show or social media?
DeleteBob doesn’t like people messing with Trump. The poor man is disordered.,
Deletehttps://digbysblog.net/2023/04/29/more-cowbell/
ReplyDelete"Meanwhile, how about the person who died in prison, down in Georgia, in the astonishing circumstance described in the (online) Washington Post?"
ReplyDeleteIs Somerby hinting that Trump shouldn't be put in jail because of the extreme mistreatment of some inmates who died there? Prison reform is a worthy cause. It was one of the main demands of the weathermen back in the 1970s. Southern prisons are rumored to be worse than Northern or urban prisons. It isn't too late for Somerby to do some good with advocacy, but not if he makes Trump his poster child. It isn't as if Trump would ever wind up in the same prison circumstances as a black man in the South.
Does Somerby know that children are dying in Sudan? How can he be worrying about men who die in jail when that is happening?
DeleteIn case no one else noticed, this whole bit about The Learning Channel is basically stolen from a comedy bit by Bill Maher.
ReplyDeleteIn any case, TDH is being very elitist with his supercilious mocking of programs made popular by real American "others". So offensive, Bob. You need to go out and talk to those fine real Americans about why they enjoy watching those shows you sneeringly mock.
You’ve destroyed Bob.
DeleteHoney Boo Boo and Duck Dynasty were widely enjoyed by The Others.
Delete"The person who died in jail: Jerry Springer died last week. He was one of the most monumental frauds in all of American history."
ReplyDeleteJerry Springer did not die in jail.
Yes, Somerby is making a cryptic reference to a prisoner who did die in an Atlanta jail. If Somerby were to describe what happened in detail, he wouldn't be able to blame the rest of us for our morbid curiosity, because that death involves all of the elements that would fascinate people on reality TV.
So, why does Somerby refer to it at all? Perhaps he wishes to suggest that liberals are responsible for all prisoner mistreatment, since we are calling for justice and prosecution of Republican wrongdoing? Maybe he is trying a role-reversal and implying that Republicans are not the tough-on-crime law-and-order party, seeking maximum sentences for minor crimes? Or perhaps Somerby is trying to deeply etch his new concern about the mentally ill, even those in prison. That way he may seem more plausible when he argues that Trump and other Republican miscreants are actually mentally ill and thus shouldn't be prosecuted but pitied.
This is the first time that Somerby has ever, even obliquely, shown any concern whatsoever about prisoner treatment or abuse. In the many years Somerby has been suggesting that people like Roy Moore be given the benefit of the doubt, that Rittenhouse was just a wayward boy, that Brock Turner just did what any red-blooded kid would have done, when he saw Chanel Miller lying beside a dumpster, Somerby has never expressed concern over prison conditions.
It is therefore offensive that his first concern for the death of a person in prison (mentally ill or not) comes to bail out Trump. No one imagines that Trump would skip any meals in whatever country-club prison he might wind up in, assuming his sentencing goes that far. Concern for the rich and famous in prison, coupled with neglect of everyone else, only shows why there are such disparities in how people are treated. It is a travesty. Somerby should be ashamed to use the plight of current prisoners to try to get Trump off the hook, ignoring the many mentally ill people who need help, in order to use their struggle as a shield for Trump's deliberate criminal behavior.
But, like most Republicans, Somerby has no shame.
Well said. Bob’s discovery of the prison condition issue rolls in at the same time it looks like Trump may be prosecuted. And the attack on the Capitol,,which Bob has never addressed in any serious way.
DeleteSo Jerry Springer was one of "the most monumental frauds in American history". According to who, other than Bobby. Did he commit Bernie Madhoff style larceny? Did he run Enron? Did he start up a phoney clinical lab enterprise, bilking investors out of many millions? No. He hosted a daytime television show that was sometimes paid for theatrics. Is Vince McMahon a monumental fraud as well? If not, why not? Get a grip, Bobby.
ReplyDeleteDid he have to payout on Trump University? Is he a billionare who once claimed he'd pay for his own campaign, but now finds endless ways to bilk his ignorant supporters of their money?
DeleteDid he start a war based on fake evidence of weapons of mass destruction?
Delete