THE TROOPS: Noem plays the most pitiful card of all!

MONDAY, JUNE 9, 2025

Commander battles "Newscum:" Will we be able to find a way "back out of all this now too much for us?"

We can't say the answer is clear. On Friday morning, the New York Times carried a column by David Brooks which ran beneath this headline:

The Democrats’ Problems Are Bigger Than You Think

As a general matter, it seems to us that that headline is right. And then, this morning, this second headline, straight outta Mediaite:

Trump Demands Gavin ‘Newscum’ & Mayor Bass Apologize for ‘Ongoing L.A. Riots’

Sad! As you can see in Mediaite's report, the commander has returned to his trademark disparaging nickname for Governor Newsom. As a general matter, he started playing this cartoonish "insulting nickname" game back in 2015.

Is something wrong in some way with President Trump? That question keeps getting shoved aside in the flurry of the moment. 

Last night, he went back to playing his "Newscum" card! To tens of millions of neighbors and friends, this conduct may not seem all that strange—and over on the Fox News Channel, one major set of troops will doubtless be falling in line.

Those troops are persistently ready to serve the desires of their corporate owners! As we noted in Saturday's report, one foot soldier had started the Fox & Friends Weekend program that morning by serving this remarkable porridge to Fox News Channel viewers. 

For a fuller account of what this storm trooper said, see Saturday's report:

BOOTHE (6/7/25): I would say [Dr. Fauci] is a guy who intentionally lied to the American people. It's so obvious. It's just common sense.

[...]

We had so many people couldn't say goodbye to their loved ones. We had so many businesses—he crashed the economy. He ruined lives in isolation. People committed suicide. They drank themselves to death and did drugs because they were so depressed.

So that guy, because of his lies, destroyed America for a large part—

[...]

I don't need his phone to know that he's a terrible human being. Dr. Fauci, looking at you, buddy! Anyway—OK, sorry.

HURT: Good stuff.

"Good stuff," Charlie Hurt said. Truly, that was pathetic.

That (longer) diatribe was very dangerous stuff. That said, the troops were already in the field—and it was 6:15 a.m.!

The reinvented Lisa Boothe was sitting in for Rachel Campos-Duffy that day. On Sunday, Campos-Duffy was back in her chair, and the situation in Los Angeles had now come center stage.

As far as we know, no one played the "Newscum" card on Fox & Friends Weekend that day. But bright and early, at 6:09 a.m., Campos Duffy was already selling this:

CAMPOS-DUFFY (6/8/25): You're right—the leadership matters. In that city, it's Mayor Bass. She's a Communist. And she loves this stuff.

It was only 6:09—but Mayor Bass was already a Communist! As we've noted in the past, this is standard fare from Campos-Duffy. Hurt took things from there.

Is there some way for our flailing nation to get "back out of all this"—to draw back from the wages of 1) "the democratization of media" and 2) the braindead corporate media practice known as "segregation by viewpoint?"

Is there a way to draw back from that? We can't swear that there is! Meanwhile, there was the pitiful Kristi Noem, playing the most pathetic card of them all on Saturday's Fox & Friends Weekend.

Pathetic is as pathetic does, Mother Gump always said. During that program's 8 o'clock hour, Noem was discussing the criminal charges which have now been filed against Kilmar Abrego Garcia, who will presumably go on trial. 

What will we learn from some such trial? As a basic matter of theory, we're supposed to wait to see. 

Noem may not be that patient. Along the way, as she spoke with the friends, the pitiful person said this:

NOEM (6/7/25): The fact that we had Democrat politicians, and [Senator] Van Hollen down there defending him and standing beside him, buying him margaritas...It shouldn't be shocking, but it still is shocking to me, that we have people like this who go so far out on a limb just to be a big frickin' deal in a political arena.

Did Abrego Garcia "traffic children for a living?" By tradition, public officials are supposed to wait for the legal proceedings within which such allegations will be assessed.

On this day, Noem presented all the charges against Abrego Garcia as established facts. That said, the most pitiful moment came when she played the margarita card—when she said that Senator Van Hollen had been "buying Abrego Garcia margaritas" when he met with him in El Salvador, following Abrego Garcia's bungled "deportation" into that country's notorious prison system.

Van Hollen had been buying him margaritas! Yes, she actually said it!

In truth, there's nothing a trooper like Noem won't say at this tribalized point in time. For the record, the same card had been played the day before, on the Fox News Channel's The Five. 

In an angry, irrational performance, Greg Gutfeld had already referred to Senator Van Hollen as "a scumbag." (Slowly but surely, Gutfeld is importing the garbage can values of his own 10 p.m. show into the world of The Five.)

Gutfeld had already said that. When it came her time to perform, a former VJ offered this:

"KENNEDY" (6/6/25): You know, if Van Hollen is so in love with the Constitution, why didn't he take the Constitution for margaritas?

WATTERS: [Chuckles]

"KENNEDY": Why did he take a gang member?

Is Abrego Garcia a gang member? That has always been a possibility. We'd be inclined to wait to see what transpires in court.

The former VJ who clowns as "Kennedy" is perhaps a bit less patient. Having nothing of value to say, she also played the margarita card. She played that pathetic card too! 

Simply put, there's nothing so stupid that these troopers from Red America aren't going to stand up and say it:

Mayor Bass is a Communist, and Senator Van Hollen's a scumbag. Governor Newsom is actually Newscum. 

As for Noem herself, she may have been auditioning for her current job when she shot her puppy that day, several top international experts have now thoughtfully said!

That said, is there a way back out of all this—back out of the chaos which has been created by the two societal forces we've cited above?

We aren't real sure there is! And now we're forced to mention a factor which we Blues will rarely cite. We're forced to mention the rolling foolishness of the troops here in our own Blue America—the serial foolishness which has persistently enabled Red America's troops in the things they say and do.

The Democrats’ Problems Are Bigger Than You Think, that David Brooks column says. We're inclined to agree with that assessment—and one of our biggest problems is the difficulty we Blue Americans have in seeing how persistently hapless our own elites have been.

The Fox News Channel has assembled a gang of troops who are willing to say and do anything. Over here in Blue America, our own self-admiring troops have endlessly floundered and failed.

We Blues have a hard time seeing that! As the week proceeds, we'll ponder each set of tribal warfighters. We'll ponder each set of troops.

A point of some concern: The Internet Archive maintains an invaluable video collection of all "cable news" programs. 

Last fall, that archive came under a cyber attack which knocked it out of commission for a period of weeks. The archive seems to be struggling once again. 

We hope this problem passes.