FRIDAY, OCTOBER 17, 2025
They're now part of Numbskull Chic: There they sat, enjoying themselves! Two Fridays ago, on The Five, they engaged in some Numbskull Chic.
They were engaged in American Numbskull Chic—in the familiar gong-show stylings of Fox News Numbskull Chic.
She had emerged from Harvard Law School; he rates as the channel's top numbskull. Despite their differences, there they sat, citing disputed claims about health care—and on this nation's most-watched "cable news" show, they behaved like a pair of clowns.
GUTFELD (10/3/25): This is a process that was gamed by illegals, OK? First of all, I looked back and I found out—
Do you know what has more views that [the Democratic Party's health care] livestream? Rosie O'Donnell's colonoscopy!
PANELISTS: [Laughter]
WATTERS: No!
GUTFELD: And it wasn't—it wasn't even recorded!
WATTERS: Ha ha ha!
GUTFELD: That was four hundred real person views [of the Democratic livestream].
For background, see last Friday's report.
That is typical fare on this dimwitted, garbage can forum. Moments later, up jumped the Harvard Law School grad:
MCENANY: I can't stop thinking about Rosie's colonoscopy. I'm trying to get that image out of my mind.
GUTFELD: Here, you want to see some stuff on my phone?
[Leans over, shows phone to McEnany]
Looks like the Holland Tunnel.
MCENANY [Delighted laughter]: Greg downloaded it!
There were no images on the phone. That was just an enjoyable insult aimed at the fading hope of maintaining a viable American nation.
No modern nation can hope to survive these purveyors of Imbecile Chic. Nor can some such nation survive the refusal of elites inside Silo Blue to report and discuss this daily and nightly behavior.
Kayleigh McEnany, 37 years old, had long been a high achiever. She has no lack of requisite smarts.
We'd be willing to say that she's smart as a whip. We've shown you the basics before:
Kayleigh McEnany
Kayleigh Michelle McEnany (born April 18, 1988) is an American political commentator, media personality, and former political spokesperson who served as the 33rd White House press secretary during the first Trump administration from 2020 to 2021.
Early in the 2016 Republican Party presidential primaries, she was a critic of Donald Trump but over time became one of his staunchest defenders.
[...]
McEnany attended the Academy of the Holy Names, a private Catholic preparatory school in Tampa. After graduating, she majored in international politics at Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service in Washington, D.C., and she studied abroad at St Edmund Hall, Oxford...
McEnany attended the University of Miami School of Law for her first (1L) year before transferring to Harvard Law School. At the Miami School of Law, McEnany received the Bruce J. Winick Award for Excellence, a scholarship awarded to students in the top 1% of their class. She graduated from Harvard in 2016.
After studying at Oxford and graduating from Georgetown, she crushed it at Miami Law School, then moved on to Harvard.
Today, she's one of President Trump's "staunchest defenders"—but that's not the way it started. According to that same leading authority, she experienced a conversion at one point, as quite a few others have done:
While in law school, McEnany appeared on CNN as a paid commentator. She supported Donald Trump in the 2016 presidential election. In early 2015, before becoming a Trump supporter, McEnany was highly critical of him, declaring on CNN and Fox Business that "Donald Trump has shown himself to be a showman" and it was "unfortunate" and "inauthentic" to call him a Republican. McEnany called his comments about Mexican immigrants "racist."
According to Michael Marcantonio, a fellow summer [2015] associate at a law firm, she began supporting Trump after accepting Marcantonio's advice, which he gave to her over cocktails. In an interview with the New York Times, Marcantonio recalled telling McEnany, "Donald Trump is going to be your nominee," and that if "a smart, young, blond Harvard graduate" wanted "to get on television and have a career as a political pundit, you would be wise to be an early backer."
On August 5, 2017, McEnany left her position at CNN. The following day, she hosted a 90-second webcast, Real News Update on Trump's personal Facebook page. She praised Trump throughout the segment, saying she had brought the "real news" to the American people.
And so on from there.
We can't vouch for the perfect accuracy of everything said in that brief history. But if you click some links within that overview and read about her initial views, it sounds like McEnany was close to being "woke-adjacent" back when she was anti-Trump.
Today, she's MAGA all the way down, which is her perfect right—and she has her own weekend show on the Fox News Channel. The conversion may have been completely sincere—but there she was on October 3, the Harvard Law School grad, pretending to peer up a good person's colon for the amusement of Silo Red.
What a freaking embarrassment! But then, according to the New York Times, the Trump-worshipping Young Master Gutfeld is a convert too—and it sounds like the CEO may have decided to clue him.
The profile appeared in June 2023:
How Fox News (Yes, Fox News) Managed to Beat ‘The Tonight Show’
[...]
[During calendar year 2015], he also often did something that feels disorienting to rewatch, given the host’s present disdain for those who moralize about Mr. Trump: He moralized about Mr. Trump.
“I’ve heard people defend him about making fun of a disability, making fun of John McCain, making fun of women,” he said on “The Five” in December 2015, accusing a Fox colleague of “Trumpsplaining” away his behavior. “No one will ever stop defending the crass stuff he says.”
Say what? Was this numbskull woke back then too? Candidate Trump was making fun of women—and he didn't even seem to like that!
We'll guess that he, like McEnany, was still voicing support for some degree of the standard Republicanism of the era before Candidate Trump changed the party's public profile.
That would only be a guess. But as he complained about how crass Trump was, this is what happened next:
Before the election, Suzanne Scott, now the chief executive of Fox News Media, hosted Mr. Gutfeld in her office.
Mr. Trump had no chance anyway, he told her.
“She was like, ‘Greg, you should maybe prepare,’” he remembered, “‘for what happens if he wins.’”
So it said in the New York Times in that June 2023 profile. We can't vouch for the perfect accuracy of that anecdote—but it sounds like the CEO called him into her office and suggested that he might want to reorder his stance.
In fairness, CEO Suzanne Scott was running a business. He was one of her corporate assets, and she may have delivered the word. We'll note that the story is sourced to Gutfeld. According to Flegenheimer and Peters, he told that story himself.
Today, this pair of clowns are the type of performers who like to laugh and giggle and play and pretend that they're peering up colons. This is classic Numbskull Chic—as is the silence of the Silo Blue lambs with respect to this ongoing Silo Red conduct.
We'll leave you today with one more point—a point which is skated past in that June 2023 profile.
We'll try to get back to a somewhat unlikely "Fox News feminist" before our discussions are through. But for today, let's return to the large role played by "comedy stylings" in the invention of Numbskull Chic.
That New York Times profile mentioned a book—a seemingly significant 2022 book which largely passed beneath the radar:
Mr. Gutfeld broadly validates the median Fox viewer on the issues that resonate most, including the fate of Mr. Trump, whom Mr. Gutfeld criticized sharply in 2016 before a well-timed recalibration.
He has accused others in late night of failing to adjust as he has and submitting instead to what he sees as an epidemic of left-wing humorlessness.
“It was like Trump was such an existential evil that even joking about it is unseemly,” Mr. Gutfeld said, seated inside his ample Soho apartment (previously occupied by Lindsay Lohan) with a vape pen between his fingers and a large painting of himself in plain view. “I was very anti-Trump up until when he won, and then I had to realize, ‘OK, do I continue as a broken person?’ Because he legitimately was breaking people. Because once the thing that you hate wins, what do you do?”
What Mr. Gutfeld did, in part, was capitalize on a defining talent that he and the former president share: a kind of insult conservatism that can frame any serious argument as a joke and any joke as a serious argument, leaving viewers to suss out the distinction.
“There’s sort of a nihilism at the core of that,” said Nick Marx, a Colorado State University professor and co-author of “That’s Not Funny,” a book about right-leaning comedy. He suggested that Mr. Gutfeld’s shtick was the troubling culmination of Fox’s commingling of news and entertainment.
The book in question emerged in June 2022. Here is a fuller profile:
That's Not Funny: How the Right Makes Comedy Work for Them
By Matt Sienkiewicz and Nick Marx
May 3, 202
University of California Press
We don't think we heard of the book in real time. To the best of our recollection, we first stumbled upon it quite recently.
That said, it seems that conservative elements had been experimenting with humor as a messaging device, possibly stretching all the way back to Rush Limbaugh and his "feminazis."
For whatever reason, the Fox News Channel experimented with Gutfeld for years, dating back to his original shows at 2 [sic] and 3 [sic] in the morning. Today, CEO Scott sends in coffles of clowns one after another—and a Harvard Law school graduate is willing to behave in the way we've described on our floundering nation's most-watched "cable news" TV program.
Silo Blue gazes off into space. Writing about a different era, Professor Knox, in 1990, described the lesson all Greeks drew from the death of sacred Troy:
The images of that night assault—the blazing palaces, the blood running in the streets, old Priam butchered at the altar, Cassandra raped in the temple, Hector's baby son thrown from the battlements, his wife Andromache dragged off to slavery—all this, foreshadowed in the Iliad, will be stamped indelibly on the consciousness of the Greeks throughout their history, immortalized in lyric poetry, in tragedy, on temple pediments and painted vases, to reinforce the stern lesson of Homer's presentation of the war: that no civilization, no matter how rich, no matter how refined, can long survive once it loses the power to meet force with equal or superior force.
That's the stern lesson the death of Troy taught. Also:
No civilization, no matter how self-impressed, can really expect to survive the fury of the Fox News Channel's Dumbbell Clowncar Chic.
In short, Silo Blue needs to fight back—and it needs to fight back the right way.
Final point:
The two conversions we've discussed may even have been sincere. But the embarrassing conduct called Numbskull Chic represents an assault on this flailing nation's hope to survive.
There's no excuse for what these people do. Will Silo Blue ever dare speak?
Probably tomorrow: Interruption of Jessica Chic
ReplyDelete"That was just an enjoyable insult aimed at the fading hope of maintaining a viable American nation."
Whoa, insult? If I pretend I have a video of your colonoscopy on my phone, am I insulting you?
Are you nuts, Bob? Suffering from the terrible suspicion that you and fellow BlueAnons get insulted, all the while calling BlueAnon opponents all kinds of names? You are nuts, aren't you, Bob?
A Right-winger who is nuts?
DeleteWho told you to pay attention?
I get paid more than $90 to $100 per hour for working online. I heard about this job 3 months ago and after joining this I have earned easily $10k from this without having online working skills . Simply give it a shot on the accompanying site…
DeleteHere is I started........ Www.Paycash1.site
Bob says, "the embarrassing conduct called Numbskull Chic represents an assault on this flailing nation..."
ReplyDeleteBob is wrong about "conduct". It's only "words" that Bob is criticizing. Trump's words are sometimes Numbskull Chic, but his actions are sane and effective.
OTOH Dems words are sane and reasonable, but some of their actions are Numbskull Chic. Like demanding that men participate in women's sports. Or, giving Iran billions of dollars that they used to fund terrorism.
DeleteOt that black people's voting rights are prrotected.
Delete
DeleteIs it bad, this "Numbskull Chic" thingy? Why? And what is it anyway?
I certainly prefer FoxNews comedy style over idiocy of CBS' Colbert dumbass, and similar.
Sixty years ago the US was a racist nation. Many states took specific steps to deter black voting. It was essential that the federal government oversee elections in these states. Hence, the Voting Rights
DeleteAct.
This is no longer the case. Democrats can be proud of leading this change. Because of Dem policy successes, we no longer need federal oversight of state elections.
David in Cal would like us all to forget that saying Charlie Kirk deserved to be shot to death by a kid from a Republican family are just words. And that Trump raping a 13-year old, because she reminded him of his own pre-teen daughter, is just an action.
DeleteNo one is going to be fired from their job for using the words "Charlie Kirk deserved to be shot in the neck for being an asshole."
DeleteKing Orange Chickenshit moved a convicted child sex trafficker from a medium security prison to a virtual summer camp. That is an action that Dickhead in Cal will never explain, cause Dickheads are all in on underage sex abuse and child rapists as long as he gets his tax cuts.
DeleteWhat's so bad about saying Israel needs to be wiped off the map?
DeleteThat is an action that Dickhead in Cal will never explain, cause Dickhead in Cal is all in on underage sex abuse and child rapists as long as he gets his bigotry.
DeleteFixed for accuracy.
"The only good Jew is a dead Jew", are just words.
DeleteKing Orange Chickenshit is now seriously considering giving the child sex predator a full pardon just as he gave a full pardon to the insurrectionists who attacked the nation's Capitol on Jan. 6, another ACTION that the Dickhead in Cal has been asked to defend repeatedly and has repeatedly ignored.
DeleteGO FUCK YOURSELF, DICKHEAD IN CAL, YOU FUCKING FASCIST FREAK.
C'mon David in Cal. I'm not asking for you to split an atom. I'm asking you to use words to explain how you can tell Neo-Nazis, white supremacists, and fine people on the Right from each other.
Delete3:28,
DeleteThe difference is splitting the atom isn't impossible.
There is no Democratic policy regarding trans athletes playing in women's sports. I would be very surprized if the majority of democrats advocate for this, but bullshit artists like DiC enjoy assigning a position to their opponents and then arguing against the straw man they have constructed. Likewise, regarding the Iranian money, it was Iranian money, not US dollars, but that fact is way too nuanced for MAGAts. Rick Scott, in describing the motivations of Democrats in the shutdown , says that they want taxpayer dollars to pay for abortions (not legal) and the Obama care subsidies to pay for illegal immigrants' healthcare (likewise illegal). Why do republican legislators need to lie in order to garner support for their bullshit positions? Of course being a Medicare fraudster might give Rick Scott some gravitas among Republicans regarding the misuse of taxpayer dollars.
DeleteIf by sane and effective you mean addled and illegal, then you're correct. Tossing things like that out there, David, without any indication as to what actions you're talking about makes you look like a blowhard. Is blowing up fishing boats sane and effective?
DeleteEffectiveness can be measured objectively
Delete-- Peace in Gaza
-- Southern border closed
-- No more kids in cages or taken from their parents
-- Record Federal Sept budget surplus
-- Rising stock market
-- Inflation held in check despite tariffs
-- There is no peace in Gaze
Delete-- Not that important
-- There are kidnapped people and some are missing. US citizens summarily deported.
-- Will believe it when reported by a reputable organization.
-- Goes up and down. What's the big deal?
-- Inflation is not held in check. In any case, it was held in check under Biden.
-- Don't forget to add violation of US and International law as one of the accomplishments.
-- Unlawful detainment of US citizens. Another accomplishment
-- Unlawful imposing of tariffs.
...don't really have time at the moment to go through all of dementia Trump accomplishment, but will come back tomorrow.
David in Cal,
DeleteDo you attend all the Profa meetings?
Trump is saying that prices have come down on everything and that we now have $2.00 a gallon gas. His cult will always believe him over their lyin’ eyes. But how about the rest of us? When is reality going to hit the 70% who aren’t Trump lovers?
Deletehttps://digbysblog.net/2025/10/17/prices-are-going-up-you-say/
Take a look at the graph.
The National debt has risen nearly 2 trillion since Trump took office; he has presided over the largest dollar amount of debt increase of any president in his 2 terms , with his big beautiful bill projected to add another 3 trillion. Domestic and imported price indices (see the Digby graph linked above) were on the decline before Trump took office and have been on the steady increase since. The grifting and corruption of the current administration is record setting. Minutes before Trump’s recent Friday tariff remarks tanked the crypto markets a Bitcoin whale made over 150 million by shorting the currency. No coincidence. Watching this grifting family and associates (see Howard Lutnick’s son) leverage power for wealth should be disgusting but the blind eye is always turned by rubes like DiC.
Delete@7:40 - Digby wrongly says, “His cult will always believe him (about some exaggeration)...”
DeleteNo. Trump’s supporters know that he speaks in his hyperbole and we adjust for that.
Trump supporters hear his bigotry loud and clear, and they are 100% on-board with that.
DeleteDiC,
I agree that his cult won;'t always believe/ support Trump.
If Trump calls for reparations for slavery, and they will turn on him like he's Hillary Clinton.
"risen nearly 2 trillion since Trump took office"
DeleteThe executive taking office has no immediate control over the budget.
Shut up now, and start squealing in 3 years, Democrat. If you find something to squeal about in 3 years.
"Trump’s supporters know that he speaks in his hyperbole and we adjust for that."
DeleteHelp me understand, DiC. In the aftermath of J6, 65% of Republicans said the election was stolen.
According to you they weren't falling for Trump's lie, so the explanation for the poll result is...they're just stupid?
10:32,
DeleteAgree that our current President is a useless piece ofd shit.
David in Cal isn't stupid. He just cosplays as a stupid fuck on the internet, because it supports his open bigotry.
Delete10:32 that was before the USSC let the executive steal funds allocated by Congress. Perhaps you missed that there is a No Kings protest against this constitutionally illegal overreach, you putzfuck.
Delete
DeleteFree advice: you Soros-monkey need to ask your Soros-monkey manager for better-written bullshit.
Squeal louder, snowflake at 11:44.
Delete11:44 is a putzfuck 11:49.
Delete11:32 No need to get into my time machine and dial up 2028. Better, you check out the national debt graph from 2016-2020. This is going to shock you, but the history of the economy under republican administrations c/w their democratic counterparts is pathetic, dating back the last 60 years or so. There is absolutely nothing in the Trump agenda that breaks from that, except from being significantly worse, with severing of trading partners being a prime ingredient to failure. Job growth, arguably the most indicative of a strong economy, is in the toilet thanks to Trump policy. But pretend all is well because of the stock market AI bubble.
DeleteHere's Somerby's point: "In short, Silo Blue needs to fight back—and it needs to fight back the right way."
ReplyDeleteTo me, that does not express a right-wing view.
The proof is in the "not like that".
Delete"The proof is in the 'not like that'."
DeleteSomerby says the Blue Silo doesn't fight back against Fox propaganda AT ALL! The silence of the lambs. (And this does not strike me as a right-wing view.)
DG,
DeleteWho exactly in the Blue Silo isn't fighting back against Fox propaganda?
The corporate-owned Right-wing media, or are you referring to others?
Be specific.
Well, I'd guess Somerby means the NYT, WaPo, the Atlantic, the New Yorker, etc. But that's missing my point: Somerby says that the Blues should be, but aren't, exposing Fox propaganda for what it is. Whether what he says is true or not, it's not a "right-wing" point of view.
DeleteWould Somerby care to share with us the “right way”? There’s massive pushback against Trump’s agenda. No kings rally anyone? But Somerby takes the supposed lack of discussion of Gutfeld’s show as “blue” failure.
DeleteWhen you correct Fox misinformation, nothing changes. They just keep repeating the same lies. Why is this a good use of blue America's time?
DeleteMissing the point. Whether you agree with the statement or not, saying, “Expose and fight Fox propaganda!” is not a right-wing view.
DeleteMy silo is green.
ReplyDeleteMy balls are blue.
DeleteStrike Four for Trump Legal Eagle
ReplyDelete"U.S. Attorney for D.C. Jeanine Pirro has once again failed spectacularly, as she has been unable to charge the same D.C. woman in court four different times.
On Thursday, a jury found Sidney Lori Reid not guilty on misdemeanor charges of assaulting an FBI agent."
Yes, misdemeanor charges. Jeanine's first 3 attempts were felony charges, which she then reduced to misdemeanors as if she was holding a going-out-of-business sale. The grand jury still wouldn't buy it.
Maybe Ms. Reid has some outstanding parking tickets Jeanine can get tough on.
Or perhaps she fibbed on a mortgage application.
DeleteMaybe she can be deported.
Delete5:19: Or did she? The accounts that I have read indicate that there were multiple entries in the application in which she answered the ownership question correctly.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteI get paid more than $90 to $100 per hour for working online. I heard about this job 3 months ago and after joining this I have earned easily $10k from this without having online working skills . Simply give it a shot on the accompanying site…
ReplyDeleteHere is I started........ Www.Paycash1.site
Potty-mouth Grandpa Talks Tough
ReplyDelete"President Trump used an expletive Friday to warn Venezuelan strongman Nicolás Maduro against conflict with the U.S.
“He doesn’t want to f‑‑‑ with the U.S.,” Trump said, speaking from the White House during a lunch meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky."
Reminder that Trump wanted to fuck his own daughter.
DeletePresident Orange Dementia has spoken!!!
DeleteTrump has commuted George Santos' sentence.
ReplyDeleteGame recognizes game.
Santos was once a high ranking KGB member and will be instrumental in negotiating peace in Ukraine.
DeleteSickening that Trump would promote the pro tranny Brazilian agenda. I think the dementia has caused him to lose his way.
DeleteJoin us tomorrow at the No Kings march in your local area.
ReplyDeleteFind your nearest rally location at this link:
Deletehttps://www.nokings.org/
I will be attending a pro Trump counter rally named YesGrifters.
DeleteBe there or be square!
Delete
DeleteI'm sure insurrectionists will be jailed. Hopefully for 20 years each.
Or, come to think of it, deported to San Salvador prisons. That's a cheaper option.
7:22,
DeleteThey will if Profa (AKA The Republican Party) has their way.
DeleteIf the "no kings" insurrectionists get away with it, that'll be the end of Our Democracy ™
I just got my check from Mr. Soros so I will be heading out soon to the local No Kings protest.
DeleteSucker. I registered twice, so I'm getting paid double.
DeleteLet's just agree that the 2nd Amendment in no way protects the First Amendment.
DeleteIf letting Republicans rape children is so bad, why does the entire Right-wing think it's fine and dandy?
DeleteIf we are going to let Republican House of Representatives member Thomas Msassie call for the release of the Epstein Files, we can kiss Democracy goodbye.
DeleteWe had a lot of fun today. By far the biggest loser was the deranged Trump cultist screaming who paid you? out her window. When everyone knows it's that crazy rich Jew asshole, David in Cal.
DeleteAttaching different derogatory terms to something doesn't explain anything more about it. A month ago it was Stumblebums, now it is Numbskull Chic. These terms are as silly as Gutfeld's show, without adding any new insight to what happens at Fox.
ReplyDeleteThe GOP in New York has expelled from its ranks a group of its young leaders for allowing to be exposed what we all knew. On a debate stage with a spokesperson/ friend of Charlie Kirk, hosted by Chris Cuomo, Adam Mockler challenged this guy to renounce Naziism three times, and his best response was “we can talk about it”. They have been telling us who they are as far back as Charlottesville.
ReplyDeleteAlmost certainly, the Nazi element within their ranks is confusing to some republicans. It was much simpler when the only groups they hated could be distinguished by skin color.
DeleteThey were telling us who they are as far back as the first white settlers to the future USA.
DeleteIs it Day One yet?
ReplyDeleteRepublicans are incapable of governing: Day 18
ReplyDeleteWho are you going to believe? The media or your own lyin' eyes.
DeleteTrumped stopped the IMO from being king of the world.
ReplyDelete“The International Maritime Organization had been set to vote on Friday on adopting a global carbon tax aimed at pushing the shipping industry to stop using fossil fuels. But that vote did not happen after President Donald Trump on Thursday called for other countries to oppose the tax, saying that the United States would not “tolerate” or “adhere” to the measure.”
Why do you hate the future you fucking fascist putz. Another I'll be dead, fuck 'em kind of hateful asshole ain't ya.
Delete
DeleteHe should've canceled that "International Maritime Organization". Without a doubt all it is is a bunch of useless massively overpaid DEI bureaucrats.
Anonymous at 11:47 will stop Trump and the Republican Congress from being the Kings of America.
DeleteBy calling for hard-working Americans to not tolerate or adhere to paying their federal income taxes for the years 2025 thru 2028.
Trump should've canceled that "International Maritime Organization", but he didn't because he was too busy beatring off over a photo of Hunter Bidden's penis.
Delete11:48,
DeleteIn Trump's defense, he's only been President for 10 months, which isn't nearly enough time for him to stop beating off over the size of Hunter Biden's penis.