SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 22, 2024
The humor of Candidate Trump: In Friday afternoon's post, we formally announced the date of this year's Al Smith Dinner.
One day later, the Harris campaign swung into action. CNN offers this news report about that candidate's plans:
Kamala Harris to skip historic Al Smith Dinner in New York before election, campaign official says
Vice President Kamala Harris will not attend next month’s Al Smith charity dinner in New York City, her campaign has told organizers, opting instead to stump in a battleground state on October 17, less than three weeks before the election.
The historic Catholic fundraiser traditionally features light roasts by the two major-party nominees—aimed at one another and others—in presidential election years. This fall’s gathering is already sold out and poised to welcome an estimated 1,500 guests to a gala ballroom in Midtown Manhattan,
Candidate Harris won't attend! As the report continues, it offers this surprising recollection about the wit and wisdom of Candidate Donald J. Trump:
Donald Trump stunned attendees in 2016 when he abandoned the collegial banter and launched a series of personal attacks on Hillary Clinton, who in her own remarks had offered the expected round of self-deprecating humor. The affair—black-tie for attendees, white-tie for the headliners—is named after the first major-party Catholic presidential nominee, four-term New York Gov. Al Smith, the Democratic standard-bearer in 1928.
Smith lost to Republican Herbert Hoover, and it would be more than three decades before another Catholic candidate, Democrat John F. Kennedy, was nominated by a major party—on his way to the White House in 1960.
Eight years ago, with New York Cardinal Timothy Dolan seated nearby, Trump ambushed Clinton, calling her a liar and mocking her over hacked emails.
When the audience booed, Trump went further, saying, “I don’t know who they’re angry at, Hillary, you or I [sic]. For example, here she is tonight, in public, pretending not to hate Catholics.”
The lesson that year was obvious. Nice guys (or gals) win the popular vote but lose the Electoral College.
Fearlessly, Trump was willing to call attention to Clinton's hatred of Catholics. On Saturday morning, the trio of friends on Fox & Friends were busy describing Harris's father as "a hard-core Marxist."
Pete Hegseth said he wonders "what she heard at the dinner table" when she was growing up. Such are the wages of "segregation by viewpoint," the pseudo-journalistic practice by which the friends all voice the same points of view as they read from the same corporate scripts.
In 1960, did Candidate Kennedy kick-start the tradition according to which the candidates offer humorous remarks at this charity event?
You'll have to research that one yourselves. Theodore White seems to give that impression in The Making of the President 1960.
At any rate, one of Kennedy's quips that year involved his wealthy father. As we noted on Friday, the sally went like this:
On this matter of experience, I had announced earlier this year that if successful I would not consider campaign contributions as a substitute for experience in appointing ambassadors. Ever since I made that statement, I have not received one single cent from my father.
That calls to mind an alleged remark from that year's primary season. Allegedly, Candidate Kennedy offered this quip, out on the stump, about his father's participation in the West Virginia campaign:
My father wired me, "Don't buy one more vote than necessary. I'll be damned if I'll pay for a landslide."
So it went in days of yore. At any rate, as the brainwashed daughter of a hard-core Marxist, Harris won't attend.
Somerby is revealing his true colors finally. He describes the Al Smith dinner and the fact that Harris has said she will not attend (preferring to campaign instead). Then Somerby quotes Trump's ugly "roast" of Hillary:
ReplyDelete"here she is tonight, in public, pretending not to hate Catholics.”
Then Somerby concludes:
"The lesson that year was obvious. Nice guys (or gals) win the popular vote but lose the Electoral College."
Somerby has never acknowledged the role played by Comey in Hillary's loss, nor the Russian meddling, nor the e-mail hacks and suspected collusion with Trump's campaign by Russia. No, according to Somerby, it was Hillary's fault for being "nice" while Trump bared his fangs at an event that was supposed to be collegial and good-natured fun. This is Trump lying that Hillary "hates" Catholics, much as he told Kamala Harris during the debate that Biden hates her.
But today Somerby raises the age-old complaint always made against female candidates -- that women are too nice, aren't strong enough to fight back (breaking rules as Trump did), that women cannot go for the jugular.
This is ludicrous aimed at Harris who was a highly successful prosecutor before becoming DA in San Francisco and Attorney General of CA. She demonstrably went for the jugular in her Senate hearing questioning, which is why those of us who have paid attention do not consider her "nice" or "weak" or "soft" or "gentle" or "too compassionate" to be a strong president. But that doesn't prevent Somerby from hauling out that tired old chestnut, when any hunter knows the danger posed by a female animal, a mother protecting her offspring. Aggressive male posturing is not part of female culture, but women are as strong as men in service of their goals, including fighting for the presidency, fighting other nations who encroach on our country, and defending the values of our nation in war and peace.
Somerby knows this is a low blow, so he cloaks his own aggression toward Harris in stories about Trump and Hillary. Trump's behavior should reflect poorly on him, but too many men confuse fighting dirty with strength. It is especially a conservative problem, which is why I believe Somerby is once again revealing himself as a right winger.
Yesterday Kamala was "imperfect" to Somerby. Today she is "too nice" to win the electoral college. What will it be tomorrow? You can bet it won't be anything positive, because that is not Somerby's purpose here. Today, his job appears to be spreading misogynist bullshit to undermine Harris's decision to use her limited time to advance her candidacy, assuming New York Catholics will understand, even if Somerby doesn't.
Hillary murdered Vince Foster, but Somerby calls her too nice to win in 2016, because she assumed the format of the dinner would be the same as in previous years?
DeleteThe people who get cheated by a cheater are not weak for being honest. Somerby is displaying the kind of thinking you find in criminals: "well, if they didn't want to be pickpocketed, they shouldn't have worn a coat with pockets" or "it is just smart to evade taxes -- if the govt wants my money they can pry it out of my cold dead fingers."
DeleteThis kind of admiration of cheating is why Trump must be held accountable for his crimes. Somerby is once again siding with the dishonest Trump by calling Hillary too nice and implying that Harris is too decent to be president -- we need an asshole dictator strongman like Trump, who may be crazy but at least he doesn't "lose" at the Al Smith dinner.
It is odd that Somerby seems to side with Trump on this, when bitter attack is nothing like the sense of humor demanded by that event. Hillary has a sense of humor. Many people laugh at Trump but not because he is humorous (unless you consider mockery of disabled reporters funny). Has Somerby, a professional standup, lost his appreciation for what such a dinner was supposed to show in each candidate? A willingness to laugh at themselves (which Trump cannot do), grace and humiliaty (which Trump lacks), and a commitment to the charity embodied by the fundraiser (Trump stole from his own charity foundation).
How has Somerby fallen so far down the rabbit-hole? Harris would be a fool to put herself in Trump's sights, after the way he cheated in order to savage Hillary. Does Somerby now blame her for being smart? That's a damned if you do, damned if you don't situation that Harris saw coming. Somerby seems disappointed she didn't fall for Trump's trap.
“If I don’t win this election … the Jewish people would really have a lot to do with that if that happens, because at 40 percent that means 60 percent of the people are voting for the enemy,” he warned.
ReplyDeleteSomerby says:
ReplyDelete"Fearlessly, Trump was willing to call attention to Clinton's hatred of Catholics. On Saturday morning, the trio of friends on Fox & Friends were busy describing Harris's father as "a hard-core Marxist."
Pete Hegseth said he wonders "what she heard at the dinner table" when she was growing up. Such are the wages of "segregation by viewpoint," the pseudo-journalistic practice by which the friends all voice the same points of view as they read from the same corporate scripts."
Then at the end of his essay, he says:
"At any rate, as the brainwashed daughter of a hard-core Marxist, Harris won't attend."
Nowhere in today's essay does Somerby explain that Harris's father was not a marxist and that she is not the brainwashed daughter of a marxist or any other brainwashing.
Without fact-checking those lies told by the right wing, Somerby's repetition of them, in a context where he appears to be complaining because Harris will not attend (or why bring this up at all?) tends to further the spread of misinformation about Harris. Those of us who actually do support Harris and plan to vote for her, take our daily opportunities to correct this bullshit when it is being spread. Somerby -- not so much. That's why it appears that his revival of old stories about Kennedy are mainly a pretext for saying negative things about Harris, joining the Republicans in their spreading of their lock-step talking points.
Here are some facts that Somerby has left out:
1. Harris did not grow up with her father so she did not hear him talking economics around the dinner table. Her parents split up when she was in elementary school and she was raised by her mother, as a single mom.
2. Harris's father is an economist who taught a course in Marxism at Stanford University. Does that make Stanford a Marxist University? He helped found a Worker's Party in Jamaica, before Harris was born and before he came to the US. He is considered a Development Economist (specializing in the economies of developing nations), not a Marxist.
3. Harris is estranged from her father and vice versa. He has not participated in any aspect of her campaign and gives no interviews.
4. Harris has said repeatedly that she supports capitalism, as should be evident from her past decisions, policies and plans for holding office. There is nothing Marxist about any of her beliefs or acts, unless you apply the word in the distorted sense that it is used by the right wing, which makes it meaningless.
Somerby presumably knows that Harris is no Marxist. Why then does he repeat the right's criticisms without telling the truth about Harris?
You're a bot, right? No human could be so brain-dead as to think Somerby is seriously calling Harris a Marxist in this post.
DeleteNot even a Republican? They think all sorts of strange things. But what would it hurt Somerby to explain Harris's background? He may need that info himself -- there is no evidence he doesn't.
Delete"At any rate, as the brainwashed daughter of a hard-core Marxist, Harris won't attend."
ReplyDeleteMaybe Somerby thinks this is true? Hard to tell, but he does watch a lot of Fox News, where he has heard this stated as fact over and over. Anything is possible.
Or maybe he thinks she is being insufficiently respectful of the memory of Al Smith. After all, emphasizing the shared Catholic heritage of Smith and Kennedy is a way of pointing out that certain other identities have also had trouble getting elected (especially when championing the little man as opposed to coming from the millionaire class).
The lesson seems to be that millionaires will be forgiven anything, even their Catholic religious background.
"Smith was the first politician of national stature to rise from the ranks of urban immigrants, in his case, the Irish-American immigrants of downtown Manhattan. He became a four-term governor of New York and, in 1928, the first Roman Catholic to win a major party’s presidential nomination."
Smith was opposed by the KKK who accused him of digging a tunnel beneath New York City in order to sneak the Pope into the country in order to rule as king. Similar things were said about Kennedy but didn't stick. In contrast to Kennedy, Smith had a long and distinguished career in public office. Kennedy was much less experienced. Perhaps that made him appear to be less of a threat to powers that be.
When Republicans call Harris a Marxist, they are perhaps implying that she will rock the boat and is thus dangerous. That may even be what Somerby thinks -- but it is hard to tell because he never says anything directly. What IS his point today, other than to smear Harris?
Where were you manufactured? Are you battery-powered or do you derive your energy from some advanced, fuel-cell technology?
DeleteIs it hard to find spare parts when you break down?