SATURDAY, OCTOBER 17, 2026
The president gay-baits Ossoff: We want to show you two bits of text from last night's Anderson Cooper program on CNN.
In this, the first of these clips, the president is gay-baiting Senator Ossoff. Cooper is speaking with Tim Pawlenty, the former (Republican) governor of Minnesota, a person who never engaged in this kind of conduct:
COOPER (10/16/26): Governor Pawlenty, I just want to play another part of the president's speech in Georgia today.
PRESIDENT TRUMP (videotape): I call him Pee-Wee Herman. Pee-Wee Herman, he looks like Pee-Wee. His name is Jon Ossoff, highly overrated.
Somebody said he's a good-looking man. I don't think he's a good-looking man. I actually think Mike Collins is a good-looking man. And he's all man. He's all man. I'm not sure about Ossoff.
If I am casting a movie for a senator, I like the white hair. I like the big, strong build, big, strong guy. But that's what I want. But he's a respected man.
COOPER: I'm not sure what he was insinuating about Ossoff, but why does he keep commenting on men's appearances? I mean, it's sort of fascinating to me.
PAWLENTY: You know, he says all kinds of things that are sort of entertaining. But you know what the voters want to hear is what's going on with my pocketbook, what's going on with affordability, what's going on in the economy...
Obviously, Cooper knew what the president was saying about Ossoff. (Pawlenty also avoided the obvious.) Next week, we expect to note the way this sort of thing is currently driving so much of MAGA (and Fox News Channel) politics.
In this, the second clip, the president is Muslim-baiting Abdul El-Sayed. Cooper is speaking with Lulu Garcia-Navarro of the New York Times:
COOPER: And Lulu, I want to play you something else the president said today about Michigan Democratic Senate candidate Abdul El-Sayed.
PRESIDENT TRUMP (videotape): He's as bad almost as Mohamed Abdul El-Sayed.
You know, I took a lot of heat for calling him "Mohamed." And I said, I don't care, I'm the president of the United States. I can call you whatever the hell I want. I can call you whatever I want, Mohamed.
And then today, a guy sends me something. His name is actually "Abdullah bah-bah-bah-bah-bah"—Mohammed El-Sayed. So, his middle name is Mohamed. So, I was right, almost.
Oh, by the way, how about that guy? He's a Jihadist. He's a radical left person. He hates our country.
COOPER: How do you think? I mean, do you think that works for the people he wants to turn out?
GARCIA-NAVARRO: No, I mean, I think it's racist, obviously. He's using "Mohamed" as a sort of slur, when it's the name of the prophet and for Muslims. And then beyond that, it's just more of the same...
By any normal standard, that was astonishing conduct by the sitting president.
It was obvious Muslim-baiting. We were struck by the fact that Cooper was only willing to fashion a question as to whether this obvious baiting would "work."
(In response, we wouldn't have used the highly general term "racist" ourselves.)
By the way, here's a quick thumbnail of the man who was being baited by our sitting president—the man who hates our country:
Abdul El-Sayed
Abdulrahman Mohamed El-Sayed (born October 31, 1984) is an American epidemiologist and politician who is the Democratic nominee in the 2026 United States Senate election in Michigan.
Born and raised in southeast Michigan, El-Sayed graduated from the University of Michigan and was a Rhodes Scholar at the University of Oxford, where he earned a doctorate in public health. He then earned his medical degree from Columbia University. He then became an assistant professor of epidemiology at the Columbia University School of Public Health. He was the executive director of the Detroit Health Department from 2015 to 2017. From 2023 to 2025, he served as director of the Wayne County Department of Health, Human & Veterans Services.
[...]
In 2003, El-Sayed graduated from Bloomfield Hills Andover High School, where he was a three-sport athlete and captain of the wrestling, football, and lacrosse teams. He then attended the University of Michigan...He graduated Phi Beta Kappa with highest distinction in 2007 with a bachelor's degree and gave that year's student commencement speech.
Once captain of his high school's football team, he hates the U.S. today! Along somewhat similar lines, here is some background on Ossoff, whose background is not widely known:
Jon Ossoff
Thomas Jonathan Ossoff (born February 16, 1987) is an American politician who has served as the senior United States senator from Georgia since 2021. He is the youngest incumbent U.S. senator, and a member of the Democratic Party.
[...]
He attended The Paideia School, a private school in Atlanta. While in high school, he interned for civil rights leader and U.S. representative John Lewis. Ossoff is a 2009 graduate of Georgetown University's Walsh School of Foreign Service with a Bachelor of Science degree in culture and politics. He earned a master of science degree in international political economy from the London School of Economics in 2013.
[...]
Ossoff is married to Alisha Kramer, an obstetrics and gynecology doctor at Emory University, where she completed her residency in 2023, and a graduate of Georgetown University and Emory University School of Medicine. Ossoff married Kramer in 2017 after 12 years of dating. On the night of Ossoff's election to the United States Senate in January 2021, Kramer was working an overnight shift in Emory University Hospital in Atlanta. They have two daughters, born in December 2021 and June 2025.
Just a guess: Those two girls got a very good deal when the gods selected their parents.
At any rate, despite the president's recent gay-bating, Ossoff doesn't seem to be gay. Of course, as (almost) everyone knows by now, many millions of good, decent people are. And we don't have a person to waste, as Bill Clinton used to say.
In recent weeks, the gay-baiting and the Muslim baiting have been general over MAGA elites and the Fox News Channel. With respect to that sad situation, we speak to this obvious question:
Shine on me, sunshine? Walk with me, world? What the heck's up with that?
Our record-shattering answer:
We Americans can't fact-check or name-call our way back out of our current national mess—"back out of all this now too much for us," as Frost confusingly had it.
Instead, we'll need to emerge into a world of deepened American values—some of them seeming to be a bit Reddish, some of them tilting toward Blue.
We need a deeper connection to happiness. More on that to follow.
I, for one, appreciate Trump taking time away from his busy schedule raping pre-teens to remind people he is also a gigantic bigot.
ReplyDeletePlease, no reddish values. Never.
ReplyDelete
ReplyDelete"Once captain of his high school's football team, he hates the U.S. today!"
Hey, you reap what you sow. What's good for the goose is good for the gander.
You should've voiced all this this righteous anger back in 2016 and later, when your retarded Dumbocrat comrades started doing it.
But no, back then they were all good decent persons to you. Still are. So, don't complain now.
Criticizing ObamaCare is how performatives show they are anti-American.
DeleteSarcasm doesn't come across in print because there is no tone of voice to signal that the sentence is sarcastic.
DeleteWhen Somerby repeats that "he hates the U.S. today!" he is trying to show the stupidity of saying that, but others will read it literally and think the candidate has truly become a traitor after an auspicious all-American beginning. It is better for Somerby to be direct and say that the person they are trying to portray as hating America has shown no evidence he hates his country, but worked to improve voters' lives in several capacities.
It is obviously silly to believe that football has anything to do with being a good American. But this troll manages to jumble up Somerby's intended message, which suggests others may too. Why cannot Somerby come out and say directly that Ossoff is not gay, El-Sayed is not a jihadist, and the Republicans are trying to slime good people to win the election, using slurs they do not deserve.
We on the left have been complaining about Trump since he promoted birtherism, attempting to hurt Obama's campaign. Somerby found birtherism ridiculous and said so back then. But then he converted to supporting Trump and hasn't looked back. He probably won't even call Trump's hatred of Obama racist either, but it is.
"Why cannot Somerby come out and say directly that Ossoff is not gay, El-Sayed is not a jihadist, and the Republicans are trying to slime good people to win the election, using slurs they do not deserve."
DeleteTell me you don't understand what Somerby is doing with TDH, without using the words, "I don't understand what Somerby is doing with TDH."
Somerby's words are not congruent with his actions. Psychologists call that inauthenticity. I call it dishonest. I think it is intentional.
Delete"Sarcasm doesn't come across in print because there is no tone of voice to signal that the sentence is sarcastic."
DeleteYeah, right.
I think we can and should fact-check our way out of this stuff. If we lose our grasp on reality, we wind up like Trump, pursuing only self-interest and what feels good in the moment. Trump is again playing golf this morning in Palm Beach. Do you suppose he has nothing better to do as president? We won't find our way out of trouble that way.
ReplyDeleteI am happy to see Somerby fact-checking the slurs against two accomplished, intelligent, hard-working Democratic candidates for office. Bravo! It is about time he did this. And yes, it can make a difference for voters to know that El-Sayed, despite his name, was born here, is very smart, and knows how to address public health issues, as he did in public service management roles prior to running for office.
It is also worthwhile for everyday people in both parties to understand that someone is not gay by virtue of looking gay, like PeeWee Herman for example. Someday perhaps Somerby will admire Paul Reubens' accomplishments as a comedian. Reubens did way more than Bill Maher, creating his hilarious, long-running live theater show first, then broadening that to a character (PeeWee) who appeared in several movies, then reestablishing his career in character roles after being persecuted by police for an inoffensive act (watching porn in a gay theater, alone) that represents society's gay-baiting. He harmed no one with what he did. In life, Reubens was a good decent man, unlike Trump. And PeeWee Herman (Reubens) had way more fans than Bill Maher, with Maher's Muslim-hating schtick, snide assholery and sexist, racist jokes about women and Asian drivers.
I consider the Muslim-hating attacks on El-Sayed and Ilhan Omar to be a form of racism. Somerby says:
"(In response, we wouldn't have used the highly general term "racist" ourselves.)"
Maher may hate the religion, but Trump only knows that El-Sayed has brownish skin, just as he only knows that Ossoff isn't buff like that moron Hegseth. These Republicans are confused about the meanings of the slurs they toss around, but they are mainly pointing out to followers who they are supposed to hate, so any label will do. Somerby is wrong when he says that hating brown-skinned people is not racist and tells us that public servants hate America.
There is no point in quibbling about whether being Muslim is a race, when it is so obvious El-Sayed is being singled out for his skin color. Trump is saying that brown people don't belong in America. Somerby should address that message, not some esoteric discussion of whether American muslims are terrorists when they have lived fully American lives and done nothing "jihadist". Trump, on the other hand, fomented an insurrection that no one calls him on. When Somerby addresses that fact, his fact checking will be greatly improved.
President Trump was able to lose a war with Iran on Day One.
DeleteThat couldn't have been easy.
Anyone who isn't a bigot, or isn't perfectly fine with bigotry, left the Republican Party over a quarter of a century ago.
DeleteReubens didn’t just watch the film. He exposed his penis and masturbated. Are you sure that’s OK in a theater?
DeleteHe had his lap covered by a paper bag. The cops sought him out to arrest. Hollywood used to have porn theaters dedicated to showing porn films. He was in one of those, doing what everyone does there. It was dark, so he didn't expose himself to anyone who wasn't seeking him out.
DeleteThis is the kind of entrapment of gays that was routine before the gay rights movement. Reubens has a lot of sympathy in Los Angeles.
I don’t have a problem with it. I’m just wondering how 10:58 feels about it.
DeleteYounger people do not remember when there were no VCRs, no DVDs, no internet. Both heterosexual and homosexual men use porn widely across our society. As a woman, I believe that heterosexual porn teaches men unrealistic attitudes toward women, but I wouldn't ban its use, especially for men not in a relationship. I am not gay, but I do not see why gay men should be denied porn either. Putting it in clearly marked theaters where like-minded men can share an experience shouldn't be illegal. It isn't now, on the internet, where men can have far greater privacy.
DeleteNon-gay people do not understand the criminalization of gay sex, the police raids of bars and clubs and other meeting places used by gay men to do what hetersexual people do without problems. Fern Dell in Griffith Park was one such meeting place. There were several porn theaters in Hollywood. They had XXX on their marquis and were adults only. Some showed gay porn, others heterosexual porn. There were also well-known major boulevards where men could go to find underage hookers, male and female, run by sex traffickers. That was illegal but not enforced. The lack of enforcement of heterosexual prostitution makes the targeting of Reubens more aggregious. Yes, Reubens was guilty, but of what? A harmless, victimless act that was not similarly enforced for heterosexual men in those theaters.
Referring to Ossoff as PeeWee Herman, making it clear he was targeting the gayness, as Trump did, brings with it the shame of his arrest and the end of his career, which he rebuilt with the help of those who thought he got a raw deal. Trump is bringing all that baggage with his ugly remark, not just a knock on Ossoff supposed slight build (which seems pretty average to men). To do that during a campaign is more than wrong. It marks Trump as an especially ugly human being, but what else would you expect from the President accused of raping 13 year olds as part of Epstein's sex trafficking ring. Trump himself lives in the sewer. Somerby soft-peddles that, while furthering Trump's remark about Ossoff. I have no idea whether Somerby knows the details himself, but he is not helping Ossoff today, and that is no different than any other day. But Somerby says fact checking is useless, so we now know why he doesn't do much of it himself.
Pointing out that a specific guy is not himself gay, does nothing to attack the ugly homophobia at the heart of Trump's remark and what happened to PeeWee Herman.
egregious
DeletePeeWee was arrested in 1991, when there were VCRs, but he was in an adult theater in Sarasota FL, not Hollywood (where there are similar theaters). Sarasota was his hometown, which he was visiting, but he lived in Los Feliz/Hollywood.
DeleteI knew a guy who knew a guy who, after the arrest, graffiti’d the theatre with the words “Pee Wee’s Playhouse”.
Deletetoo obvious to be funny
DeleteWhat does it mean that Trump has been so focused on men's bodies in these latest speeches? Is Trump trying to attract the gay vote? Is this part of an appeal to the manosphere -- the idea that if men don't behave in a prescribed manly way, they are not men?
ReplyDeletePoems about character used to define manhood, such as Kipling's poem "If". It says that if you can display character in the variety of ways described in the poem, then finally,
"If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!"
Any man can buy a set of weights and bulk up with supplements and T shots. But any man can also try to develop the traits, values, and conscience to do the right thing too, with effort. The latter are blue values. The emphasis on looking manly, without being manly, are red values. Trump has no idea what it means to be a man.
Republicans have no idea what it means to be anti-big government.
Delete"We need a deeper connection to happiness."
ReplyDeleteSpeak for yourself, Somerby.
Happiness is linked to optimism. Somerby is a doomsayer. The two are incompatible. Remember Obama's "Hope and Change" campaign? People responded because that is how people feel better, are happier, in an imperfect world.
Somerby really shouldn't be talking to anyone about happiness, when he hasn't figured it out for himself.
Shine on me sunshine? This is what makes me happy. We are living in an idiocracy in which the right eats its own (from Tiedrich):
ReplyDelete"Loyal MAGA patriots, please stand by for a message of the utmost importance from Brandon Beach, the Actual Goddamned Treasurer of the United States.
[video of Beach, transcribed as follows]
“This is the Trump dollar coin. It will be in the banks next month, and I want to challenge you to go get a roll of Trump dollar coins next month. And then I want you to go to your favorite liberal coffee shop with your Trump dollar coins, buy a cup of coffee, and watch their heads explode. They will not like it, but I love it, and I love this president. I love this coin.”
Now hold on there one minute, Mister Actual Goddamned Treasurer of the United States, if that really is your name. Are you telling me to spend $2.50 on a ‘dollar’ coin with Dear Leader’s big, dumb pumpkin face on it, and then turn right around and buy a cup of coffee with the ‘dollar’ coin that I just spent $2.50 to acquire, in order to make some commie have a big sad?
Shut the fuck up and take my fucking money.
Listen up, you cultist dipshits. If I’m next to you in line at my local coffeehouse, and you pull out a bunch of fake-gold Donnymoney to pay for your cuppa joe, I’m not going to be triggered. I’m going to be laughing in your face at what a credulous nitwit you are. You just spent $12.50 on your five-dollar cup of coffee.
Can you believe that MAGA wastes so much time an energy doing stupid shit simply because they imagine they’re triggering the libs? No one cares, you fucking dunderheads.
Please, I beg of you, trigger me all day long with that kind of stupidity.
Oh, and can someone explain to me: why is the Actual Goddamned Treasurer of the United States shilling for Dear Leader’s vanity money in such a blatantly partisan way? Isn’t that some kind of ethics violation? It should be."
Actually, the treasury selling money at a 150% profit might help our deficit, very slightly.
What are the reddish values of doing this?
They don't like liberals telling them what they can and can't do.
DeleteThat's why we need to make ingesting Drano illegal on Day One.
Surveys report that conservatives consider themselves happier than liberals. The problem is that surveys rely on self-report, not observations or external measures. Stats on deaths of despair (suicide, drug overdose deaths) are higher for conservatives, also alcoholism, drug abuse, domestic violence, divorce.
ReplyDeleteCan Somerby consider himself happy without ever having had a long-lasting intimate relationship with a life partner? Social relationships are listed as a main contributor to happiness. Can Somerby consider his life's achievements worthwhile? Productivity in work is another contributor to happiness. Health and financial prosperity also contribute, which is one reason why Democrats self-report less happiness. They include more poor and marginalized people whose objective circumstances are less prosperous than right wingers.
Some websites suggest that happiness results from adjusting one's mind to one's circumstances and accepting the imperfections of the world. I wonder whether Somerby will suggest we all learn to admire Trump and love Putin next week? Somerby doesn't seem to be very psychologically minded, so I expect he will tell us to sit under the equivalent of our backyard pear trees and bask in the sunshine. Focusing on happy moments does add to overall happiness, but that is a trivial suggestion having nothing to do with removing the obstacles to happy lives for those who do not have pear trees, or backyards. Looking forward to Somerby's "insights."
People who live in fear of children being read to by drag queens seem happier.
DeleteLOL.
Robert Reich says this about the midterm election:
ReplyDelete"The Democrats’ focus on affordability seems to be a winning strategy (we’ll know for sure in a little over two weeks). But we mustn’t lose sight of the moral squalor at the core of the Trump regime.
It’s that moral squalor — the utter disregard for the opinions, norms, and ideals of the nation or, for that matter, of humanity — that uniquely marks Trump and the reprobates he has attracted to Washington. It has also poisoned much of the Republican Party, including the billionaires and tech bros who finance it.
To put this despicable era behind us, we’ll need to renounce and reverse this squalor."
If Somerby isn't talking about this, he is not one of us on the left. Given how much time Somerby spends chiding blue America, I just don't see a focus on combatting the moral squalor of Trump and his people, including the red Americans who support MAGA and vote for Trump and the wife-beaters, cheaters and pen-stealing assholes running as Republicans. The squalor is at the top but also at the bottom, exemplified by people like Brandon Herrera.
Somerby says we cannot fact-check our way out of this mess. He is wrong about that. You fact check lies. Exposing those lies is how we defend truth and doing that enables more people to live in the real world, the one with that sunshine Somerby finds so important.
To put this despicable era behind us, half this country is going to need an exorcism
DeleteAffordability and the rooting out of corruption in our rigged economy.
DeleteOnly a deplorable would vote against that.
“If Somerby isn’t talking about this, he is not one of us on the left.”
ReplyDeleteI find these self- appointed guardians of the criteria for inclusion in “the left” to be particularly annoying. A movement focused on exclusion rather than inclusion is doomed to shrink.
That's why we welcome all reasons for Trump and the Republican Party's open criminality and corruption, and not just his mental state or upbringing.
Delete