I’ve been writing a lot lately about the US Republican Party and the far right generally. Some of it has been pretty mocking because, let’s face it, they’ve been so hi-lar-i-ous lately. But now, they’ve outdone themselves, raising their comedic standard even higher.
After their fake grassroots protests, after tying to stick every label they can think of on President Obama (and even trying to re-name the Democratic Party), after piling all of that on top of their normal distortion and disinformation, now they’ve found another way to attack President Obama: Mustard.
In what has to be the looniest attempt at an attack I’ve ever seen, the far right has been trying to discredit the president because he asked for mustard on a hamburger. No, I’m not making this up—who could? Planet Wingnut is beside itself over condiments!
When the president visited that hamburger place and ordered a cheeseburger, he said he wanted mustard on his burger, specifically, “if you’ve got a spicy mustard, like a Dijon mustard or something like that”. Apparently, choosing that is enumerated as treason on Planet Wingnut.
Ordering a burger is what ordinary people do, and this is the heart of the wingnut attacks: They cannot allow the president to be seen as an ordinary person because that would undo all their efforts to frame the president as an elitist, unlike the real ordinary people, the multi-millionaire blowhards in the wingnut media. So, they focus on his choice of condiments to “prove” they’re right. One wingnut went even farther, “What kind of man orders a cheeseburger without ketchup, but Dijon mustard?"
What all of this shows, yet again, is how utterly out of ideas the far right now is. They have nothing to offer America but opposition to everything and attacks over stupid things, like choice of condiments.
All of which suggests a commercial: One limousine is stopped, wingnut millionaire commentator in the back. Another limousine pulls up, the Republican leader leans out and says, “Pardon me, would you happen to have a clue?” The wingnut, of course, doesn’t, and they both drive off, utterly clueless, but with plenty of condiments.
Tip o' the hat to Mark from Slap Upside the Head who pointed me to the story.
3 comments:
Growing up in Indiana, we had ketchup on hamburgers; mustard on hot dogs. When I went to grad school, my roommate was just the opposite. He was from Nebraska. How much more 'middle American" was that? Y'know, I got to LIKE mustard on burgers. The wingnuts might find change is good if they were open enough to TRY it the first time!
I had an impossible time wrapping my head around this story, but I'm happy I got to hear your thoughts about it. The wingnuts' need to somehow define Obama as an elitist---especially during moments where he connects in something as universal as ordering food---actually makes sense... in an utterly foreign and twisted way, that is.
It's still baffling, mind you, that they (the wingnuts) don't predict people seeing right through this. Surely no significant population is buying this nonsense? I mean, they're talking about one of the world's all-time most popular condiments!
(Incidentally, over here, ketchup is largely considered a children's food. It's popular on french fries for all ages, but not many people would put anything that sweet on meat. Not that it would ever cause a media frenzy if anyone were to do so, though.)
Lord Byron: Good point. I'm not too fussy about condiments, but I tend to like both "American Yellow" mustard and ketchup on both burgers and American hot dogs. But all that is somewhat different in New Zealand, where "mustard" is often brown and tomato sauce (ketchup/catsup) is commonplace.
Mark: Yes this is one of the loopiest things ever—and thanks for tipping me off to the story! The reason that the wingnuts don't realise we'll see through their latest attack plan is that they have no self-awareness—they don't have a clue how ridiculous they've become, so they have no idea that we see it.
As I said in answer to His Lordship's comment above (we in the Commonwealth know our peerage forms of address…), tomato sauce is quite commonly used here, and in addition to burgers, it's put on hot dogs (battered sausages on a stick), on BBQ sausages (sold at the weekend outside home improvement stores as charity fundraisers—I always look for a Mum cooking them, not a Dad or a kid; Mum's make sure the sausages are cooked) and on the ubiquitous pie (beef mince and cheese is my favourite). Mustard is seldom used.
Sometimes the tomato sauce is VERY sweet, other times, not so much. personally, I prefer it slightly vinegary.
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