In the cast of the populist circus, functionally misnamed, “Fox News,” the part of the reluctant, put upon, intellectual is played by a grumpy middle-aged man, Tucker Carlson. Tucker, impervious to the concept of hubris, and like the apocryphal, Oracle at Delphi, renders Deity-inspired wisdom to such supplicants as loyally invoke it.
Simply out of idle curiosity, we decided to attend at his Delphic Greek Temple situated atop the amorphous clouds of Fox News,” by watching it on the appropriate, television channel. Initially, we would refer to his revealed persona and style of unholy pontification, prior to the revelation of the substance of his invaluable, and irrefutable revelations, then heard by us. Carlson’s face seems to reveal the attitude of profound injustice that he be unfairly taxed with the singular responsibility to simplify and explain things to the lesser gifted television viewer. While one is confident that he did not read at Oxford, he nevertheless effects that stereotypical exterior, viz., retro hairstyle and sports jacket (looks like tweed), and far too often wears a sardonic and patronizing smile of condescension. Our take on T.C., who, in populist reality, is an ardent supporter of another great and reliably wise Oracle, Donald J. Trump, and that he is as candidly an intellectual, as the Wizard of Oz was an effective Sorcerer. Tucker is known by many legitimate newscasters as an exaggerator, a prevaricator and a mere dilettante, in the misleading and false trappings of a sophisticated guide to empirical wisdom.
By example, Carlson is known to be a down player or denier of climate change, despite the universal agreement of its existence by world’s recognized climatologists and scientists, an avid supporter of the former incapable, immoral and shockingly ignorant, President, Donald Trump [ rated, “his highest-profile proponent] and of Trump’s Wall separating U.S. and Mexico, a Member of the Dan White Society, named after the killer of the Mayor of San Francisco Mayor, George Moscone and of Harvey Milk, a propagandist as to the lack of severity of Covid-19, apologist for the January 6, 202l insurrection, an opponent of immigration, and has, generally, been described as a racial bigot, anti-feminist, a follower of “White Grievance” politics, and practitioner of delusional conspiracy theories.
Carlson, in his petulant-pedantic manner, speaks, as the inaugurated, scholastic authority of Fox News [News ?] to its audience, largely composed of the mal-informed underbelly of the Nation, in an effort to “explain” the causes for our Nation’s problems.
During that single observance, made out of idle curiosity, mentioned above, we observed a typical example of the Tucker emphatic screed; this time, on the purported cause of the contemporary high prices and possibly ensuing danger of inflation. In sum, he imperiously and confidently placed all the responsibility [as expected] on the Biden Administration. Apparently, Biden is destroying the entire American economy by furnishing [modest] monetary relief to needy and hungry families. “It is entirely the fault of Biden!” We were satisfied on this one occasion that we had serendipitously occasioned on a stereotypical example of a prime Tucker Carlson [Trumpist] Oracular revelation. Did no one notify T.C. of the Pandemic?
It appears that most accredited economic experts did not consult the Carlson Delphic Oracle, and, authoritatively instead, attribute today’s high prices and threat of inflation to the Covid pandemic. As usual, despite his arrogant patrician delivery, Tucker Carlson, as usual, was not only, incorrect, but faithfully and obnoxiously, spewing right-wing Trumpian alternate facts.
As to the specific, empirical reasons for the present Covid-caused, high prices are, strained shipping routes around the globe, restricted supply lines, lockdowns, pent-up revenues caused by the pandemic, the closing of a great many factories and businesses, the latter, resulting in less availability of products, the pent-up price demand, and the consequent price increase; the latter, one hopes, will find itself in the slow process of normalization.
Tucker should take notice, and honestly acknowledge the empirical fact that the length, as well as the severity, and the numbers of mortalities of Covid, were significantly exacerbated by Trump’s public downplaying of its importance and his interference with the prophylactic measures professionally recommended [masking, distancing, and vaccination].
Mr. Carlson, in his characteristic pseudo-intellectual style of Trump sycophant, no doubt, privately realizes that the Covid-19 epidemic, in truth, is the guilty perpetrator of the concerning price increases and not Joseph Biden [ Trump’s opponent]. Snake oil salesman, grifters and propagandists come in all conceivable costumes, from populist garb, like overalls, religious robes or tweed jackets; their similarity resides in their propensity for shameful and potentially dangerous misrepresentation.
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