Flip-Flop: Bernie Sanders Endorses Misogynistic Pig, Then Retracts Endorsement
[guest post by Dana]
Whenever I write about politicians with gross attitudes toward women and their happy willingness to objectify them in the most demeaning of ways, Trump always comes to mind because he is the biggest reminder that a disturbingly huge swath of Americans don’t really care about the character or moral clarity of those elected to lead. And now we have Democratic candidate Bernie Sanders demonstrating a similar who cares attitude as he endorses a well-known misogynistic sleazebag:
Bernie Sanders endorsed a California congressional candidate Thursday with a long history of making crude and degrading comments about women and provocative statements about Jews, Muslims and other groups.
The Democratic presidential candidate said Cenk Uygur, founder and co-host of “The Young Turks” online talk show, is “a voice that we desperately need in Congress” to fill the seat of former Rep. Katie Hill of Santa Clarita.
In one episode in 2013, Uygur ranked women on a scale of 1 to 10 on how likely men would be to let them perform oral sex on them.
Uygur also defended the Harvard University men’s soccer team in 2016 for ranking the sexual appeal of female students on a scale of 1 to 10 on a widely shared “scouting report,” including explicit descriptions of potential sex acts with the women.
“We’ve been doing it for as long as humanity has existed, so they put it in a Google doc — not guilty,” said Uygur, who has promoted Sanders on his program.
In 2007, Uygur used the n-word multiple times in a show about Duane “Dog” Chapman after the celebrity bounty hunter used the racial slur.
Charming guy. So, if Sanders thinks this is the “voice that [Democrats] desperately need in Congress,” then that is quite an insight into Bernie Sanders and his willingness to overlook disgusting behavior because the end justifies the means, or perhaps because sexism and the harassment of women is just a continuing part of his campaign. I don’t know. Clearly any candidate running for the presidency is not going to give his his imprimatur to just anyone. The candidate will have obviously been fully vetted and researched before an endorsement is given. Also, Uygur is not some unknown, new kid on the block. His misogynistic sleaze has been very thoroughly documented.
Reminiscent of another middle-aged Democrat trying to avoid taking full responsibility for his actions, Uygur blames conservatism for his foul behavior:
“The stuff I wrote back then was really insensitive and ignorant,” Uygur said. “If you read that today, what I wrote 18 years ago, and you’re offended by it, you’re 100 percent right. And anyone who is subjected to that material, I apologize to. And I deeply regret having written that stuff when I was a different guy.”
Uygur also noted that at the time, he “was still a conservative who thought that stuff was politically incorrect and edgy.
OK, got it: a part of conservative orthodoxy is that right-leaning men not only want to be edgy, but think that being “edgy” means making disgusting comments like those that Uygur has made:
An entry from 2000 complaining about his lack of sex declared that “the genes of women are flawed” because they “do not want to have sex nearly as often as needed for the human race to get along peaceably and fruitfully.”
Another entry titled, “Rules of Dating,” said he would break up with a woman if he hadn’t felt her “tits” by the fourth date, and that “there must be orgasm by the fifth date.”
Anyway, not all Democrats are on board with Bernie endorsing Uygur:
Will Rodriguez-Kennedy, president of California Young Democrats, a group that backs Sanders, had called on the Vermont senator to withdraw his endorsement of Uygur.
“We think that he doesn’t necessarily reflect the movement that Sen. Sanders has built,” he said.
Mark Gonzalez, chairman of the Los Angeles County Democratic Party, had also called on Sanders to “disavow” Uygur and pull his endorsement. Uygur’s “vulgarity, his hate speech and divisive rhetoric have no place in our party,” Gonzalez said…
UPDATE:
.@cenkuygur has been a longtime fighter against corruption. However, our movement is bigger than any one person. I hear my supporters who were frustrated and understand their concerns. Cenk today said he is rejecting all endorsements for his campaign and I retract my endorsement.
— Bernie Sanders (@BernieSanders) December 13, 2019
What a load of bullshit. What a weaselly way for two weaselly men to wiggle out of a tangled web of their own making. As if Sanders or anyone on his team didn’t already know about Uygur’s misogyny. Just google “Cenk Uygur” and all his nastiness is there for anyone to see. Note, too, that Sanders doesn’t even mention Uygur’s misogyny in his tweet. As if the very thing that the complaints were focused on doesn’t exist.
Elizabeth Warren, opportunity is knocking loudly at your door…
–Dana
