Bailout unites prez, Kerry
Both agree Rep. Massie wrong to delay voting
It took a “Masshole” to do it, but Washington is finally united in defeating the coronavirus.
United in the belief that U.S. Rep. Thomas Massie is the biggest jerk in America.
Massie, the Kentucky Republican who forced his colleagues to rush back to Washington to vote on a $2 trillion stimulus package, was vilified by everyone from President Trump to former Secretary of State John Kerry to Massie’s fellow Republicans in an unheard of display of bipartisanship.
After Trump tweeted that Massie was a “third rate Grandstander” who should be thrown out of the Republican Party, Kerry joined in the Massie bashing on Twitter, saying he has “tested positive for being an (expletive).”
“He must be quarantined to prevent the spread of his massive stupidity,” Kerry, the Democratic nominee for president in 2004, wrote. “He’s given new meaning to the term #Masshole.”
Ha. It may have been the first joke that Kerry didn’t botch.
Massie now joins in the ranks of other well-known a-holes, like spring break partiers in Florida, as the world is dealing with the coronavirus.
He has a history of jerky behavior, even earning the nickname “Rep. No” for his frequent opposition to legislation and other largely ceremonial initiatives. Massie argued that the House needed to debate the coronavirus relief bill for transparency sake.
“Is it too much to ask that the House do its job, just like the Senate did?” Massie tweeted.
Predictable outrage followed, from the likes of Democrats and Republicans. U.S. Rep. Joseph P. Kennedy III live tweeted his car trip to Washington to vote, like it was some kind of heroic sacrifice. No, Joe, it’s called doing your job.
Massie has actually clashed with Kerry before. At a 2019 hearing on climate change, Massie called Kerry’s political science degree from Yale a “pseudoscience degree” — earning the wrath of the former secretary of state. So maybe that’s what prompted the former Massachusetts senator to lash out at Massie again. But in attempting to make a joke at Massie’s expense, Kerry was in dangerous waters.
The last time Kerry tried making a joke in public, it didn’t go over so well, remember?
“If you make the most of it and you study hard and you do your homework and you make an effort to be smart, you can do well. If you don’t, you get stuck in Iraq,” Kerry said at a 2006 campaign rally. The Democratic presidential candidate later had to apologize, calling it a “botched” joke. But not before it damaged his 2006 campaign.
Now Massie is the man we can all hate.
Even though, as it turned out, it wasn’t really necessary for all House members to rush back to Washington. The stimulus bill passed anyway by a voice vote. Turn the car around and go back home, Joe K.