January 05, 2016

Bill Cosby

Bill Cosby

Source: Wikimedia Commons

Well, it can”€™t be a political “€œthing.”€ Cosby’s a Democrat, although I”€™m not sure how helpful he’s been to the party. Throwing his support behind Hillary Clinton’s bid for the Senate, Cosby told an audience:

This is another joke we are going to play on Hillary. We are going to vote her into office. She wants it, she is going to get it.

And everyone laughed obediently, even though”€”is it really just me?”€”I don”€™t actually understand what he meant.

(Has anyone else noticed that, for a man whose mouth made him fabulously wealthy, Bill Cosby is often shockingly inarticulate, at least of late? Is this some famous-old-black-dude disease? Look at”€”or, more apropos, listen to”€”Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton, if you can stand it. Their silver tongues could use some Twinkle too.)

Anyhow, if Cosby’s hot-potato status isn”€™t a matter of his not having a “€œD”€ after his name, is it, in fact (and I hear a hint of sarcasm in Steyn’s voice), down to “€œsome kind of, like, racism thing“€?

How can it be when it was an otherwise undistinguished performance by black comedian Hannibal Buress in Cosby’s hometown last year that, for whatever reason, mainstreamed longstanding rumors about the guy’s sexual proclivities?

So far I”€™ve been unable to concoct a Grand Unified Theory that solves Steyn’s riddle. Could it possibly mean something that Cosby’s sitcom went off the air the same year Clinton was first elected president…?

I do know I”€™ve got a do-no-wrong list. If you told me that Pete Townshend”€”yes, I know“€”Sarah Palin, and Zombie Frank Sinatra went on a five-state killing spree, my immediate reaction would be “€œWell, they must have had a good reason…”€

And evidently (although just why remains elusive) Bill Clinton is on millions of Americans”€™ do-no-wrong list and Cosby”€”despite being so “€œbeloved”€ and lauded for generations”€”is not.

Today I read that “€œadult children of alcoholics are extremely loyal, even in the face of evidence that the loyalty is undeserved.”€

But I hate that explanation. It seems so…”€œClinton era”€ somehow.

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