NOTE: This was written before Hillary Clinton essentially clinched the nomination.
With the critical California primary looming, Hillary Clinton has received a key endorsement that will likely help her clinch the “self-absorbed weirdo millionaire who did a comic strip you once kind of liked” vote.
That’s right, folks. Dilbert creator Scott Adams has thrown his support behind Hillary. Sort of.
In a post on his always strange blog yesterday (archived here), Adams offered a bizarre rationale for his choice: He’s endorsing Hillary because he’s afraid that if he doesn’t, her supporters might literally murder him.
No, really. In his post, Adams explains that
Clinton supporters have convinced me – and here I am being 100% serious – that my safety is at risk if I am seen as supportive of Trump. So I’m taking the safe way out and endorsing Hillary Clinton for president.
Let’s unpack the, er, logic that led to this phony backwards “endorsement.”
Adams has been gushing for months about what he sees as Donald Trump’s “extraordinary persuasion skills,” by which he evidently means Trump’s bellicose, bullying rhetoric designed to appeal to Americans’ worst instincts. But now, in the wake of Clinton’s masterful takedown of Trump in a withering speech last week, Adams sees that she’s got some “solid-gold persuasion” skills of her own.
So naturally Adams has concluded that his life is in danger.
I’ll let him explain it because I certainly can’t:
This past week we saw Clinton pair the idea of President Trump with nuclear disaster, racism, Hitler, the Holocaust, and whatever else makes you tremble in fear.
Yeah, I’m pretty sure it’s Trump’s most fervent fans who are pairing Trump with Hitler — though they tend to see Trump’s similarities with their Nazi idol as a good thing.
And I’m also pretty sure that Clinton didn’t force The Donald to retweet such lovely individuals as @WhiteGenocideTM, a resident of “Jewmerica” whose Twitter bio links to a pro-Hitler “documentary,” and who once Tweeted an image of a gleeful Trump getting ready to gas Bernie Sanders in a Nazi death camp. Or self-described “fashy goy” @EustaceFash, who likes to post things like this:
Ein Reich Ein Volk Ein Wall pic.twitter.com/bucwnHRWu0
— Eustace Bagge (@EustaceFash) April 23, 2016
But let’s set that aside for now, because in Adams’ world it is The Hillary who’s responsible when people look at The Donald and notice a bit of a resemblance to The Adolf. Clinton’s “new scare tactics are solid-gold persuasion,” Adams declares.
The only downside I can see to the new approach is that it is likely to trigger a race war in the United States.
Yeah, that’s right. It isn’t Trump’s racism and xenophobia, or his repeated incitements of violence against protesters, or his winking cultivation of literal Nazi fans, that might stir up a race war. It’s Clinton mentioning those things in public.
But Adams’ “logic” gets weirder:
And I would be a top-ten assassination target in that scenario because once you define Trump as Hitler, you also give citizens moral permission to kill him. And obviously it would be okay to kill anyone who actively supports a genocidal dictator, including anyone who wrote about his persuasion skills in positive terms.
Dude, dude. Really?
So I’ve decided to endorse Hillary Clinton for President, for my personal safety. Trump supporters don’t have any bad feelings about patriotic Americans such as myself, so I’ll be safe from that crowd.
He may actually have a point here. Trump’s most violent fans would much rather be beating up people whose skin is a bit darker than that of a pasty-faced white cartoonist.
And so Adams has thrown his support — if you want to call it that — behind Clinton, in order to protect himself from violent monsters like these in the event that she loses, which he thinks she will.
As of press time, this writer could not confirm the color of the sky on Adams’ planet.
Whenever he talks about how none of the candidates actually support his views, I figure the only political position he has is that everyone everywhere should be forced to praise his genius as he walks by.
“Ugh, those stupid feminists and all their fee-fees! Why can’t they see that I’m the real victim here?! They might murder me! I’m so important!”
I don’t think it’s just him having himself a bout of self-victimization. I think there’s quite a good helping of Unwarranted Self-Importance as well.
What makes him think Hillary supporters give a single, solitary rat turd about him? Or even know (or care to know) who he is? What the fuck makes him think he’s so important that Hillary supporters would kill him?
Because he’s a once-relevant comic strip artist who runs a blog? Pffft.
I want to comment about Scott Adams being a rabid douchecanoe but…goddamn, that picture is freaking nightmare fuel. I’m not saying remove it or anything but yikes 🙂
Well, THAT picture didn’t embed.
Why would he be a top-10 target? Surely there are dozens more high-profile Trump supporters than some dumb cartoonist.
Talk about some serious projection — accusing the person that the Far Right almost universally refers to as “Hitlery” of playing the nazi card. Wow, just wow.
Yay, Mammoth is back! Hope your break was lovely, David, and that you feel a little less worn down.
@Scildfreja – “ambulatory dumpster fire” :D. In a thread full of pithiness, this one wins for me.
@throwaway
They aren’t afraid of the idea of a “race war.” They want an excuse to shoot people.
@ Bina
Nah, Ein Wall is actually fine if imitating the Lingua Tertii Imperii and wanting to stay with a single form of the indefinitive article. “Wall” is a somewhat anachronistic use of German, but still understood. Of course, the tweeter is still ein sackdämlicher Dünnschissgurgler.
Coincidentally, I just read an article about him: http://www.patheos.com/blogs/daylightatheism/2015/12/beware-the-man-who-knows-one-thing/
The article and the comments seem to explain his moonbattery fairly well.
I’m just amused that he thinks anyone actually gives a crap about him and his noxious “opinions” anymore.
Is he negging?
@P.I.
True.
That seems to be the mentality of anyone whose had some form of fame, even when it’s limited to a niche audience – they not only see themselves as being immune to criticism (which they often mistake as a “personal attack”) but think they’re a bigger deal than they really are.
I’ve certainly noticed this with other comic artists as well as stand-up comedians. Which is weird because, well, they’re in entertainment and audience feedback – positive, negative, or otherwise – is bound to happen. Made all the more unbearable given their sycophants, who never seem to understand the hypocrisy of defending the free speech of one individual while telling everyone else what they’re “allowed” to say or not say about their work.
Apparently it doesn’t matter if those people gave their time and money to those creative individuals, thus have every right to express their opinion on them, because you should just be “grateful”…even if you didn’t like it…
Well, Hillary is now over the top, delegate-wise:
http://www.seattletimes.com/nation-world/nation-politics/ap-count-clinton-has-delegates-to-win-democratic-nomination/
I guess it was Scott Adams’ endorsement that did it, huh? (Not.)
I found that German has a word for Scott Adams, because of course it does: fachidiot.
http://www.collinsdictionary.com/submission/1182/fachidiot
…and this was a man who used to be funny; now, he’s merely ridiculous.
{observes moment of silence for vanished reputation}
Yes, Scott. Hillary Clinton’s supporters are the ones who are dangerous, not Donald Trump’s. It’s not like his supporters have been filmed beating a BLM protester while chanting “All Lives Matter!” /s
Dammit. I used to like Dilbert, if for no other reason than I found his curvy tie adorable.
OT: Can anyone guess what movie the character in the first part of my name is from?
David, David… Creepy Photoshops of American Presidential Candidates Week is next week.
Okay, I’m being silly. Not quite as silly as Scott Adams, though.
I see the Dilbert comic strip sometimes in the newspaper. Dilbert the character often acts insufferable under the guise of being logical. Now, as a former English Obliterature student, I know I’m not supposed to say The Character is the Author… but here, it’s tempting.
This doesn’t seem like Adams is even pretending to be logical, though. Is it a particularly tortuous attempt at a gotcha?
Point taken…and yeah. Or should I say Ja?
@Anne Lewis – Google told me, so it doesn’t count 🙁 I’ll let other people answer.
(I haven’t seen the movie, but now that I’m reading about it, it sounds like something I might like. She seems like a cool character, too.)
Scildfreja
That’s exactly how I feel too. I definitely have issues with Clinton, but (as the Statler Brothers sang) “when they ordain Madeline O’Hair and she becomes a priest” is when I’ll vote for Trump.
The more I learn about Scott Adams, the more I’m glad I never thought Dilbert was funny.
@epitome of incomprehensibility
She is SUCH a cool character and I highly recommend the movie.
Scott Adams must belong to the school of thought that says if you have to explain why a joke is funny, that’s just proof that it’s damned funny.
As if he needed any further proof that his jokes are side-splittingly hilarious.
OK, I had to share about the ad that just popped up for me.
It’s a photo of a woman in cotton lingerie with a cute puppy on her knee.
The company is Yummie.
The tagline is “The next woman’s movement.”
Not complaining. Just amused.
Yep, Hilary will kill Scott Adams if she gets in. Just like Obama killed Ted Nugent and put him in jail after he won in 2012. Or was it put him in jail and killed him? Guess we’ll have to ask Terrible Ted about the sequence.
Oh, wait….