Remember in 2017 when a tearful Jimmy Kimmel used his late-night television program to shill for the Affordable Care Act?
His weepy activism even earned him the title “America’s conscience.”
Remember in 2015 when Kimmel struggled to hold back tears as he informed viewers Cecil the Lion had been killed in Africa by a big-game hunter?
As it turns out, the late-night host’s supposed empathy and compassion extend only so far. They certainly don’t extend to the Floridians who have died recently of the coronavirus.
Kimmel made light on Tuesday of recent Florida COVID-19 deaths, turning tragedies across the Sunshine State into a punchline.
“Of the 54,000 Americans who died from COVID since the start of the summer,” said the Jimmy Kimmel Live host, “almost one of five — one in five of them died in Florida, which my God, all those orphaned ferrets, it’s a shame.”
@jimmykimmel mocks Floridians who’ve died of Covid: “Of the 54,000 Americans who died from Covid since the start of the summer, almost one of five — one in five of them died in Florida, which my God, all those orphaned ferrets, it’s a shame.” pic.twitter.com/U9jMgCVyKt
— Tom Elliott (@tomselliott) September 14, 2021
Get it? Floridians are notoriously eccentric. Eccentric people usually own eccentric pets, which apparently include ferrets. And now that the Floridians are dead, the ferrets are orphans.
Har! Har! Har!
Imagine Kimmel making a similar joke about New York, where an estimated 54,271 people have died since the beginning of the pandemic. He’d never make that joke, however, as his chief aim is the dehumanization of conservatives. Because Florida is governed by a Republican and voted for former President Donald Trump in the 2020 election, its dead are apparently fair game for the late-night host. Remember: Kimmel also recently dubbed Florida “America’s North Korea,” whatever the hell that means.
In contrast, New York is governed primarily by Democrats, and its residents vote overwhelmingly Democratic, so its COVID-19 victims are safe from Kimmel’s jokes.
Speaking more broadly, the host has also used his show to attack the percentage of the country that is still unvaccinated, which includes many blacks and Hispanics, though Kimmel clearly believes it’s almost entirely white conservatives.
“Dr. Fauci said that if hospitals get any more overcrowded, they’re going to have to make some very tough choices about who gets an ICU bed,” Kimmel said.
He added, referring to those who’ve taken ivermectin as a COVID-19 countermeasure, “That choice doesn’t seem so tough to me. ‘Vaccinated person having a heart attack? Yes, come right on in — we’ll take care of you. Unvaccinated guy who gobbled horse goo? Rest in peace, wheezy.”
It comes as no surprise that the man who succeeded the eminently affable Johnny Carson, Jay Leno, and Conan O’Brien should be such a despicable bug (which is ironic, considering he used to host a program called The Man Show). He has always been a partisan stooge, using the airwaves to push whatever party leaders asked of him.
After all, in 2017, when Kimmel was squeezing out tears and singing the praises of the Affordable Care Act and the necessity of healthcare for all, he did so explicitly at the behest of then-Sen. Minority Leader Chuck Schumer of New York.
Fast-forward a couple of years, and Kimmel is now making jokes at the expense of Florida’s COVID-19 victims.
Amid the pandemic, Kimmel has made it clear he doesn’t care about people, especially conservatives. He cares only about his team.
With Kimmel yucking it up over dead Floridians, libertarian commentator Michael Malice’s old quote about the zealot left wing rings truer than ever: “They want you dead, but they will settle for your submission.”
