Osama...Obama...Fo-Fama...

I realize this is a week old, but you don't have to be Zad Rust--yes, that Zad Rust--to know that True Tales of Ted Kennedy keep better than yogurt pie on a window sill in August.

Reports the AP via ABC News, the Duke of Chappaquidick--a key element of what has come to be known universally as the Stupid Grandson Theory--"mangled" the name of the Democrats' greatest hope for...what exactly is not sure, but there's a lot of hope there:

Kennedy...mangled the name of the Democrats' new star, Illinois Sen. Barack Obama, calling him "Osama bin...Osama...Obama."

I believe the actual word the reporter was looking for was moidalize. Strangely, sadly said mangling came after this Algonquin Roundtable-level exchange, pronounced "deft" by the AP:

In other comments, Kennedy deftly dodged a question about whether foreign-born citizens should be allowed to become president.

"I didn't know David Ortiz was planning to run," said Kennedy, referring to the Boston Red Sox slugger who is Dominican.

He then looked out at his sister Eunice Shriver, who was in the audience, and said, "Did you hear that, Eunice?"

Shriver's daughter Maria is married to California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who has been talked about as a potential presidential contender but was born in Austria.

Whole thing here.

Comments

Coarsetad | January 19, 2005, 11:13am | #

Teddy just loves to remind us why he was only Kennedy nobody bothered to assassinate.

Thomas Paine's Goiter | January 19, 2005, 11:18am | #

Ted Kennedy - showing the world why the word 'asshat' was created.

joe | January 19, 2005, 11:22am | #

Moidalize: now there's a word you don't hear as much as you might like!

- Completely Mental Ed Grimley

Skeptikos | January 19, 2005, 11:54am | #

Yet another thing he has in common with Bush. Inability to speak at key moments. Either these too men are really dumb, or they are token on the same bong. I vote dumb.

joe | January 19, 2005, 12:00pm | #

It's clearly a sign of stupidity or mental illness when a 78 year old white guy from Massachusetts screws up an African name.

Twba | January 19, 2005, 12:04pm | #

It was just a mother Freudian slip.

NoStar | January 19, 2005, 12:12pm | #

Teddy is 78?
Damn!, So it's true: Only the good die young.

Gilbert Martin | January 19, 2005, 12:23pm | #

"Teddy is 78?
Damn!, So it's true: Only the good die young."

Yeah.

Old Teddy personally helped one of them along too, about 30 years ago.

Stevo Darkly | January 19, 2005, 12:28pm | #

Twba: Yes, those Freudian lacy underthings will get you every time.

Stevo Darkly | January 19, 2005, 12:29pm | #

Slips! Freudian slips!

Twba | January 19, 2005, 12:29pm | #

It's clearly a sign of stupidity or mental illness when a 78 year old white guy from Massachusetts screws up an African name.

Listen to WRKO playback the many soundbites left by the Senator and you will realize he screws up far more than a Yemeni name.

wellfellow | January 19, 2005, 12:49pm | #

"It's clearly a sign of stupidity or mental illness when a 78 year old white guy from Massachusetts screws up an African name."

Yeah, it's not like has any reason to invest some tiny amount of effort in learning, it's not like that's part of his job or anything. But I see what you're saying, why would an old white senator need to learn a black man's name?

Brett | January 19, 2005, 12:51pm | #

Ahhh...memories of the MLB home run record chase from a few years back, when good ol' Teddy commended "Mike McGwire and Sammy Sooser". In baseball terms, that's "0 for 2".

andy | January 19, 2005, 1:23pm | #

"It's clearly a sign of stupidity or mental illness when a 78 year old white guy from Massachusetts screws up an African name."

There goes Joe. The redder the person being insulted the more fervently he tries to defend them. Is there any Commie you wouldn't take a bullet for, Joe?

joe | January 19, 2005, 1:46pm | #

Nothing gets people crankier than interrupting the Two Minute Hate.

Brett, "Sooser" is how someone with a thick Boston accent pronounced "Sosa." Sort of like "Chiner."

Oh well, back to my commie/racist musings.

Jason Ligon | January 19, 2005, 1:54pm | #

'Sort of like "Chiner."'

The First Law of Norteastern Liguistics: R's can be neither created nor destroyed - they are conserved.

Thus, if one speaks of "Chiner", one is condemned to drive a "Caa".

joe | January 19, 2005, 2:06pm | #

Jason, you ah so quee-uh.

Mark Borok | January 19, 2005, 2:25pm | #

"Obama" sounds a lot more like "Osama" than "Barney Frank" sounds like "Barney Fag".

Jason Ligon | January 19, 2005, 2:37pm | #

joe:

Tell you-ah Pats to take it down a few notches.

I think my Steelers have what it takes to win at home this weekend if they bring their A game, but that Colts massacre was scary.

Here's to Tom Brady - may he see much of Joey Porter again this weekend.

joe | January 19, 2005, 3:09pm | #

Da Stillers got a chance if Big Ben shows up. You can't finesse the Bus - they either put enough guys in the box to stop the league's best running game, or they don't. "Enough guys in the box" means Pittburg's wideouts are in single coverage a lot. So either Ben puts the ball in their hands, or he doesn't.

I'm not hearing much about "the Patriots' banged up secondary" anymore, though.

John | January 19, 2005, 3:20pm | #

Actually, Ted Kennedy is only 72 (born in 1932). But his mind is still addled.

jag | January 19, 2005, 3:25pm | #

The criticism of Teddy is silly.

Everyone knows that when you are better than everyone else you needn't bother to learn anyone else's name.

Well do you?

Adamant | January 19, 2005, 3:51pm | #

Ah yes, getting a name wrong. Always funny. Like saying Saddam when you mean Osama? Like saying Nukular. Or maybe trying to spit out the word subliminal? But hey, we're all human, right? We just try to put food on our family.

Trippin | January 19, 2005, 4:13pm | #

Cut Teddy some slack. Word on the street is he was liquored up.

Isaac Bartram | January 19, 2005, 4:22pm | #

I thought Orrin Hatch had got him to quit.

Silicon Valley Jim | January 19, 2005, 4:22pm | #

Yet another thing he has in common with Bush. Inability to speak at key moments. Either these too men are really dumb, or they are token on the same bong. I vote dumb.

Is is a sign of something when a poster doesn't know the difference between "two" and "too" or between "tokin'" and "token"?

D Anghelone | January 19, 2005, 4:23pm | #

Yes, those Freudian lacy underthings will get you every time.

Teddy's a Freudian lace curtain.

joe | January 19, 2005, 4:31pm | #

Actually, he seems to be more of an ink blot.

wellfellow | January 19, 2005, 5:00pm | #

"Ah yes, getting a name wrong. Always funny. Like saying Saddam when you mean Osama? Like saying Nukular. Or maybe trying to spit out the word subliminal? But hey, we're all human, right? We just try to put food on our family."

Because, of course, nobody was there to criticize Bush for those things...

bill | January 19, 2005, 5:28pm | #

Teddy is a drunk. Osama for President.

Jerry | January 19, 2005, 5:55pm | #

A couple of cocktails mid-morning, a little something fortifying before lunch, wine with lunch and all of a sudden a guy is supposed to be drunk? This is prudery at its worst.

Dman | January 19, 2005, 6:10pm | #

I think he also mispronounced Chappaquidick once but that was because he was cold and wet.

Fernie | January 19, 2005, 6:36pm | #

At least he didn't call him Osama Yo' Mama.

Yehudit | January 19, 2005, 7:00pm | #

"Yet another thing he has in common with Bush. Inability to speak at key moments. "

But only one of them gets regularly made fun of for that particular quirk.

Kevin Carson | January 19, 2005, 7:37pm | #

LAWYER: Mr. Quimby, did you assault Mr. Lacost?
FREDDY QUIMBY: Of course not. I love each and every, uh, living thing on God's green earth.
LAWYER: Well therefore you certainly would NEVER lose you temper over something as trivial as the pronounciation of 'chowder'.
FREDDY QUIMBY: That's CHOWDAH! CHOWDAH!!! I'LL KILL YOU! I'LL KILL ALL OF YOU! ESPECIALLY THOSE OF YOU IN THE JURY!
JURY: (gasp)
LAWYER: Wow, that didn't go well...

JoeS | January 19, 2005, 10:04pm | #

Teddy is the fool who drinks himself drunk, passes out, then vomits in the middle of the party.

This is the "Dean of the Democratic Party"

Drew | January 20, 2005, 12:16am | #

If someone dropped a "dumb-bomb" on Teddy, it would raise his IQ.

harlan pepper | January 20, 2005, 9:11am | #

I know of an easy way Teddy could get rid of 60 to 70 pounds of ugly fat.


He could cut his head off.

joe | January 20, 2005, 10:03am | #

The drunk jokes are 15 years out of date. When I used to pass him in the early 90s, the dude's face was purple. But he's cleaned up since then.

Isaac Bartram | January 20, 2005, 10:20am | #

Like I said, Orrin Hatch got him to quit.

Couldn't convert him to Mormonism though.

Gilbert Martin | January 20, 2005, 10:48am | #

"The drunk jokes are 15 years out of date"

So is Teddy.

joe | January 20, 2005, 10:58am | #

Touche, Gil.

I mean, er, Freedom, Gil.

Gilbert Martin | January 20, 2005, 11:16am | #

Whatever floats your boat.

Bob | January 20, 2005, 8:49pm | #

Teddy drives me crazy. Of course, that's the only place I'd let HIM drive me...

Andrew | January 21, 2005, 12:35am | #

"The drunk jokes are 15 years out of date. When I used to pass him in the early 90s, the dude's face was purple. But he's cleaned up since then."

He hasn't cleaned up -- his face just ran out of purple pigment. Either that, or he's using better makeup these days.

Ben | January 22, 2005, 7:36am | #

The problem with the drinking is exactly that - it does not go away just because he stopped. The effects continue to Kerry over.....and over.....and over.......

kevrob | January 22, 2005, 3:42pm | #

How well I remember the old battle-cry from the `80 campaign:

Sink Or Swim With Teddy!

Kevin