We all know Fox is a GOP propaganda organ rather than a news network, but they really have jumped the shark spending precious air time deconstructing the “ethnic” significance of New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson’s beard. Yes, this is the best they can do when discussing the impact of the former Clinton cabinet member’s endorsement of Barack Obama. (Media Matters):
When I saw Richardson’s beard for the first time, what came into my mind is that he looks great with it, not whether he looked Hispanic enough. It certainly is more becoming than Al Gore’s post-2000 facial fur.
I guess these Faux folks are so color aroused that their implicit biases just take over.
42 Responses to “Faux News on the significance of Richardson’s beard”
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Yeah, I don’t even like Richardson, but my first thought is, “Wow, that looks really good on him!”
What I want to know is, when did Wesley from Buffy/Angel become a political commentator on Fox?
“Aren’t we going to talk about the beard? Is it possible he’s a Hirsuticus demon? I shall research it!”
maybe he just grew a bread because he wanted to grow a beard
and I LOVE beards
Ba-ches? We doan need no steenkin ba-ches!
Cly: I too love Katie Holmes.
That link is wicked.
When my dad grew a beard, he looked just like Steven Spielberg. Clearly this was a statement in favor of Hollywood liberalism. Instead of, you know, just a beard.
(He really did look just like Spielberg, especially when he wore a baseball cap and sunglasses, but not only then. To the point where people asked him for his autograph. At least one waiter, in my presence, came up to him and said quietly “Excuse me, sir, but are you Steven Spielberg?” When he said no, the waiter explained that everyone had been taking bets in the kitchen.)
Reminds me of when I was in the Peace Corps in Paraguay. Beards were banned for the male volunteers because there is a strong association there between beards and communists. Didn’t realize it was like that here. And doesn’t one of those big-time conservative lawyers also have a really bushy beard? Attenborough?
I’m guessing he grew the beard because it goes hand in hand with his whole losing weight thing. A lot of guys I know experimented with facial hair either when they were uneasy about their weight (hides a multitude of double chin issues) or when they started getting committed to actually being aware of and caring about their bodies.
Maybe, like Gore, he did it because he’s taking a break from public life for the time being.
Maybe he got some terrible rash or acne outbreak the week before he knew he’d be endorsing somebody, and he grew the beard to hide it.
Or really, who CARES? Makes me wonder how in the world the press is going to deal with the possibility of a woman president. Would it be 4 years of “look at President Clinton’s new haircut”?
Huh? I’ve heard a lot of ethnic stereotypes about Hispanic males, but their supposedly favoring beards is a new one on me.
Sean Connery in my house. People always think they’re the first one to think of it too
You know what would make tons of money? A TV show where viewer can zap every idiots in studio.
I’ll pay $1000 buck right now to zap everybody in that studio. Imagine if 200,000 viewers zap them all at once. They’ll learn to behave right quick.
I have to patent this idea.
Caroline - when my Dad grew his, kids at school would say he looked like Abe Lincoln. We got a pic of him at my first wedding and it’s so true.
The Richardson beard thing is mildly interesting.
But the REAL question is what does Obama’s Pastor Jeremiah Wright think about Richardson’s beard? Are there tapes or transcripts of him denigrating American beards? Has he implied there were government experiments on men with beards? Does he consider the existence of beards to be proof of the moral failings of America? We need to know!
After all, Obama has sought spiritual guidance from this man for over 20-years!…
He looks like a hot sexy Hispanic Perry Mason.
Boy surmises that it’s actually a sign that Richardson has been replaced with his own evil twin.
Thank MikeEss for getting to the heart of the issue
Esme wins! (LOL)
damn I forgot the ewe
Maybe, like Gore, he did it because he’s taking a break from public life for the time being. Maybe he got some terrible rash or acne outbreak the week before he knew he’d be endorsing somebody, and he grew the beard to hide it.
Actually he didn’t grow it right before the endorsement. He grew it IMMEDIATELY after he dropped out. It’s just he hasn’t been in the news much since then, so this is the first. But, I did see a picture of him like two weeks after he dropped out and was like “whoa! beard!”*. So I think your first theory is correct.
I think he should keep the beard, though.
* Seriously it was a pretty nice beard at that point for only having grown it two weeks. I was impressed.
I usually find beardy men grossly unattractive, but I have to say, that is one fine-looking beard. Fox would have more of a story if it looked silly.
Boy surmises that it’s actually a sign that Richardson has been replaced with his own evil twin.
Word. Now the twins just need different colored suits and we have a sitcom.
“Word. Now the twins just need different colored suits and we have a sitcom.
…and one has to speak with an English accent…
So I think your first theory is correct.
Actually all of them were somewhere between wild guesses and jokes. I have no idea why Richardson grew a beard and couldn’t really care less. Though it does look nice.
Now the twins just need different colored suits and we have a sitcom.
You just know there’s some idiot TV producer out there with a hankering to do a very un-PC rehash of Perfect Strangers, set in El Paso or San Antonio. Don’t give anybody any ideas…
Playing the ethnic card = doing anything an official white person might not do
White being the default state of humanity, you know!
I got it, he was making a MALE statement! yeah! Everybody knows that drag queens shave their faces …
You just know there’s some idiot TV producer out there with a hankering to do a very un-PC rehash of Perfect Strangers, set in El Paso or San Antonio. Don’t give anybody any ideas…
Balki Bartokamus = Bill Richardson (also playing his evil twin in a chromatically opposite suit/tie color, speaking with an English accent, never being referenced at any point in the show’s plot lines until he magically appears in one episode, three years into the show, looking to cause trouble for the cousin he always envied and competed with)
Larry Appleton = Mike Huckabee
Now we do the dance of joy!!!!
IMO he’s working it and it looks good. Fox just gets dumber every day.
Wait, Bill Richardson grew a beard? I live in NM and wasn’t aware of that. It looks nice though, well trimmed. Makes him look kinda like John Rhys-Davies.
Also, I thought the stereotypical Hispanic facial hair was the moustache.
The first thing I thought was, “Wow, that beard looks crappy.”
To each her own, I guess.
Hattie: That’s just James Carville talking.
Am I the only one who Liked Gore’s beard?
And Bill R. looks smashing.
See, I figured it would have something to do with the fact that while campaigning, one has to be clean cut and all, but once returned to private life, you’re free to do so and everyone knows beards are in these days.
as a proud beardo, I find it utterly confusing that the likes of Fox News will cite biology as reasons for all kinds of behavior, excusing everything from warmongering to rape to just general purpose assholery, but when someone does something GENUINELY biologically determined, they think it’s weird.
It’s easy to make the case that shaving is more unnatural than homosex. and Everyone knows growing a beard is proof of badassery.
fox weirdos. yeesh.
when someone does something GENUINELY biologically determined, they think it’s weird
Yep. I suspect that most fox commentators couldn’t grow a beard if their lives depended on it. Hence the anxious masculinity rearing it’s ugly head again here.
We’ve been talking about a different kind of beard over at my pad —
Poor Charlie Crist - he’s really desperate for that VP slot
The beard looks great on Richardson. It sort of completes his face, like Commander Riker.
The beard looks great on Richardson. It sort of completes his face, like Commander Riker.
Absolutely! Man what an improvement that was when Frakes grew the beard - was that season 2?
Re: The Rev. Wright’s hirsutetical opinions,
MikeEss- thanks, that made me laugh out loud.
Season 2, yes.
Actually, I thought Richardson looked like Stephano DeMera, the cuddliest bad guy on daytime TV. At any moment, I thought he’d break out an Italian accent and say “And now I shall crown her Queen of The Night!”
Come to think of it, Jesus had a beard too. Dirty fucking hippie.
Blue Jean, Jay Leno showed video of Richardson next to Stephano and said “See!” and yes, he does have a strong resemblance, indeed.
I think it looks great on the Governor and he’s gone from shlub to handsome to me now. Hubba hubba.
(I am going to hell.)
As a man of Hispanic descent, I find it somewhere between funny and offensive that a group of TV anchors that could be referenced to as “Wonder Bread Central” tries to tell me what has and hasn’t “ethnic” significance in terms of facial hair.
Jesus christ, I can’t believe what I just heard. “Trying to be macho”… “playing to the ethnic card”… “but he DOES look Hispanic…”.
I almost hurled all over my keyboard.
I think it’s nasty lookin’. But I don’t like beards. At least it’s filled in a bit. When he first started growing it, the New Mexico media was all over it, showing us images of his scraggly, nascent beard. He looked like he had mange on his face. Ugh.
As a person of Mexican descent who grew up in El Paso, my image of the archetypal Hispanic male requires a thick mustache, not a beard.