And here we are.
This is the story that RFK Jr richly deserves.
In the three months since announcing his bid to become the next president of the United States, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. has largely stayed in his lane of conspiracy theories and anti-vaccine nonsense. But we have also seen some stranger moments, including a video of a shirtless Kennedy working out in jeans and a belt that activated a certain segment of very online bros.
Yet even for a political era defined by demented characters and strange shit, nothing could have prepared me for this story in the New York Post:
The headline is not hyperbole. In fact, it manages to undersell the sheer chaos that erupted Tuesday night at an event showcasing Kennedy, where “two boisterous old men” barreled into a shouting match over climate change. Things like “the climate hoax” and “miserable slob” were reportedly shouted when suddenly one of the men, a columnist called Doug Dechert, pierced the night with an extended fart. “I’m farting!” he declared.
Was this a stunt? No, Dechert later told the Post: “I apologize for using my flatulence as a medium of public commentary in your presence.”
Kennedy reportedly remained stoic during the fracas, which might be the first time I can admit to admiring the guy. As for the stunning weaponization of flatulence—a tactic made famous by lefty organizer Saul Alinsky—it seems fitting that it landed during an event intended to raise Kennedy’s stature with the media.
Camelot it ain’t.
Page Six regrets to report that a press dinner to boost Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s presidential campaign descended into a foul bout of screaming and polemic farting Tuesday night.
The White House hopeful attended the affair at Tony’s on the Upper East Side, no doubt hoping to impress on the ladies and gentlemen of the Fourth Estate his worthiness to sit at the very same Oval Office desk once occupied by his late uncle.
But a shouting match over climate change broke out between two boisterous old men, sending the evening down an extremely unfortunate path.
The gaseous exchange — to which Page Six bore reluctant witness — began after a guest asked Kennedy, founder of the ecological organization Waterkeeper Alliance, about the environment.
And it seems that the mere inquiry was enough to set off apparently drunk gossip columnist-turned-flack Doug Dechert, the host of the event, who became enraged and screamed at the top of his lungs: “The climate hoax!”
Meanwhile, octogenarian art critic Anthony Haden-Guest, who appeared to have been sleeping happily for most of the dinner, was roused by the abrupt rumpus.
He suddenly opened his eyes and denounced his longtime pal Dechert, calling him a “miserable blob.”
“Shut up!” implored Haden-Guest.
Haden-Guest tells us he was not asleep. “I was just thinking,” he told us, and says he is the one who asked the question about the environment.
Dechert continued to scream wildly about the climate change “scam” while Haden-Guest peppered him with verbal volleys from across the table, calling him variously “f–king insane” and “insignificant.”
Here, it seems, Dechert sensed the need for a new rhetorical tack, and let rip a loud, prolonged fart while yelling, as if to underscore his point, “I’m farting!”
The room, which included a handful of journalists as well as Kennedy’s campaign manager, former Rep. Dennis Kucinich, was stunned, seemingly unsure about whether Dechert was farting at Haden-Guest personally or at the very notion of global warming.
(Regrettably, we may assure readers that there was no room for doubt that the climate changed in the immediate environs of the dinner table.)
The candidate maintained a steady composure in the face of the crisis.
Former Page Six reporter Flo Anthony attempted to change the subject, telling Kennedy how much she admired his father, the tragic attorney general, Robert F. Kennedy.
UPDATE:
At the same event:
https://nypost.com/2023/07/15/rfk-jr-says-covid-was-ethnically-targeted-to-spare-jews/
Error: he said it at a different fart-filled event.
Apparently a later portion of the same event. Apologies for the multiple posting.