Before he bowed out of the presidential race, Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey left a lasting impression on the GOP field by exposing a big flaw of boy wonder Marco Rubio: that the senator repeats his talking points ad nauseum.
Yes, last Saturday on the debate stage in New Hampshire, Christie targeted the well-rehearsed Rubio’s penchant for verbal regurgitation, first warning the audience to look out for the canned lines, and then firing a memorable strike: “There it is, everybody. The 25-second memorized speech.” Since then, thanks to his very public malfunction, the public has adopted the nickname “Robot Rubio,” and the scripted Floridian finished in an underwhelming fifth in the New Hampshire primary, collecting 10.6 percent of the vote.
“Boy, this race has shown a lot can happen in a week,” quipped Bill Maher. “A week ago, Marco Rubio was the chosen one, now he’s the little broken robot boy. His Valentine’s Day card to his wife was very sweet, it said, ‘Remembering you on this special day,’ and then when you opened it, it said, ‘Remembering you on this special day.’”
On Friday night’s edition of his acclaimed HBO series Real Time with Bill Maher, the acerbic comedian piled on poor lil Marco.
“Look, politicians all repeat themselves but this guy, my car knows more phrases!” Maher exclaimed. “He’s like a first-generation iPod: two-hundred and fifty songs.”
He also poked fun at Rubio’s mentor—and now rival—Jeb Bush, mocking the diminished candidate in front of his longtime Stan Ana Navarro, a former Republican strategist who know talks politics for CNN.
“I’m not a Trump fan, but when he says ‘Jeb’s a stiff and if he weren’t in politics you wouldn’t hire him for a job,’ well, he’s kind of right!” Maher said.
Navarro then got defensive, claiming that Jeb was not a “trust fund” kid like Donald Trump, whose father seeded him millions to start his real estate empire. This, of course, prompted the entire panel—especially Maher—to laugh in her face, since Jeb is the son of President George H.W. Bush, and the kids all received trust funds. Jeb attended Phillips Academy Andover despite receiving poor grades, and his first postgrad job was at Texas Commerce Bank, which was founded by the family of James Baker—otherwise known as George H.W. Bush’s Secretary of State.
Anyways, on the GOP side Maher, as is his wont, also weighed in on his good pal Donald Trump’s insinuation earlier this week that Ted Cruz was “a pussy.” “Of course, the media is obsessed with the fact that two days ago Donald Trump called Ted Cruz ‘a pussy,’” said Maher. “They pretended like the world was coming to an end which was, first of all, so unfair to pussies. Not to defend Donald Trump, but it wasn’t said in the bad sense of pussy, like ‘your pussy,’ it was like ‘pussy’ as in ‘pussycat.’ And you know what it was [over]? Ted Cruz is for waterboarding but not enough for it, so he’s a pussy. This is so Republican! They’re so binary: if you’re not enough of a dick, you’re a pussy.”
