Marco Rubio Sets New Olympic Record For Self-Owns

For the love of God stop him before he hurts someone.

Sen. Marco Rubio (R-The Land Before Spine) fancies himself quite the internet smart fellow. He tweets Bible verses, to prove his piety, and dabbles in light shitposting, too. Other than trying to undo voting rights, trolling is all Republicans do anymore.

But poor Lil' Mar'co is just not good at it. In a run of tweets Thursday and Friday, he tried to mock Democrats' reactions to the COVID pandemic, but mostly just made himself look stupider and stupider.

Rubio no doubt thought he'd really caught Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin in some "embarrassing COVID theatre" Thursday, because just look at the crazy Democrat, who's vaccinated but wearing not only a face mask, but also a faceshield , if you can believe it, what a virtue-signaling dork! 

Our @SecDef is vaccinated But he arrives in the Philippines wearing a mask AND a face shield Embarrassing COVID… https: //t.co/uuoydVnu6e

— Marco Rubio (@Marco Rubio) 1627572248.0 

Our @SecDef is vaccinated

But he arrives in the Philippines wearing a mask AND a face shield

Embarrassing COVID theatre

It's a haiku! Oh, what's that, Politico Defense Editor Dave Brown? 

From the embassy: "The Philippine government has mandated that everyone must wear full-coverage face shields togeth… https://t.co/DulPKHcXg4

— Dave Brown (@Dave Brown) 1627576830.0 

From the embassy: "The Philippine government has mandated that everyone must wear full-coverage face shields together with face masks while in public places. Local governments continue to implement additional requirements to slow the virus' spread"

Now, Rubio could've replied with an aw-shucks "My bad! Thoughts and prayers!" and that would have been the end of it. He might even have asked a staffer to check whether Brown was right. (He is; the US Embassy in the Philippines says that).

Is COVID bad in the Philippines? Business Insider thought to Google that, and then some:  

 Reuters reported Tuesday that the Philippines recorded its highest single-day increase in COVID-19 cases in more than six weeks. The country has the second-highest number of COVID-19 cases in Southeast Asia, after Indonesia, according to The New York Times .

Rubio's home state of Florida is dealing with its own COVID-19 surge. The state leads the US in COVID-19 cases, and has the highest number of residents hospitalized with COVID-19 per capita, according to data compiled by the Times. It also has the second-highest number of COVID-19 cases per capita, after Louisiana.

Rather than acknowledge that COVID is indeed a serious concern at home or away, Rubio was back with another GOTCHA , Friday morning. Oh yeah, reporter guy, you say Austin was simply following the local regulations? HA! Look at him going around without a face shield ALL OVER the Philippines, hurr-hurr!

To underline the gross hypocrisy, Rubio wrote, "I guess the face shield mandate was lifted shortly after he landed"

I guess the face shield mandate was lifted shortly after he landed https: //t.co/N55U7d2FRt https://t.co/JNFnll7O4b

— Marco Rubio (@Marco Rubio) 1627648145.0 

Bit of a problem with Rubio's analysis, however: In the photo on the left, Austin is wearing the mask and face shield while meeting Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte, as are two others in the picture. Duterte himself isn't, because when it comes to his own pandemic rules, he's Donald Trump.

The second photo is a montage of three other images from Austin's trip, so we'll look a bit closer. Enhance! 

Now, it's true that in the image on the left, Austin is in the Philippines and not wearing a face shield as he poses with Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana . Why not?

Snopes notes that moments before the photo, both men were wearing face shields, which they removed for the photo op. Video Screenshot! 

In the other two photos, the main reason Austin ignores the Philippines' face shield mandate has a lot to do with his not being in the Philippines .

The upper right image is from Vietnam, where Austin was greeted by Defense Minister Phan Van Giang , and the lower right pic shows Austin signing a guest book at the Defense Ministry in freaking Singapore  , with Defense Minister Ng Eng Hen. Both visits took place Thursday before Austin traveled on to Manila.

Was Rubio perhaps horrified at realizing he'd conflated three wholly different Southeast Asian nations? Or worried about looking racist as fuck for acting like all Asians look alike?

Heck no! Marco Rubio learned one very important thing from the man he once derided as a "con artist": Never back down or apologize.

So in another Friday tweet, Rubio pretended he'd sprung a clever trap on Democrats and the liberal media, Ha! Ha! The real fool here is not Marco Rubio, but lazy reporters who failed to investigate the real facts! 

We like the part where Rubio never even acknowledges he got two entire countries wrong (and probably knew he was lying anyway). Instead, he added photo of US Chargé d'Affaires John C. Law, not wearing a face shield as Austin arrived in Manila, so why are you people still mocking Marco Rubio?

If SecDef was just following local face shield mandate,a real news outlet would cover how our chargé & Filipino lea… https: //t.co/n3CY9BOLfZ

— Marco Rubio (@Marco Rubio) 1627665059.0 

If SecDef was just following local face shield mandate, a real news outlet would cover how our chargé & Filipino leaders ignore it, not push snarky anti-GOP narratives

The problem here- -aside from CNN being wrong- -is that they desperately cater to the far left to remain relevant

It's a hell of an evolution of Rubioid logic: Thursday, the scandal was that Lloyd Austin was embarrassing for ostentatiously wearing far more protection than he needed. So much pandemic theater!

25 hours later, the scandal was that lazy reporters were mocking Rubio instead of asking why one US diplomat and (some of) Austin's Filipino hosts weren't doing that very pandemic theater. And how about those hypocrites in Vietnam and Singapore, too?

In conclusion, how dare you accuse Marco Rubio of engaging in empty culture warring for the sake of appealing to the GOP base, when CNN and The Left are constantly trying to get attention with their pointless trolling, huh?

[ AP / CNN / Snopes / image:  CNN on YouTube ]

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