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A Congressman Is Being Mocked Online For Seeming To Think Kangaroo Courts Are Run By Captain Kangaroo

We live in wild, weird, unpredictable times, when a president who paid to sleep with a porn star and may now get impeached took to social media to brag about his “unmatched wisdom.” But even that isn’t as out-of-nowhere as this: While defending the very same president from what he deemed “kangaroo courts,” a Republican representative implied that he thought they were run by classic children’s TV show host Captain Kangaroo.

That congressman is Matt Gaetz of Florida, who was railing against Adam Schiff, the House Intelligence Committee Chairman who is leading the impeachment inquiry. Schiff has become a household name of late, being Trump’s number one foe during the procedure he’s being struggling to thwart, most recently by saying his administration will not participate in the inquiry that could (but probably won’t) lead to his ouster from office.

Gaetz got in on the hate, repeating a Trumpist talking point about how the president is being unfairly treated by lawmakers. “What we see in this impeachment is a kangaroo court, and Chairman Schiff is acting like a malicious Captain Kangaroo,” Gaetz railed while cameras rolled.

The quote quickly took the internet by storm, many wondering which he understood less: kangaroo courts or Captain Kangaroos. For the record: A kangaroo court is the term that applies to trials — often enacted by corrupt or fascistic regimes, such as the Nazi party — that ignore judicial standards, denying rights and/or rules en route to an oft-hasty, unfair, and sometimes violent sentence. Captain Kangaroo, meanwhile, was a character played by Bob Keeshan, who presided over the beloved children’s show of the same name from 1955 through 1984.

Twitter had a ball roasting a once-relatively obscure conservative figure who seemed to think Captain Kangaroo liked to torch basic human rights.

https://twitter.com/saladinahmed/status/1181612856179122177

One publication used the occasion to brief readers on Gaetz’s predictably dubious rise to power.

Some began to think these relentless Trump defenders were not the brilliant tactician they thought they were.

Anyway, Monday Donald Trump was invoking another children’s fave. What’s in store come Wednesday?