Laura Ingraham’s Attempt to Dunk on LeBron James Is Going Over Like You’d Expect [Updated]
In a conversation that appeared earlier this week on Uninterrupted, LeBron James and Kevin Durant—the two most recent recipients of the NBA Finals MVP award—embarked on a wide-ranging discussion of politics and social justice with ESPN's Cari Champion. The sight of three black American citizens offering pointed criticism of, among other things, the current president of the United States was deeply troubling for Fox News personality and Payless Ann Coulter knockoff Laura Ingraham, who stared into a camera last night and urged them to, and I unfortunately quote, "shut up and dribble."
This is standard-issue Fox News drivel, a brand of dog-whistle commentary—Ingraham begins by characterizing James's statements as "barely intelligible" and "ungrammatical," and then later asks, "Must they run their mouths like that?"—that is more akin to a gigantic soundstage speaker that, for some reason, only emits racial slurs whenever you turn it on. There is another glaring problem with Ingraham's argument, though: LeBron James happens to be a genius.
LeBron is our greatest living athlete not only because of his historically unprecedented combination of size, speed, and athletic ability, but also because his brain is an alien-manufactured supercomputer designed to bend your favorite basketball team to his will in the cruelest and most efficient manner possible. Can Laura Ingraham break into a dead sprint for 90 feet and then, at the last possible moment, time her leap perfectly to volleyball-spike the championship dreams of a 73-win team into the depths of the sea? I am dubious!
If her life depended on it, could she throw a single no-look wraparound bounce pass to an open cutter? Is she capable of making Timofey Mozgov look like a legitimate NBA player, or facilitating the creation of the most important NBA team of the past two decades, or winning two games in the Finals with Matthew Fucking Dellavedova as his team's second-best player? Can Laura Ingraham even dunk?
"This is what happens," explained Ingraham, the same person who once claimed that a picture of the Cavs' 2016 championship parade was a "five-mile line" of Trump supporters, "when you attempt to leave high school a year early to join the NBA." Again, this is racist, but again, it is objectively wrong! Off the court, LeBron is politically active and unfailingly thoughtful. Klutch Sports, the agency he founded with business partner Rich Paul, might have surpassed the big shoe companies as the most powerful outside force in the NBA today. He pledged $41 million to help kids from his hometown attend college. He is a case study at Harvard Business School. The man is well on his way to becoming a self-made billionaire, which is probably a conservative figure, since just one of his myriad business deals eclipses that figure all by itself.
Come at the King, you best not miss.
Update 3:15 P.M. ET: From Instagram, this may or may not be LeBron's response:
Update, 6:00 P.M. ET: Never one to miss an opportunity to (1) defend her fatuous practice of dismissing legitimate criticism by invoking the profession of the person offering it or (2) shamelessly shill for a 15-year-old book, Ingraham provided us with the following statement via a Fox News representative.
In 2003, I wrote a New York Times bestseller called Shut Up & Sing, in which I criticized celebrities like the Dixie Chicks & Barbra Streisand who were trashing then-President George W. Bush. I have used a variation of that title for more than 15 years to respond to performers who sound off on politics. I’ve told Robert DeNiro to 'Shut Up & Act,' Jimmy Kimmel to 'Shut Up & Make Us Laugh,' and just this week told the San Antonio Spurs’ Gregg Popovich to 'Shut up & Coach.' If pro athletes and entertainers want to freelance as political pundits, then they should not be surprised when they’re called out for insulting politicians. There was no racial intent in my remarks— false, defamatory charges of racism are a transparent attempt to immunize entertainment and sports elites from scrutiny and criticism. Additionally, we stated on my show that these comments came from an ESPN podcast, which was not the case—the content was unaffiliated with ESPN.
Update, 10:30 P.M. ET: From Twitter, this is definitely LeBron's response.
It's about as many words as she deserves.
