Greg Gutfeld is riding high as one of the most popular hosts at Fox News.
CNN forced out Jim Acosta because his brand of Trump-hating “journalism” helped drive the network’s ratings into the gutter.
And Jim Acosta lost his mind over this Greg Gutfeld joke.
Greg Gutfeld mocks Jim Acosta’s new Substack show
Jim Acosta believes he is a brave truth-teller because he was a leftist in the media who said nasty things about Donald Trump.
But now that CNN forced him out because his show was an embarrassment to the network, Acosta is going the independent route of broadcasting shows from home on the Substack platform.
Greg Gutfeld and guests roasted the low-budget look of Acosta’s new livestream, especially making fun of the sickly-looking potted house plant that sat over Acosta’s shoulder during the broadcast.
There were also a number of technical glitches, with Gutfeld quipping, “I think this show is sponsored by Windows 97.”
Acosta needed to get traction for his show.
And the easiest method of building some heat around a media program is punching up at someone way more famous and successful.
Keith Olbermann followed this playbook to great effect in his MSNBC days when he built a mass audience attacking Fox News Channel’s Bill O’Reilly – the number one-rated host on cable news – on a nightly basis.
Acosta figured he could follow that paradigm with Gutfeld.
In his latest Substack broadcast, Acosta attacked Gutfeld and Fox News as lackeys of Donald Trump.
“As I posted on X earlier today, don’t you guys at Fox have anything else to cover? Oh, that’s right. You can’t say anything critical of Trump or Elon Musk, so you have to go after guys like me,” Acosta stated.
This generated eye rolls in light of Acosta’s obsequious coverage of Joe Biden and his refusal to cover the scandal of the coverup of Biden’s cognitive decline.
Acosta then recycled the old attacks on Fox News as “state TV” that CNN and other left-wing media outlets deployed during Trump’s first term.
“This is the sorry state of affairs for people like Greg Gutfeld. For the next four years, all they will be able to do over at Fox is serve as a mouthpiece for Trump. Trump State TV,” Acosta added.
Acosta then falsely claimed what happened on January 6 was an insurrection and hinted that Gutfeld would lead Fox to another defamation suit like the one Dominion brought against the network over their coverage of the aftermath of the 2020 election.
“And how did that work out the last time around when you had Fox personalities texting with the chief of staff over at the White House, Mark Meadows during the January 6 insurrection, telling Meadows at the time that this looks bad,” Acosta continued.
Gutfeld’s dig about Acosta’s house plant struck a nerve because Acosta then put the house plant on camera and whined that Gutfeld was making fun of it.
“Yeah, no kidding. Greg apparently had something else to say about one of my houseplants. I don’t know if you’re still following along here, but Greg Gutfeld during his segment on Fox about my show, this Substack show talked about my houseplant and I brought it right here. This is it right here. This is the little guy. He was in the background in one of the videos and Greg thought it was hilarious and talked about it on his show,” Acosta stated.
“Imagine having a show like his and he has nothing to offer. And comments about my plants? House plants Greg! House plants,” Acosta complained.
Acosta then attempted his own “sick burn” through his version of “I know you are but what am I?” when he said Gutfeld was really the one who was a potted plant.
“Truth be told, you’re a bit of a potted plant yourself, aren’t you, Greg? Sitting there over at Fox, unable to say what you probably would like to say about Donald Trump, but you can’t,” Acosta concluded.
Acosta committed a fatal mistake in any kind of public feud.
You never want the other guy to see his digs get to you.
And by defending the honor of the house plant Jim Acosta all but guaranteed Gutfeld would make even more jokes about it.
