Op-Ed: Rubio Memes Offer Rare Bipartisan Laughs

Politics may feel like a nonstop headache, but Megan McArdle thinks one very silly internet joke offers a kind of aspirin. In a Washington Post opinion piece, the columnist argues that the "Marco Rubio has yet another job" meme allows Americans to laugh together at a time when "the alternative is helpless sobbing." The secretary of state has held multiple official and unofficial titles in the second Trump administration, including interim national security advisor, acting archivist, and acting administrator of USAID, Fox News reports. In a hilarious turn, social media posts also imagine him abruptly learning he's White House beekeeper, Tiger Woods' chauffeur, and Cuba's new leader.

These memes work because almost everyone can laugh along, regardless of how they feel about the underlying news event, McArdle writes. She recalls the Clinton–Lewinsky era, when people with opposing views on the scandal still traded mostly gentle jokes, as an example of how humor once helped Americans process serious events together. Today's political comedy is more scolding and partisan—"a symptom of a terminally ill culture that has given up on any hope of finding common ground," she writes. But "as long as Americans push past partisan differences and laugh together, then there's still a chance we can find more enduring points of agreement." Read her full argument at the Post.