Welcome to the Bizarro World of American political news.
Soon after The New Republic published an opinion piece on Friday attacking Democratic presidential candidate Pete Buttigieg, harsh criticism started pouring in on social media _ from both the left and the right sides of the political spectrum _ prompting TNR's editor to replace the essay with an apology.
"Dale Peck's post 'My Mayor Pete Problem' has been removed from the site, in response to criticism of the piece's inappropriate and invasive content. We regret its publication," the editor's note reads.
The New Republic is largely considered to be a left-leaning news outlet. According to its website, TNR is a "journal of opinion," which has "championed progressive ideas and challenged popular opinion," since it was founded in 1914.
Adding another layer of perplexity, the op-ed was written by a celebrated openly gay author, Dale Peck, whose 2009 novel "Sprout" earned him the prestigious Lambda Literary Award for LGBT Children's/Young Adult literature.
In the hard-to-believe essay, Peck repeatedly referred to the also openly gay Buttigieg as "Mary Pete."
"Let's dish the dish, homos," he writes in the 1,342-word diatribe. "You know and I know that Mary Pete is a gay teenager."
Among the many gratuitous personal insults to the mayor, Peck also compares him to a 15-year-old boy who's wondering if he should sleep with a 50-year-old man, and speculates about Buttigieg's sexual preferences in bed _ in terms that are not appropriate to repeat in this publication.
One of its first public repudiations came from another opinion piece, this time from a very conservative and right-leaning news outlet, the Washington Examiner.
Media commentary writer Becket Adams, who's originally from South Bend, Ind., called the essay "a meandering, nasty, and disturbingly personal op-ed," which attacks Mayor Pete "as the "Uncle Tom" of the gay community," he wrote.
"The article is every bit as reprehensible as it sounds, each paragraph worse than the last," he added.
After the social media storm caused by its publication, the magazine withdrew the piece from its website. In its "apology," editor Chris Lehmann virtually implied that everybody just got it wrong. The story, in fact, intended to be satirical, he contended.
"The New Republic recognizes that this post crossed a line, and while it was largely intended as satire, it was inappropriate and invasive," Lehmann told CNN.
