The tweet was a mixture of ignorance, snobbery, and a painfully self-aware too-cool-for-school attitude.

In other words, pretty much what we've come to expect from NPR!

Commenters were quick to point out that it was just a joke.

This, in an era when "serious" fact checkers are trolling the Babylon Bee site for "misinformation."

Will The New York Times be fact checking NPR, or is this the kind of humor they "get?"

In any case, humor, particularly political humor, always makes a point and always plays off some premise. When you show something you believe to be ridiculous, and then riff on capitalism for abetting it, you are revealing not only your own mindset, but the presumed mindset of your readers. You expect them to chuckle knowingly to themselves.

"Stupid capitalism."

Which brings me to the snobbery. Clearly NPR is making fun of the notion of stiletto Crocs. Do I agree it's ridiculous?

But guess what? It doesn't matter what I think, and THAT is the whole point of capitalism and is in part, why those who would hold their opinions above others can't stand it.

They desperately want to be the arbiters of taste. Why not have a central government authority making the "right" decisions about footwear? Wouldn't that be better? Wouldn't that spare us all from having to live with people who like Crocs, not to mention cargo shorts? Or <gasp> both!

Capitalism is freedom, freedom from government dominance. Freedom from their dominance. They can't stand that.

There is also the small matter of capitalism being why this person has a job.

These are the sources of NPR's funding:

• Fully 35% of their money comes from corporate sponsorships.
• Another 34% comes from "station dues and fees." If you dig into that, over 50% of that funding comes from a mix of federal, state, and local funding, businesses, investment income, and foundations. In other words, funds generated one way or another by capitalism. So, let's add half of that to the 35% and that gets us to 47% total thus far.
• Another 13% comes from "contributions," which NPR explains as "non-profits" which of course get funded either by corporations or family wealth developed by, yes, capitalism.
• Then there's the "distribution of endowment," which is investment income, and other "return on investment," which combine for an additional 7% of funding.

Even if I gave all these numbers a haircut, not knowing exactly the sourcing of every category, NPR is funded primarily by capitalism.

Way to own the people who own you.

As an aside, people love to note how NPR gets NO TAXPAYER DOLLARS!!

That's true if you don't understand how money laundering works.

If you dig down, particularly into "station dues and fees," they get plenty of taxpayer dollars, and from every level of government, not just federal (another thing they like to distract you by).

One more thing: The writer had a rather odd reaction to the controversy created (ignore the typo, I do that more more often than I'd care to admit).

"not people in the mentions fighting over a joke about foam stilettos"

So, who do you think actually wrote this tweet? Let us know!