Despite announcing that she was shutting down her Twitter page on Tuesday, controversial comedian Roseanne Barr went off on another prolonged tirade Wednesday, blaming Ambien for her racist tweets and telling her legion of fans, “I’m not a racist, just an idiot who made a bad joke.” She also blasted her co-stars for betraying her as she withstood a tidal wave of outrage from her detractors.
Barr’s Ambien explanation was part of a torrential downpour of bizarre tweets in reaction to ABC’s cancellation of her record-breaking, blockbuster sitcom “Roseanne.” Ambien bucked back at the once-powerful Barr, saying that “racism” was never known to be a side effect of using their sleeping medication.
The thrice-divorced, Salt Lake City-born Barr, 65, told her fans on Tuesday that she was done with Twitter, but then she reloaded overnight and fired away in all directions on Wednesday morning.
Barr vacillated bizarrely between apologizing for her rancid Twitter rants and retweeting racist memes that made her apology seem duplicitous and politically expedient. The comedian also retweeted fans who portrayed her as the victim of a liberal media conspiracy to neutralize her.
Overall, Barr amazingly tweeted more than 100 times overnight and early Wednesday morning.
Among her damning retweets that call into question her character and sincerity, there are photos of former Obama aide Valerie Jarrett side by side with an ape.
It was Barr’s earlier tweet about Jarrett — saying that she’s the result of if the “Muslim brotherhood & planet of the apes had a baby=vj.” — that led to her unceremonious ouster from ABC.
Barr continues to say she was just joking, and she retweeted a fan who said that Barr could make fun of Jarrett because Jarrett is part-Jewish and Roseanne was raised as a Jew in Salt Lake City.
In a reply to that fan, CNN reports, Roseanne said, “I honestly thought she was Jewish and Persian-ignorant of me for sure, but…i did.”
Barr also said, once again, that she had been on Ambien, a powerful prescription drug to treat insomnia, at the time of her imprudent tweets about Jarrett — as if that could excuse or erase her racist intent.
Sanofi, the maker of Ambien, responded with a statement full of shade: “While all pharmaceutical treatments have side effects, racism is not a known side effect of any Sanofi medication,” CNN reports.
To her credit, Roseanne admonished her fans against making excuses for her racism and Twitter explosions aimed at Chelsea Clinton, the daughter of Bill and Hillary Clinton.
She tweeted, “guys I did something unforgiveable so do not defend me. It was 2 in the morning and I was ambien tweeting — it was memorial day too — i went 2 far & do not want it defended — it was egregious Indefensible. I made a mistake I wish I hadn’t but…don’t defend it please.”
She cited Ambien again in a later tweet, saying, “Not giving excuses for what I did(tweeted) but I’ve done weird stuff while on ambien — cracked eggs on the wall at 2am etc.”
Later on in the morning, Roseanne deleted all of her tweets about Ambien, but it was too late. Ambien became the #1 trending topic on Twitter on Wednesday morning (May 30, 2018), leading Sanofi to forcefully renounce Barr.
“I have only taken Ambien once … but I don’t remember one of the side-effects being racism,” CNN’s John Berman tweeted.
Barr also deleted this tweet about being contrite yet combative about being blasted nationwide for her overt racism: “I’m sorry 4 my tweet, AND I will also defend myself as well as talk to my followers. so, go away if u don’t like it. I will handle my sadness the way I want to. I’m tired of being attacked & belittled more than other comedians who have said worse.”
The woman often referred to by her first name only said she believed she was fired because of fears over a potential boycott of the show’s advertisers. Roseanne also lashed out at co-stars Michael Fishman and Sara Gilbert. Both Fishman and Gilbert said Roseanne’s tweets were vile and repugnant.
“You throw me under the bus. nice!” Roseanne said in a tweet aimed at Fishman.
Among her more than 100 tweets, Barr accused the left wing of America of orchestrating her termination because of her public support for President Donald Trump.
She even proferred the theory that ABC “brought the show back so they could inevitably cancel the show when she said something they didn’t like” — as if that made any sense.
Roseanne, of course, also deleted those tweets.
Another retweet quoted former Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain on Fox saying, “I believe they were looking for a reason to cancel #Roseanne and here’s why. Even though the show was a ratings success, forces within ABC didn’t like the fact that her conservative defense of certain things was so popular.”
Barr, who is Jewish, also continued to harangue George Soros, a Jewish billionaire businessman and liberal donor who has been painted as the villain in many right-wing conspiracy theories. She accused the Hungary-born business baron of collaborating with Nazis.
Barr also said her firing “worked out” because she “would leave when they started to try to censor me.”
Tom Werner, her longtime producing partner, informed Deadline.com that he is very concerned about Roseanne’s mental state and that he supports ABC’s decision to remove “Roseanne.”
He said he hoped “Roseanne seeks the help she so clearly needs.”
