After someinitial giddiness on my part, I stopped covering Dennis (The Worm) Rodman’s peregrinations to North Korea. Watching Rodman make an ass out of himself is quite entertaining but mocking a stupid, immature manchild for his naivete got a bit old. Today, however, theWorm pitched a fit on teevee with Mario’s kid over his latest dipshit “mission” to Commie Crazytown:

Dennis Rodman, former NBA star and recent international provocateur, exploded at a CNN host on Tuesday morning when speaking about his most recent trip to North Korea, implying that an American held prisoner is guilty of whatever crimes the North Korean government says he commited.

Rodman is on his fourth trip to the DPRK since last spring when he developed a surprising friendship with the country’s young leader, Kim Jong Un. Since then, Rodman has sung the praises of Kim in media interviews, while ignoring overtures to speak out about the human rights abuses currently ongoing within the Hermit Kingdom. On Tuesday, CNN host Chris Cuomo asked Rodman and the other former NBA stars assembled whether they would speak to Kim about the imprisonment of American citizen Kenneth Bae. Rodman did not take the question well.

“The one thing about politics, Kenneth Bae did one thing. If you understand — if you understand what Kenneth Bae did,” Rodman started, waving off former New York Knicks player Chris D. Smith who had been serving as spokesman for the group. “Do you understand what he did? In this country?” When Cuomo asked for Rodman to clarify precisely what crime Bae had commit — which the North Korean government has yet to do — Rodman instead chose to speak about the important cultural diplomacy he and his fellows were undertaking.

“I would love to speak on this,” Rodman yelled. “You’ve got ten guys here — ten guys here, that have left their families — left their damn families to help this country as a sports venture. You got all these guys here. Does anyone understand that?”

When Cuomo tried to turn the line of conversation back to Bae, the former Chicago Bull exploded. “I don’t give a [expletive]!” he shouted. “I don’t give a rats ass what the hell you think! I’m saying to you look at these guys! Look at them! They came here!”

The idea that anyone would think that Wormplomacy could be helpful or useful is belied by the fact that Rodman played with Bill Lambeer and Rick Mahorn on the nastiest NBA champions ever, the Detroit Pistons of 1989 and 1990. The Nasty Boys would throw a punch, an elbow, then laugh and brag about it the next day. Those guys didn’t give a rat’s ass, so why should Rodman now? I understand why the desperate Bae family asked him to intervene but I hope they stop hoping this tattooed narcissist will help.

Back in the red scare days, people referred to so-called fifth columnists and apologists for dictatorships as “useful idiots.” (Lenin was the first to use the term but the McCarthyites glommed on to it.) While it’s tempting to call Rodman that, he’s more of a useless idiot. He has no credibility, doesn’t know his ass from a hole in the ground and does this because he misses his PR glory days back in the ’90’s: the days of drag, Madonna, and marrying a porn star or whatever the hell she was. I still feel some pity for the Worm because of his portrayal by David Halberstam in Playing for Keeps: Michael Jordan and the World He Made. Halberstam depicted Rodman as a guy who was mentally and emotionally fixed at 14 or 15 years old. This clip confirms Halberstam’s view of the Worm:

I realize sports retirement can be boring but Dennis Rodman should find something better to do with his time than be a stooge for a dictator who is rumored to have fed his own Uncle to the dogs. Literally. I would hope that he’d rather not hang out with theMr. Wu of world politics.