It’s a healthy thing when the public has more than one practical, grounded political party and philosophy from which to choose. It’s not so healthy when the only choice is between one party seeking realistic solutions and another chasing dark hallucinations.
Sadly, this is the situation we now face. What had once been the reality-based party of Lincoln, TR and Eisenhower has become the fantasy land of Palin, Bachmann and Beck.
I would love to engage in a reasonable battle of ideas with these folks, except that they do not appear to have anything left that may properly be called an “idea”.
Instead they treat us to dangerous delusions: that our government is a malignant, tyrannical monster obsessed with taking away our guns and freedoms; that businesses, by contrast, are a benign force that should be freed from all regulation; that America’s salvation depends on taking the country “back” – a century backwards to before the Progressive era, according to Glenn Beck, chief Tea Party hallucinogenist.
A key example of the logic-free argumentation of today’s Repubs was our Caribou Barbie this past week telling her Tea Party drones that military spending should be exempt from deficit reduction. Why? Oh, because she said so.
It’s a weird feeling going into battle against an army that’s firing blanks. But it would be an unimaginable disaster to have folks so unhinged from reality actually in charge of our national government. Just imagine Ken Cuccinelli — multiplied by a billion.
What are these people actually fighting for?
Yes, I know, “liberty”! But what do they actually mean when they use that historically freighted phrase? As far as I can decipher, liberty to our tea party friends means the freedom specifically:
– to buy and use any kind of gun anywhere
– to drive pickup trucks and SUVs with cheap gas
– to freely smoke cigars and cigarettes
– to eat bad, unhealthy food to the point of morbid obesity
– to pick on gays and immigrants
– to never have to pay taxes (even while freely accepting govt services)
– to avoid any responsibility to help the unemployed, uninsured or otherwise disadvantaged
Looking at that list, it’s hard to avoid the conclusion that the whole point of this tempest in a tea pot is nothing more than protecting the inalienable right of Americans to act like ignorant, dumb ass rednecks. I mean, is there something else that I’m missing here?
Sure the national debt is too big, as it has been for the past 40 years or so. But do the Republicans have any actual solutions to solve the problem? Of course not, since they refuse to touch taxes or military spending and have zero credibility on entitlements. It’s no coincidence that deficits skyrocketed under both Saint Ronnie and George II.
Look at the whole Tea Party takeover of the Republican party, and it doesn’t take long to come to the conclusion that there’s no there there. This is A Movement About Nothing.
And we’re running in fear from these clowns? We should be ripping them to shreds, exposing the nonsense that is at the core of all they stand for. It’s time for Democrats to stand tall and say that not only does the Tea Party Emperor have no clothes — but damn is he butt ugly!
Sign up for the Blue Virginia weekly newsletter
