The lunatic fringe is having a tea party! Oh, joy! Lewis Carroll would recognize these deranged, erratic, ill-informed, Republican right-wingers as they wave guns and threaten violence, and then deny they said anything of the sort. They're mad as hatters! Sarah Palin, the Mad Queen of the Nutballs, says her tea party pals should "reload" and "target" lawmakers and then hands out maps with cross-hairs for easy shooting. Her white-haired bunkmate, Cranky McCain (together again! all is forgiven!) says this sort of crazy, incendiary language is a good old American tradition and all hunky dory! These perpetual candidates wink and nudge and fan the flames of seething Heartland rage, and then stand back smiling when the actual bombs are planted and elected officials are threatened in their homes. Nice. The so-called "Christian" militia-types they inspire are fueled on something--maybe that hillbilly heroin (also an old American tradition)-- but whatever makes them so stupid and pissed off these politicians sure wish they could bottle.
Too bad history books have been outlawed in most states by conservative school boards, or the uneducated public might recognize these inklings of fascism, the historic parallels with Germany in the 1930s when people were shaken by a depression and felt they'd been stabbed in the back, and the shrill barking opportunists of the day fanned the flames of hatred to rise to power. The Sturmabteilung, usually translated as Stormtroopers, were crucial to Hitler's success in the early days, and were intially informal and ad hoc groups that were fired up at mass rallies and then unleashed to "gash heads" or otherwise threaten and rough up the opposition. Evidently, incendiary talk was also a good old fashioned German tradition, so the fiery beerhall speeches that fueled the rage of these "brown shirts" were all hunky dory. The cross-hairs on their maps were also merely informational, and the rhetoric of patriotism and betrayal and scapegoating--however shrill and baiting--was mere oratory. Right? Hooray for the angry mob!
You've got to laugh. Here to help us find humor in this grim scenario is Jon Stewart, who is probably on the top of any right-wing hit list out there. Here he looks at the Tea Bagger Movement.
| The Daily Show With Jon Stewart | Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c | |||
| On Topic: Scandal-List - Tea Bagging | ||||
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2 comments:
That was a great compilation. Now I know why I don't watch TV.
I know. I have to moderate my dosage or my blood pressure goes up. Even so, I like to keep informed, so I'll watch a little television--and read newspapers and listen to the radio and look at certain websites. We live in a fascinating time.
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