If a picture paints a thousand words,  A.L. and Louise Geddings were lonesome representatives of the laughably low turnout yesterday when SC governor Nikki Haley spoke at a Tea Party rally at the Statehouse in Columbia

Organizers for the event said they were expecting 2000 people to show up, but just 30 attended. They blamed the pathetic turnout on Donald Trump canceling his threatened presidential bid (Trump had been scheduled to appear at the event).

I don’t know, but If 1970 Teabaggers who would have otherwise shown up for a rally, but didn’t bother once Donald Trump bolted from political life, is anything to go by—and I think it is—then. rut roh, the Republicans are going to have a much, much bigger problem on their hands in 2012 than I think they anticipated.

Via Buzzfeed

 
Via MoveOn/Hat tip to Mark Szabo!

 
Has the Tea party movement burned itself out, save for all but the most fanatical types? It’s difficult to draw definitive conclusions from the attendance of just one (very) poorly populated event, but when the event in question is in Florida and they can’t even find the requisite number of cranky, dumb old Republicans to fill the seats for something called the “Save America Convention,” you can’t really help but wonder if something’s gone seriously off the boil:

With Fox News host Glenn Beck’s ratings down and the biggest tea party rally eclipsed by a recent pro-labor rally in Wisconsin, could the tea party be losing steam? One new sign: a big tea party convention in Tampa, FL this weekend — headlined by such conservative favorites as Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX), Fox News Judge Andrew Napolitano, and former GOP Congressman Tom Tancredo — attracted only about 300 people. The Save America Convention’s website lists 25 guest speakers, meaning there was one speaker for every 12 attendees. If one includes the 13 musicians and other performers listed as entertainment, that ratio drops to one for every 7 and a half.

Joseph Farah, the founder of the birther news website World Net Daily, who spoke at the event, promised “lots of opportunities for interactivity between participants and presenters.” Indeed, this photo from the convention posted by Saint Petersblog suggests attendees would have little competition to meet Farah and the other speakers’

Aimed at the farthest right of the far right, the three-day event touted a sponsorship from the John Birch Society and an appearance by Stewart Rhodes, the founder of the Oath Keepers militia. But this kind of uber-conservative fare has had no trouble attracting bigger crowds not long ago. There’s no video of the event — which didn’t include a single female speaker — since “video recorders and audio rendering devices are prohibited and would be grounds for removal without refund.”

Probably because they desperately didn’t want images like the above pic getting out. A videotape would only have made this wingnut micro-gathering seem even more pathetic. If a picture paints a thousand words, what would you title this one?

Via Think Progress

 
File this under “Take with a grain of salt”: Tea Party Nation founder, Judson Phillips claims that ‘Anonymous’ is harassing his group by asking supporters to register at the their website and post porn and offensive images culled from Encyclopædia Dramatica. In an “urgent message” Phillips told members:

So far, Anonymous’ attacks have been mostly of the juvenile nature. They have been coming online, posing as Tea Party members and posting racist messages. Those are being deleted quickly. Two nights ago, one of them posted extremely graphic and disturbing pornographic pictures. We discovered it and quickly deleted them. They then sent a suspended message saying, “expect us.”

Phillips posted the above graphic as “proof” that the attacks were emanating from the Anonymous hive, but so far AnonNews has mentioned nothing of the supposed attack or of a “Project Reaganomics.” Not saying it didn’t happen, but this could just as well be a PR ploy by Tea partiers looking to gin up a fight. With the unrest in Wisconsin and the catastrophe in Japan, maybe Phillips and his Teabagger crew are just feeling forgotten and trolling for some attention like famewhore weirdos, the Westboro Baptist Church were recently exposed doing? How very UN-original.

Phillips would not reveal his sources in an interview with TPM, but says he had heard that ‘Anonymous’ was planning to target Tea Party Nation - when he saw the graphic he says it seemed to confirm his suspicions.

He allowed that the graphic could have been fake, but added that it’s from a “source I trust,” and that “based on other information we had, we don’t think so.”

“My belief based on information we have received is that this comes from somebody associated with that group,” Phillips said. He added: “If they believe in free speech, why are they trying to shut down those who disagree with them?”

‘Anonymous’ has taken down other conservative, supposedly grassroots websites. This month, they attacked Club For Growth and Americans For Prosperity in response to the Wisconsin protests.

 
Look at this face, look at this ridiculously stupid, Republican-looking face, the most Republican-looking face I have ever seen.

When I look at Scott Walker’s wimpy, goofy face, he’s like an ICON of idiocy to me. He’s a GOP Alfred E. Neuman. As if his DNA was CAST by fate itself for the role of a GOP *fool* for the national stage.

Scott Walker is labor’s BEST FRIEND since Jimmy Hoffa, in a perverse sense. He’s going to go down in history as the guy who broke the glass and pulled the alarm on all out class war in America.

A war the people are going to win this time.

The Democrats should trademark his stupid face and have it etched on urinal cakes and distributed nationwide…

Look at the face of this delusional man whose misguided, strong-arm tactics will help end the Republican party in America for good this time.

Gov. Scott Walker seems intent on pouring gasoline on the class war, but it’s only going to burn his own political career to the ground, bring his political party into a fight with its own fucking citizenry—that it can’t possibly win!—and see him go down in history as one of America’s single biggest assholes…

BREAKING NEWS: Collective bargaining bill appears to be on its way to passage tonight

In a surprise move late Wednesday, Senate Republicans voted to move forward with the governor’s controversial budget repair bill, sending the measure to a Senate-Assembly conference committee, which quickly adopted a version of the bill that both houses will vote on.

It was unclear how the Senate, which has been deadlocked after the body’s 14 Democrats fled the state last month denying it the quorum needed to vote on a fiscal bill, was able to advance the legislation to this point.

Republican leaders would only say the Senate bill differed from the Assembly bill and, after voting to take up a couple of Assembly amendments, indicated it was possible that lawmakers could strip fiscal elements from the proposal and pass only measures dealing with collective bargaining.

Such a move could allow Republicans to pass the governor’s bill without the 20 Senate members needed to vote on fiscal matters. Currently 14 Democratic senators remain in Illinois, hiding out in an effort to deny the quorum and stall the vote.

If the Republicans move forward with their plans, it would be a major reversal for Gov. Scott Walker and Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald, R-Juneau. Both have contended that the bill is fiscal in nature and thus the collective bargaining could not be stripped from the measure.

Democratic Senators on Wednesday immediately criticized the move and said there was a possibility they would come back Wednesday night to fight the bill on the floor. The senators said the Republicans maneuver proves their goal has had more to do with ending collective bargaining for public employees and less to do with balancing the budget.

“They have been saying all along that this is a fiscal item; we’ve been saying it is not,” said Sen. Jon Erpenbach, D-Waunakee, from Illinois. “They have been lying. Their goal is to bust up the unions.”

Sen. Bob Jauch, D-Poplar, called the maneuver undemocratic and “almost barbaric.”

“There’s going to be a public hanging of public employee unions at the Capitol tomorrow if it comes out as I expect,” he said, referring to the provisions meant to strip most collective bargaining rights from public employee unions.

Groups that have been protesting the bill for more than three weeks began issuing urgent appeals Wednesday evening for supporters to come to the Capitol to oppose the move.

It’s gonna be a party tonight in Madison!

Viva the people of Wisconsin! America is behind you!

 
There was a fascinating article in The Dever Post yesterday—it’s practically just a list—examining how certain extremely wealthy people pay very, very little in Colorado property taxes. Familiar names and faces like Tom Cruise, Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell, Dick Ebersol of NBC and his wife actress Susan St. James and others pay far, far less in property taxes than most home-owning, God-fearing, rank and file tea-bagging Americans do. What’s a close-minded wingnut to make of this? It’s not what Michele Bachmann, Rush Limbaugh or Sarah Palin want for America is it??? Or is it?

Hey, wait a minute, Brad Reed writes at Crooks & Liars, this could serve as an effective meme for making those amongst us who are totally impervious to “facts” and “reality” (I’m looking at you, teabaggers) understand how the rich often screw the rest of us over. It might even be a way of persuading the un-persuadable that they are actually acting against their own economic self-interests by their politically unsophisticated participation in far-right advocacy groups. From “How we can convince Tea Partiers to raise taxes on rich people”:

So The Denver Post has done us an extremely useful service today by highlighting just one of many ways that rich people in the United States get away with paying practically zero taxes. I think this could be useful because many of the rich people featured in the story happen to be Hollywood celebrities, who are often the bane of our conservative brethren on a great many issues. Let’s take a look:

Actors, captains of industry, an Ivy League astrologer, sports figures, politicians, energy giants, schoolteachers from Pasadena, Calif. All these are also considered farmers or ranchers for tax purposes in Colorado. They have secured low property taxes through agricultural designations on land they own even though they personally have little or nothing to do with producing food — the reason state legislators originally created a low property-tax rate for the agriculture sector.

In some cases, the properties where they have second, third or fourth homes were traditional working ranches before they were sold to the wealthy and became what, in real-estate lingo, are termed “gentleman ranches” or “recreational ranches.”

You can see where this is going, can’t you? And once you get into the gory details, things get really ugly:

Actor Tom Cruise owns five parcels of land on a scenic mesa northwest of Telluride that has become an enclave of high-end vacation homes. Sheep graze around the mansions for brief periods each year, according to the assessor’s office. Cruise pays just more than $400 in taxes for 248 acres for which he paid nearly $18 million between 1994 and 2002. He pays $11,380 in residential property taxes for the land where his $9.7 million home is located.

Yes, this is how poorly our tax systems across the country are designed: Tom Bleeping Cruise can get away with paying $400 a year in taxes for property that’s worth around $18 million, all because he occasionally allows sheep to walk through it.

Want another ugly detail? Check out this one:

David Tresemer, an astrologer and Harvard-educated psychologist, owns 191 acres and four structures that are listed as farm buildings or residences in the foothills west of Boulder where he operates the StarHouse. It is advertised as a spiritual and cultural space for celebrations of the seasons, the lunar cycles and rituals from ancient and indigenous cultures.

He pays $11.48 in taxes for 38 of the vacant acres and $3,699 for the remainder of the land with the buildings.

OK, even if Ma and Pa Tea Party are still Tom Cruise fans, there ain’t no way they’re happy that a Harvard-educated astrologer is paying just over $11 in taxes for 38 vacant acres of land. And remember, these are only two examples that demonstrate how the rich and their accountants have completely gamed the tax code to their advantage. A more thorough audit of other rich people in other states would no doubt unveil countless other horrors.

Hey, have you got time for another one? Sure you do:

Dick Ebersol and Susan Saint James own a 35-acre lot in the upscale West Meadows subdivision near Telluride. They purchased the land for $1.8 million in 1996 and pay $123 in property taxes on it annually because there is hay on it. They also own an $11 million home in the Mountain Village.

How many Fox News-watching slobs would feel good about themselves if they ever saw THAT story discussed on their favorite rightwing Republican propaganda network? It’ll never happen of course, but it’s worth daydreaming about…

Read more: In Colorado, some famous faces, names get ag-land tax breaks, too (The Denver Post)

 
By now, we’ve all probably seen the video of the anti-Muslim hate rally in Orange County, CA. These REPUBLICAN idiots should be ashamed of themselves, but chances are of course, that they feel completely self-satisfied about their actions. Why allow them this pleasure?

Each of these REPUBLICAN politicians who spoke at the anti-Muslim hate rally should resign, effective immediately, so as not to bring any more shame on the great state of California. Why not exercise YOUR right of free speech and let these folks know exactly how you feel about their disgusting behavior? Last time I checked, this was still America and these folks DESERVE SOME FREE SPEECH, don’t ya think?
 

 
You can reach REPUBLICAN Congressman Ed Royce here (I just called both offices, it was fun!)

1110 E. Chapman Ave, Suite 207
Orange, CA 92866
T (714) 744-4130 F (714) 744-4056

2185 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
T (202) 225-4111 F (202) 226-03
 

 
Villa Park Councilwoman Deborah Pauly, also a REPUBLICAN, said this at the hate rally: “I know quite a few marines who would be happy to help these terrorists to an early meeting in paradise.” Was she implying that our marines should be put in service of killing the people who were attending the charity event???

Vile Teabagger Deborah Pauly can be reached here:

Here is her Twitter account:
@YnotDebPauly

Email address:
.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

Facebook profile:
www.facebook.com/deborah.pauly

How I wish I had a phone number for her, but so far, no luck… Deborah Pauly is also the first pol in the OC to call for CA following Arizona’s plans for illegal immigrants!

You can contact her fellow members of the Villa Park city council here. Why not cc them on anything you send? Can’t hurt!
 

 
Ethically-challenged wingnut asshat REPUBLICAN Representative Gary Miller has three offices, two in CA and one in Washington, DC.

Send your love to Rep. Miller at one (or all three) of the following addresses:

2349 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515

Phone: 202-225-3201
Fax: 202-226-6962

1800 E. Lambert Road
Suite 150
Brea, CA 92821

Phone: 714-257-1142
Fax: 714-257-9242

200 Civic Center
Mission Viejo, CA 92691

Phone: 949-470-8484

Go get ‘em. They NEED to hear from you!
 

 
Also among the non-elected protesters were Rabbi Dov Fischer of Young Israel of Orange County, Irvine Jewish activist Dee Sterling and Chapman University adjunct professor of law Karen Lugo. It was Karen Lugo (a pal of Michele Bachmann) who said “This is not about hate [...] We are not hatemongers. The word ‘Islamophobia’ is an effort to chill us. The Constitution was never meant to allow a tyranny of a minority.”

She’s a freakin’ LAW PROFESSOR and she makes a statement like that in this context! Lugo must have a severe irony deficiency, eh? (Or else she’s just a flaming idiot). Best of all? Lugo is a member on the California Advisory Committee to the US Civil Rights Commission!!!

Unfortunately, here’s that vile video again if you want to psych yourself up for the task:
 

 
In which embattled Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker gets what he deserves, a good **cking.

The latest from the brutal satirists behind Mock the Dummy. Lorne Michaels should be offering these “Dummies” a contract to produce these for SNL.

Please share far and wide, this is guaranteed to annoy your teabagger relatives!
 

“A public union employee, a tea party activist, and a CEO are sitting at a table with a plate of a dozen cookies in the middle of it.

The CEO takes 11 cookies, turns to the tea partier and says, ‘Watch out for that union guy. He wants a piece of your cookie.’ “

 
Apparently a lot of people have been updating their Facebook status with this joke today. Maybe you’d like to also?

“Hello, Anonymous calling for the enemies of democracy. Are the Koch Brothers in?”
 
This warms my Trotskyite heart: After posting the following “open letter” to Koch Industries, effectively putting them on notice and asking the American and European population to stop buying their products, the politically motivated hackers of “Anonymous” have already begun to make good on their threat, as last night and this morning the Koch-supported rightwing political organization, Americans for Prosperity’s website was knocked offline several times. If an elite hacker was able to get into the intranet of Koch Industries, they could probably really disrupt their business for a few days. Let’s hope they cause maximum chaos for these evil bloodsuckers. (I hope Fox News is next. THAT would be the best thing ever, wouldn’t it?)

Here is the text of the letter:

Dear Citizens of the United States of America,

It has come to our attention that the brothers, David and Charles Koch—the billionaire owners of Koch Industries—have long attempted to usurp American Democracy. Their actions to undermine the legitimate political process in Wisconsin are the final straw. Starting today we fight back.

Koch Industries, and oligarchs like them, have most recently started to manipulate the political agenda in Wisconsin. Governor Walker’s union-busting budget plan contains a clause that went nearly un-noticed. This clause would allow the sale of publicly owned utility plants in Wisconsin to private parties (specifically, Koch Industries) at any price, no matter how low, without a public bidding process. The Koch’s have helped to fuel the unrest in Wisconsin and the drive behind the bill to eliminate the collective bargaining power of unions in a bid to gain a monopoly over the state’s power supplies.

The Koch brothers have made a science of fabricating ‘grassroots’ organizations and advertising campaigns to support them in an attempt to sway voters based on their falsehoods. Americans for Prosperity, Club for Growth and Citizens United are just a few of these organizations. In a world where corporate money has become the lifeblood of political influence, the labor unions are one of the few ways citizens have to fight against corporate greed. Anonymous cannot ignore the plight of the citizen-workers of Wisconsin, or the opportunity to fight for the people in America’s broken political system. For these reasons, we feel that the Koch brothers threaten the United States democratic system and, by extension, all freedom-loving individuals everywhere. As such, we have no choice but to spread the word of the Koch brothers’ political manipulation, their single-minded intent and the insidious truth of their actions in Wisconsin, for all to witness.

Anonymous hears the voice of the downtrodden American people, whose rights and liberties are being systematically removed one by one, even when their own government refuses to listen or worse - is complicit in these attacks. We are actively seeking vulnerabilities, but in the mean time we are calling for all supporters of true Democracy, and Freedom of The People, to boycott all Koch Industries’ paper products. We welcome unions across the globe to join us in this boycott to show that you will not allow big business to dictate your freedom.

U.S. Product Boycott List

Vanity Fair [not the magazine, the napkins and “classy” paper plates -RM]
Quilted Northern
Angel Soft     
Sparkle
Brawny
Mardi Gras   
Dixie            

European Product Boycott List

Demak’Up
Kitten Soft
Lotus / Lotus Soft
Tenderly
Nouvelle Soft
Okay Ktchen Towels
Colhogar
Delica
Inversoft
Tutto

To identify these brands, please look for the following logo anywhere on the packaging:
 

 
Anonymous.

We are Legion I We do not forgive I We do not forget I Expect us

 
Happy to say that I don’t think I’ve ever bought any products manufactured by Koch Industries. I wouldn’t wipe my ass with them. Literally!
 

 

 
LOVE IT. This is from a series called “Mock the Dummy.” I just discovered them today, but plan to dig in for more.

Dummies should be mocked. Name ‘em, and shame ‘em.
 

 
Yikes! Using “real” dummies really makes the stupidity of the real-life Tea party dummies seem quite sinister, if you ask me. Remember those creepy ads for Magic?
 

Via Blog to Comm

 
Former Tea Party Express chairman Mark Williams, the low IQ buffoon who wrote the racist “letter to Abe Lincoln” from “the coloreds” has a, um, brand new bag…

Via our friend Charles Johnson at Little Green Footballs:

Well, Williams has a new idea. Now he’s going to infiltrate pro-union protests pretending to be a supporter, then try to get in front of cameras and make outrageous statements to discredit the demonstrators. And with that toxic mix of vitriol, low cunning, and pure stupidity for which he’s infamous, he posted his plans on his website and invited others to do the same thing: FIGHT THE SEIU WITH TACTIC THEY USE AGAINST US – THIS WEEK! | Mark Williams News & Commentary.

http://action.seiu.org/page/s/solidarityaction

That link will take you to an SEIU page where you can sign up as an “organizer” for one of their upcoming major rallies to support the union goons in Wisconsin.

Here is what I am doing in Sacramento, where they are holding a 5:30 PM event this coming Tuesday:  (1) I signed up as an organizer (2) with any luck they will contact me and I will have an “in”  (3) in or not I will be there and am asking as many other people as can get there to come with, all of us in SEIU shirts (those who don’t have them we can possibly buy some from vendors likely to be there)  (4) we are going to target the many TV cameras and reporters looking for comments from the members there (5) we will approach the cameras to make good pictures… signs under our shirts that say things like “screw the taxpayer!”  and “you OWE me!” to be pulled out for the camera (timing is important because the signs will be taken away from us) (6) we will echo those slogans in angry sounding tones to the cameras and the reporters.  (7) if I do get the ‘in’ I am going to do my darnedest to get podium access and take the mic to do that rant from there…with any luck and if I can manage the moments to build up to it, I can probably get a cheer out of the crowd for something extreme.

WARNING: When around these union events do NOT instigate ANY physical confrontation, walk away from anyone who tries to start one with you. These people WILL have a mob mentality and ARE dangerous …

Several Tea Party chapters around the country are planning to join with me, if you are a member of one in your area please contact them for details.  If they are not participating get them to!

*****UPDATE:  IOWA, COLORADO, MASSACHUSETTS AND SEVERAL OTHER STATES HAVE CHECKED IN…. Tea Party Patriot groups and individuals are flooding me with emails vowing to participate and come up with their own creative ruses!   Several have also reminded me that we have a distinct advantage in that the SEIU primarily represents non-English speaking illegal aliens so we will be the ones whose comments will make air!!!!*****

******Help me keep this going!  I need to travel beyond Sacramento to the other SEIU rally cities and then Madison, and in short order!  Please contribute!!!  Click here for secure link*****

Chances are that because I am publishing this they’ll catch wind, but it is worth the chance if you take it upon yourself to act…there’s only one of me but there are millions of you and I know that you CAN do this!

Our goal is to make the gathering look as greedy and goonish as we know that it is, ding their credibility with the media and exploit the lazy reporters who just want dramatic shots and outrageous quotes for headlines.  Even if it becomes known that we are plants the quotes and pictures will linger as defacto truth.

What a sleazy creep.

How idiotic to announce you’re going to do something like this! Who is this guy Jethro Bodine??? I would imagine that if anyone recognizes him—see pic above, btw—he’s gonna get a severe beat-down. Some people, well, that’s all they understand, isn’t it?

 
In the March issue of Esquire magazine, Chris Rock is interviewed by Scott Raab and manages to put a hopeful spin on the Tea party movement:

“Like many nice Caucasians, I cried the night Barack Obama was elected,” said Raab. “It was one of the high points in American history. And all that’s happened since the election is just a sh—storm of hatred. You want to weigh in on that?”

“I actually like it, in the sense that—you got kids?” asked Rock. “Kids always act up the most before they go to sleep. And when I see the Tea Party and all this stuff, it actually feels like racism’s almost over. Because this is the last—this is the act up before the sleep. They’re going crazy. They’re insane. You want to get rid of them—and the next thing you know, they’re f—-ing knocked out. And that’s what’s going on in the country right now.”

A sage perspective, indeed.

 
The reaction to the post yesterday about Palin, Sharron Angle, Glenn Beck and the radical right’s violent rhetoric coming back to haunt them was an interesting thread to wake up to this morning. Thank you to (almost) everyone who contributed. A few observations:

First of all, my point, in case anyone didn’t get it, was contained in the bold text (”...the genie is all the way out of the bottle for this type of violence, for them, too.”). I’m saying that the potential for a blowback against the folks propagating the majority of this hate talk is rather ripe. If you piss in the wind, don’t be surprised when it comes back to hit you in the face. Then poor Eric Fuller went and proved my point about 3 hours later, to his shame. His story is the very embodiment of my argument in the post. The guy should have been arrested, but it’s sad

I hardly see any evidence there of a “full-throated, hate-filled rant,” either, as I was accused of in the comments by “Metzger’s id,” someone who obviously did not read what I actually wrote. (Steve Doocey IS one of the stupidest people on television. He’s a fucking idiot and I will not back down from this position).

Commenter moflcky scores when he asks “Do you think it’s worse now than it was in the 60s/70s with SDS, the Weather Underground, the SLA, the Black Panthers, the Klan and the race riots?”

This is a very good point and worth thinking about. However, I think contrasting the difference of then vs today is best served by comparing *the media* that exists today vs. what we had at that time. With just three TV networks, I think the center could hold very easily back then. In the realm of “public opinion” it was much easier to achieve a broad general agreement 40-50 years ago and so there was, by and large, a very strong “centrist” majority. The GOP of Nixon’s era has very little to do with the GOP of today, they’ve moved far, far to the right of the positions they held in the 70s. And the Democrats of today are pretty much standing in the same place, ideologically speaking, as most of the Republicans were at that time. Nixon, it can be argued, was to the left of Bill Clinton, in many respects.

The political elites of both parties moved significantly to the right in the past 40 years, even if the general public did not. As the politicians shifted rightwards, the population, or some of the population, anyway, reacted by going in the other direction and eventually—sometime in the 90s—modern progressive politics is born (just as the Great Society and Roe vs. Wade saw an awakening of the religious right/Moral Majority as a political force in the late 70s).

You could say it was “the dialectic” or “zeitgeist” in motion or even just a “generation gap”—I refer you to Spiral Dynamics or the work of William Strauss and Neil Howe. I think both get it right. The generation up and coming looks at the Tea party and largely sees a bunch of ignorant, cranky old white people. As the younger citizens of the United States grow up, the folks who are attending these Tea party rallies will be dying off.  And as they do, something else will happen that no one can anticipate at the present time. That’s just the way it works.

The Weather Underground didn’t get face time to argue their beliefs on MSNBC in 1970, although admittedly they might today, depending on the ratings potential. I don’t think they had ANY influence on the general public. The same cannot be said of the radical right Tea party-types and folks like Tony Perkins, Bryan Fisher, Rush Limbaugh, Michael Savage, Sarah Palin, Sharron Angle, Ann Coulter, Michelle Malkin and the rest of them.

There is a huge chasm between some misguided grad students who most people were appalled by, and few supported, and an obviously doomed Republican Senate candidate telling her supporters that if they don’t win at the ballot box, they’ll win with guns? This isn’t some group of hippies who appear to be freaks to 99% of the population talking, this is a lemon-faced church lady-type who faced off against the Senate Majority leader and raised a record amount of cash (most from from outside of her state).

William Ayers was brought up in the comments. I find bringing up Bill Ayers, specifically, in this context (and nearly all others) to be utterly meaningless and tiresome. How is he relevant in 2011 or is this situation comparable? Can someone please remind me?. I’ll say it again: the biggest difference between the Weather Underground in 1969 and the Tea party in 2011 is that the Weather Underground never had their own cable news outlet (The Weather Channel?) and 15% of the dumbest and least educated portion of the population did NOT follow or sympathize with their ideals.

Imagine the Democrats were running Bernardine Dohrn for the Senate? Wouldn’t THAT would be the flip-side of the GOP running Sharron Angle? WHO is the equivalent to Sharron Angle on the mainstream Left? (There is NO nuance in advocating “Second Amendment remedies! It’s not a statement open to that much wiggle room in the interpretation!)

Make no mistake about it, this is what MORE THAN HALF of the country is hearing when we have to listen to this Tea party bullshit: These folks want MINORITY RULE.

They will not get it, obviously, without violence.

 
Lately I’m more inclined than I’ve ever been—am I mellowing with age or have I just been worn down?—to feel zen about the fact that I live in a country where the stupidest people are on the ascent everywhere. It used to bother me, but now I’ve come to realize that there is not a damned thing I can do about it.

I just think it’s better for my health this way.

Full-scale replica of Noah’s Ark planned in Kentucky (USA Today)

Via Christian Nightmares/Jesus Needs New P.R.