Go ahead, squint at the current slate of Republican candidates, the most extreme and in some cases strange crop of politicians in a lifetime. No coherent, cogent narrative explains why so many of them are on the verge of winning office this, despite what you read in the papers:
- It's not concern over the federal deficit -- see Marco Rubio and the $3.5 trillion added by extending the Bush tax cuts.
- It's not a national rejection of big government -- see Sharron Angle, Ken Buck, Rand Paul, et al advocating for federal control of every pregnancy.
- It's not anger over the federal stimulus -- see the really long list of Republicans who criticized the stimulus and then trumpeted the stimulus checks.
- It's not about a revolt over health reform -- see Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell, among others, who criticized and even sued over it and then trumpeted the checks.
- It's not about the Wall Street bailout -- see Pat Toomey, former derivatives trader and Republican for Senate from Pennsylvania.
- Nor it is about political neophytes and outsider candidates -- see Christine O'Donnell, perpetual election/media machine, among others.
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It's apparently about trying to elect the worst possible candidates ever, and seeing how low the bar can go.
The bar does not even exists this year .....Joe Miller handcuffing a reporter because he didn't like the question asked! Christine O'Donnell not knowing what was in the 1st amendment! Paladino threatening to kill a reporter! Carly Forina ranting about Barbara Boxer's hair! Sharron Angle, a former teacher who wants to do away with the Dept of Education! Rand Paul wanting to re-write the Civil Rights Act! Pat Toomey screaming about Wall St Reform when that is what saved his behind!
This election is an example of America on crack!
If they are extreme, as you say, then it is simply a reaction to the extreme radical in the White House that you inflicted on the rest of us.
I believe this is America's last ditch effort to resist the change she so badly needs to move forward and maintain our place as a major actor; retain our status as THE Hegemony we've worked so hard to be. Look back at history, right before every major change for the better in this country there has been an event that defied logic and tested our mettle as a people.
@tangojones
The president just so happens to be a left-leaning moderate. Health care reform was long overdue, and can hardly be considered radical. The government regulating every pregnancy in the country and forcing women raped by their own relatives to give birth... that is radical, and unbelievably so.
Agreed. It's about trying to elect candidates who have no interest in governing such that no governing will actually happen and then they can say (again, but with more vigor) that government doesn't work.
It's because you fools in the media keep bringing it up! Don't report on them "possibly taking over" and perhaps they wont! I swear it's something akin to mind over matter. For example..if you keep telling yourself you will catch a cold when exposed to it, it's more likely you will..and vice versa.
You have an interesting point, Fantomblu. The other bit of this equation is to get out and vote. The extremists are counting on the folk who helped to elect our President not coming out to vote. People, you must vote on Nov 2nd. If you don't, then you have nothing to whine about on Nov. 3rd, if seats are lost that shouldn't have been and if the 'party of no' is in control again.
It's "reality t.v." Quirky, dramatic, entertaining....American! It responds to base emotions-fear, revenge. It has attitude and does not have to make sense as long as it gets people riled up. And it does.
Go to rural America and hang out with the folks who's main relationship, who's main contact with the world is via the television. Nice folks with absolutely no critical thinking, only the venom that comes with what we are fed via campaign ads. It works, that's why it's happening.
You nailed it. Truer words were never spoken.
I am officially dubbing this the Forrest Gump Election Cycle: Stupid is as Stupid Does. If you dumb down our electorate, nobody is able to think critically for him- or herself. Thus, no one understands a logical train of thought or logical policy and you get the anti-big government advocates who want control of women's reproductive rights and so-called fiscal conservatives who trumpet their stimulus checks. And the homophobes who own gay bars, etc. etc.
RE: last night's 6-way NY gubernatorial debate, I don't know what SNL can possibly do to make it any funnier than it was. At a certain point, the imitation of life by art merges into nirvana.
I think the Republicans know deep down that Obama has the majority of the nation behind him. The Republicans don't want their best man to go up against him. It's embarassing how Republicans are out and out blatant on wanting Obama to fail. He is our President..we elected this man. Why can't the Republicans stand behind him? We had to deal with the Bush's and all their lies. Let's face it....the rich want to be little kings in their own land. If the Republicans don't want big government then why don't they step down? Get out of office so we don't have to pay your salary anymore.
Lawrence O'Donnell's MSNBC show promo talks about the respect he has for those representatives who must go into the governing chambers and make the decisions that effect people's lives. Today there is no respect for any of them. No respect for the office they hold. No respect (understanding) of what they are trying to do. The way many have performed and behaved, the hypocrisy we all see, the disrespect has been earned. With Republican groundless obstructionism and the Fox News attack machine grinding a negative message 24/7 positive things, good changes, legitimate accomplishments have been completely demonized and trumped. Which would fine except for the lies, vicious hate and racism expressed has kicked it up several notches. Unfortunately many people approach elections blindly, don't do the work to know the truth and can be misguided easily. The voter attitude prevalent now is a total "throw the bums out". I get that. But to cast a vote "for" some of these candidates without actually knowing what they've said, are saying, and will try to do is very troubling.
I think all of this has to due with Americans apathy for our government and it's processes (voting), combined with the negative results of a two-party system. Americans don't care about midterm elections, so they definitely do not care to get out there in the primaries for these elections. What does that leave us with? The tea party candidates. Now enter the two-party system. The Tea Party is it's own entity, but in a two-party system, they had to hijack one of the party's to gain power. The Tea Party hijacked the Republican party in the primaries and now lower efficacy voting Republicans have no choices in the generals, but by partisanship duty (can't let the scary Democrats win), they will still vote "R" down the ballot.
First you have to realize that fact based analysis is irrelevant to those that support these candidates. All that matters is that the candidates talk the talk of christian fundamentalism/small government. Government to enforce their religious views is fine but not for anything else. The champions only need to talk the talk they don't need to 'walk' it and if they talk it there is almost no transgression that is too great. Unfortunately I think we are getting a taste of what life may be like under religious fundamentalist rule in other places.
They're throwing everything to see what sticks to try & elect people you wouldn't trust to sit the right way on a lavatory because...............because OBAMA !.If any of these idiots actually make it into the house or the Senate the GOP is going to find it's self with a nightmare of it's own making on it's hands.Throwing their lot in with this bunch of dumb belligerent ideologically extreme fools will soon get old when they discover they can't control the message their sending through the tv machine because they can't control their Tea Party bretherin running off at the mouth.
On CNN this morning, they had a clip from a reporter who got a question in to Palin about the Tea Party. She said that if the GOP didn't follow what the Tea Party wanted, the GOP was done for. That's right, she said that basically the GOP was now a hostage to the whims of the Tea Party. Do as they order, or be eliminated as a political party. Whether this is true or not is probably less troubling than the arrogance and the threat itself.
Be very worried America, because even if the Tea Party loses most of its contests, it still has a tremendous amount of control in the GOP, and they don't strike me as being gracious in defeat.
Why does Democracy work so poorly at times like this? What causes the emergence of anti-government groups like the Tea Party? It all comes down to the current balance among our basic instincts. The internal instincts that guide us are complex, ranging from simple self preservation, through concern for the well being of others like us, to concern for abstract things like “our country”, and finally to concern for humanity as a whole. Which of these dominates our political thinking, all depends on our perception of our immediate personal circumstances. Right now, when almost everyone knows someone like them who is unemployed or losing their home, self preservation dominates.
What do people want when their instinct for self preservation dominates? They want what income they have to remain theirs to spend on things they need for themselves or for their immediate family. That means “I don’t want to pay taxes” which is expressed as “I don’t want big government.” They say, “I’m concerned about the deficit” which means “I don’t want to pay taxes in the future either.” But if you push them on the details, they really want the government to continue to provide those benefits that they expect to receive, like Unemployment Insurance, and Social Security. Their thoughts on Medicare are mixed: they want it to pay their medical bills, but they don’t want any changes, like “Obamacare,” that may cost them money just to provide better medical care for “others”. They don’t want the government to provide services that they don’t expect to benefit from themselves.
In better economic times, people still don’t like paying taxes, but they can rationalize that the taxes are paying for things that they can’t buy any other way: protection from military and economic threats from other countries; protection from threats to their physical wellbeing from terrorists and petty criminals; and protection from other more abstract threats, like air pollution or contaminated food. In the best of times, they can even take pride in their country’s spending their tax money to help others, whether those others are the homeless in their own city, or the victims of a hurricane in New Orleans, or the victims of an earthquake in Haiti. They can even rationalize that it is to their advantage when our country spends billions of taxpayer dollars on an invasion of a country like Iraq.
At any time, our democracy is dominated by a balance between our instincts, but the balance shifts. We never totally give up on self preservation, and we almost always take pride when our country goes to the aid of the victims of a natural disaster. But right now, self preservation dominates, and the Tea Party becomes a significant force in our elections by railing against “Big Government”.
Not a bad analysis of human and political instincts. You've forgotten the role education and/or advertising play(s) -- either in a positive or negative way -- in the spectrum. I learned about the Constitution, democratic government and our system of checks and balances before the 10th grade, and my father worked in the Kennedy Administration (an honest-to-god New Frontiersman!), so I have a pretty good idea how slowly and well the government works when its basic need for an educated electorate is met. BUT we have systematically NOT met that need for the past oh, say, 25 years, have we? So, what do we expect when the populace seeks the lowest common denominator? Hmmm...
Pffft... With the glorification of ignorance and the elevation of anti-intellectualism rampant in America, I give this country fifty years before it's reduced to another civil war and subsequently rips itself apart. Toss in the fact that our laws are no longer written for the people, but rather by and for corporations who can easily pay for politicians and armies, it's hard to see America surviving as any sort of democracy.
Seriously. There are people in this country who STILL, in this day and age, can't understand something so blisteringly simple as the freakin' First Amendment. How can we claim to be the greatest nation in the world when our own citizenry is too painfully uneducated to comprehend the history of this nation? Look at all those idiots above. They aren't extreme insofar as they are simply opportunistic and rock-slappingly dumb. Politics aside, these people are too stupid to fully appreciate just how stupid they truly are. The fact that Americans think this somehow makes them more qualified to hold office is heartbreaking to say the least.
ignorance, stupidity, corporate media... follow the money...
These are a few of this election's themes.
They're trying to bankrupt the Democracy so it can be bought by the Plutocracy!
If we realize that it is not our elected officials who control our government, but a combination of careerists and very powerful special interests behind the scenes, we realize that the "powers that be" would prefer that our congress and even the white house be occupied by figureheads, empty heads, and entertaining clowns that they can control. The last thing they want are thinking leaders. Conservatives, at least for the past generation or so, have preferred symbolic office holders.
It's scary to think what is going to happen to this country if these people are elected. Not only the way they will govern, but the division will be even greater, and people that are liberals will be persecuted even more, to what extent is scary to think about. The conservatives call Obama 'Hitler', but what they don't realize is that, in reality, they would be voting in a government of exactly what they fear. If anyone has ever read The Authoritarians, which is a study done of authoritarian-followers who are the type of people that will be led to vote for these nutjobs (i.e., Tea Partiers as just one example), you will understand their MO. They are dangerous and we really, really, really, need to get out and vote in November to stop this insanity. http://home.cc.umanitoba.ca/~altemey/
Simple, the grand unifying theory of GOP politics this cycle is the same as the last few years, FEAR. Be afraid, America, be very afraid. Of people who aren't white, of people who aren't rich, of people who aren't christian, of government, of gays, etc.
brilliant story rachel. I have never heard a single journalist analyze this race in such simple terms that even republicans can understand! I am sharing this video with as many people as I can!...Thank You!
I think Rachel is making a mistake in trying to use logic and reason to figure out why these candidates might win. Trust me, conservatives are not supporting them based on logic or reason so looking for any sign of rationality will just drive her mad.
The very sad truth is, the heart of the heartland is racist. Even those who claim not to be. They simply are. When you are out of a job, losing your home it is hard to "look down" on non whites when you are pretty much 'down there' yourself. Especially hard when a black man is now president and he is 'up there' where you are not. You don't see very many black or hispanic Tea Partiers do you? At least I don't. Every vitrolic hate filled face I see on TV sprewing extreme non solutions are white. The comments are that these people are stupid. Actually they are not. They just don't want to take responsibility for anything. They want to blame and make it 'the other guys' fault' and preferably the black guys' and illegal guys' fault. What they don't realize is that if they are elected, then it will be THEIR fault. Maybe it is time to run this country like a successful business instead of a three ring circus.
These days, a "successful" business is like Wall Street, manipulative, deceitful, dishonest, and dependent on fraud and government bailouts to succeed and hand out massive bonuses.
http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=everyone+loses&aq=f
You left out the biggest reason these candidates are still in the lead, the massive amounts of corporate and anonymous campaign contributions and advertising that keeps their ccandidacies afloat. That's the only narrative you cannot discount and it's a travisty for our demorcacy.
The MSM spinning the Republican talking points is what was made crystal clear by Rachel's segment last night.
I have had this gut feeling for some time now but thought I might be a little biased. But after that segment last night I am glad to know I am not paranoid.
The fact that so many in the MSM is OK with having these crazies running the country is what is so scary. The rest of the free world is laughing at the US and wondering what in the world happened.It is the scary Black man in the WH!
Interesting comments, though I'm slightly more optimistic about the election of the "extreme" candidates. I mean, lets be realisitic...even if every single one of these folks is elected, not much will change. We may suffer gridlock. We may be subject to some really awful soundbite (and correspondingly funny late night TV). But they can't really do much harm.
I have full faith in entrenched bureaucracy to resist the temporary influx of extremes.
And in 2 years, when the "public" has received a few good hard "slaps in the face" by Paladino or someone else wanting to implement something completely ridiculous (I don't know...banning Unions or something), they will go out and vote and throw these folks back OUT of office and elect some more reasonable people.
Personally, I'd prefer to see a little more turnover in congress. I'm not all about term limits, but after 20 years in congress, what does some old, fat, rich, white guy know about what's good for the country?
Letting a few extremists in because they can't possibly do much damage, after which they will be voted out...does the phrase "Bush/Cheney" strike a bell? Palin claimed in an interview this morning that if the GOP doesn't follow what the Tea Party wants to do, it's done. They've proven they can get lots of money from billionaires like the Koch brothers, Citizens United has opened the floodgates of corporate money to overwhemingly repub candidates, and they get tremendous media support from Fox. They feel confident enough that their candidates can have journalists handcuffed and detained by their own private security forces. This is not some fringe group with a dozen nutty followers and a buck fifty in change in a tin can that will dissolve on its own. It is large, well-funded, well-publicized, and doesn't have any respect for opposing views. If they don't worry you, I would suggest you aren't paying close enough attention. Let's see how things go in the days after the election, when most of their candidates have lost. Rather than tuck their tails between their legs, I expect they will start talking about conspiracies that robbed their candidates of victory, and a racheting up of the violent, vitriolic rhetoric.
You prefer the well-funded, well-publicized, intolerant status-quo then? Billionaires fund candidates on BOTH sides, so it doesn't matter who wins to them. Please don't act like this is the first time money has come into politics. Or even the first time anonymous money has come into it. It's not like 504c groups didn't exist before or only fund (R) candidates.
And it's not the first time some fringe group had the medias attention and said "now you have to do what we want."
And it's not like they will be the first losing candidate to talk about conspiracies and how the election was "Stolen."
We've survived all this before, we'll survive it again. Honestly, I just don't think our country and our republic are that fragile.
Does the general mood and politics of the country worry me? Sure. These candidates are a reflection of that mood. But I don't think it's going to ruin the country or politics or congress to have them elected.
The only unified theory that fits is the Chaos Theory.