At first blush, reading Republican neo-con Likudnik Jennifer Rubin's piece in today's
[After an obligatory dig at Hillary Clinton...] Republicans have their own problem: They tolerate far too many crackpots.
Dr. Ben Carson joins Mike Huckabee in refusing to accept that Supreme Court decisions, on gay marriage for example, are binding. Pressed by Chris Wallace, Carson insisted that Marbury v. Madison and more than 200 years of history have not settled the issue. “It is an open question. It needs to be discussed.” Actually, it’s not open, and him taking this seriously should disqualify him from office since he is telling us up front he won’t be bound by court decisions, something not even President Obama has done.
Huckabee has said much the same thing. And to boot he’s hawked “nutritional supplements” as a cure to diabetes. He insisted on Sunday, “One of the elements of the plan was dietary supplements, but it is not the fundamental thing.” (Then why encourage people to buy them?) He declared, “I don’t have to defend everything that I’ve ever done.” So he’s both a constitutional and dietary charlatan. Either one should disqualify him.
Then there is Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.), who cynically chooses to pander to the conspiracy-mongers who turning a military exercise primarily in Texas into a secret plan to impose martial law. Cruz has taken their nonsense as legitimate and made inquiries at the Pentagon. [snip]
In less obvious ways, some presidential hopefuls also play on the ignorance and fear of the public. How many times has Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) falsely suggested the National Security Agency is listening to the content of millions of phone calls? Before reversing himself, he also gave support to the anti-vaccine hooey. At what point do voters say, you know, that’s not the mindset or character of someone who we’d want as president? (our emphasis)Ouch. Well, o.k. Two points here. First, Carson, Huckabee, Cruz and Paul are all several bulbs short of a chandelier. If you noticed, though, she eased over the biggest political story of the past 50 years: that the Republican Party -- her Republican Party -- doesn't just tolerate crackpots, it has actively fed and encouraged a crackpot base, then recruited and elected crackpots for many decades. It is the Party of Crackpots. Rubin and her fellow cogs in the right-wing noise machine can take a lot of the credit for that.
Also, note the names Rubin has omitted from her Crackpot Call-out: Sen. Marco "Glug Glug" Rubio, Gov. Scott "Koch Head" Walker, and John Ellis "J.E.B." Bush, all of whom Rubin has promoted in past columns, and who would pass auditions for the Shelly Adelson/ Koch brothers billionaire "establishment" blessing. However, while not quite descending to the Carson/ Huckabee/ Cruz/ Paul level of crackpottery, all three are outside the American mainstream on issues such as immigration reform, same sex marriage, global climate change, and economic fairness and growth. They'd also like to bust unions and take health insurance away from millions of Americans. Call them proto- crackpots.
But then, in her piece de derp, Rubin says "responsible conservatives" (an oxymoron these days) should "name and shame [the crackpots] — lest the GOP be seen as a haven for the unhinged." Hahahahaha. Too late!
(Image: Jennifer Rubin, in search of crackpots; doesn't own a mirror --via Sparklepony)
