A Wingnut Monday: Don't Touch it. It's Evil! Edition

In response to my Sunday wingnut post, Paul Dirks asked: "Aren't you afraid that all that wingnuttery concentrated in such a small space might reach critical mass and implode sending us all into an alternate Universe wherein it all makes perfect sense?"

I found that an interesting question, and it got me thinking about concentrated evil exploding. Like this terrifying bit of evil from Time Bandits:



Benen: QUOTE OF THE DAY....

Chuck Norris, the martial-arts actor, continues to publish a fascinating column for various far-right outlets. His latest piece argues that federal officials are hostile to privatizing education and promoting home-schooling because the government is focused on "indoctrination."

The reason that government is cracking down on private instruction has more to do with suppressing alternative education than assuring educational standards. The rationale is quite simple, though rarely if ever stated: control future generations and you control the future....

Is it merely coincidental that the private choice of home schooling was outlawed by the Soviet state in 1919, by Hitler and Nazi Germany in 1938, and by Communist China in 1949?

Is America next?

The same column included a couple of promotional references to his "new best-selling book" and the "martial arts program for kids in Texas schools" that Norris runs.

Wow.

John Cole: Frum Gets It

Say what you will about David Frum’s New Majority (possible motto: “Same bad ideas, but with less hate!”), he certainly seems to understand something about Obama that the rest of the Republican party has not figured out:

Let me add here a personal editorial comment. A large part of the secret of President Obama’s political success is his self-presentation as calm, judicious, and fair-minded – and his ability to depict his opponents as intemperate and extreme. You’d think by now that Obama’s opponents would have figured out this trick. You want to beat him? Great. Be more calm, more judicious, and more fair-minded. Don’t be provoked. Don’t throw wild allegations. Don’t boycott. Don’t lose your temper.

Instead, we get Anger Theater. It’s not smart. And it’s not working.

I wonder when the rest of them will figure it out?

Sully: The GOP's Problem

A.L. gets to the root of it:

When you've just been voted out of power for manifest incompetence and your opponents are led by a very popular and reasonable-sounding person, you don't have the luxury of acting righteous and uncompromising all the time. You have to acknowledge error. You have to act civilly. You have to appear pragmatic and reasonable. But the GOP is not interested in doing any of these things. Those who are left in the party are ultra-partisan and utterly convinced of their own infallibility and moral righteousness. Until they lose that attitude and general combativeness, it won't matter what their ideas are. They'll just keep turning people off.

Cantor and Jeb are at least trying, I suppose. But it reminds me of the endless Tory "listening tours" in the wake of their 1997 collapse. It's eleven years later, and only now do they look like getting back into office. And only after Blair has long left the building.

Benen: SEEKING ADVICE FROM LOYAL BUSHIES...

Too often, Republicans have an odd habit of seeking advice from those who've already proven themselves unreliable. Newt Gingrich was a disastrous leader for the GOP, and yet the party still seeks his guidance. Karl Rove failed repeatedly, and is considered a genius in Republican circles.

And now Republicans want to learn lessons about communications management, and they're turning to aides from the Bush White House.

Republicans looking to recover from Bush-era defeats are turning to an unlikely source for advice: top aides to former President George W. Bush.

Former White House press secretary Dana Perino, former Bush counselor Ed Gillespie and former White House deputy press secretary Tony Fratto are among those set to provide words of wisdom to House Republican press secretaries at their annual workshop this Friday.

GOP House Conference Communications Director Matt Lloyd said Perino, Gillespie and Fratto represented "the gold standard for Republican communications professionals" and were obvious choices to advise the party's messengers.

Seriously? The House GOP conference, struggling to get back on track and suffering with the consequences of recent Republican failures, are turning to veterans of the Bush White House to help shape their communications strategy?

Dana Perino, explaining why she and her colleagues from the Bush gang have valuable insights to share, said, "We are battle-tested."

There's some truth to that, but it seems the point to keep in mind is that she and her team lost those battles. Their messaging proved unpersuasive.

Experience can be helpful. Successful experience matters more.

John Cole: Calling All Moderates

Michael Steele unveils the newest strategery:

Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Steele appealed to the political middle Friday to join his party but added that the party itself wouldn’t moderate.

“All you moderates out there, y’all come. I mean, that’s the message,” Steele said at a news conference. “The message of this party is this is a big table for everyone to have a seat. I have a place setting with your name on the front.

“Understand that when you come into someone’s house, you’re not looking to change it. You come in because that’s the place you want to be.”

Steele talked to reporters at the Radisson Hotel in downtown La Crosse before addressing party faithful to kick off the state party’s annual convention this weekend.

Couldn’t he just meet Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins in Washington, rather than asking them to go halfway across the country?

And he still fails to understand what is happening. Once Collins and Snowe are drummed out of the party, the definition of what is “moderate” will change yet again. The music will stop, and Lindsey Graham, with his ACU rating of 90, will find himself without a seat because he isn’t conservative enough.

It is already happening with Chuck Grassley (ACU rating of 76), who the conservatives are trying to screw out of the Judiciary seat because of insufficient fealty to the cause. Jeff Sessions of Alabama is their choice. He’s a “real conservative.” The same with Orin Hatch, whose ACU rating is only 80. He recently pointed out that conservatives aren’t going to win a fight over the Souter Supreme Court seat, and I am sure we will soon learn how he is insufficiently conservative and needs to be purged. Plus, he talks to Ted Kennedy.

Only the completely crazy need apply to the GOP.

• commenter D0n Camillo
  

  I think it’s more telling than he realizes – he might think he’s welcoming moderates, but what he’s really saying is “you can only ever be a 2nd-class citizen of our party.

  He has just come straight out and said that, even though the are Republicans, it is not their house. That’s the kind of welcome message of which party switches are made.

• in response to people asking why John left the wingnut word, here's John Cole:
  

  @Krista: Abu Ghraib and Terri Schiavo were when it all changed forever. Wish Schiavo had happened six months earlier and I would have voted for Kerry.

  I don’t think people realize how much the Schiavo thing really infuriated me. The Republicans were just dead to me after that, but I was still in the party but was probably going to become an independent. Graeme Frost was the final straw before I left the party and the reason I became a Democrat.

TPMtv: Sunday Show Roundup: The Ol' Switcheroo

Anonymous Liberal: Specter is Clueless About His Own Political Peril

For someone who switched parties in order to avoid losing a primary contest, Arlen Specter is surprisingly oblivious to the very real risk he faces in next year's Democratic primary. As Josh Marshall points out, since announcing that he's joining the Democratic Party, Specter seems to "have been going out of his way, not just on the optics, which I can sort of understand (since he doesn't want to appear utterly craven), but also to oppose the consensus Democratic position on almost every issue."

I completely agree, and I'm frankly surprised. Not because I think Specter agrees with the general Democratic consensus, but just because I expected he'd be a little more attuned to the political realities of his new world. If Specter thinks that he can simply obstruct every appointment and piece of legislation that Democratic primary voters care about and then waltz to the Democratic nomination next year, he's in for a rude awakening. Not only will some genuine Democrat run against him next year, but that person will crush him. Does he not remember what happened to Joe Lieberman in the Connecticut Democratic primary a couple years ago? And Lieberman had been a Democrat his whole career, even serving as the party's Vice Presidential nominee. Specter has no history at all with his state's Democratic primary voters. They'll have no reason at all to be loyal to him.

And it's not as if the Joe Sestaks of the world didn't already have a lot of ammunition to work with. There are all sorts of video clips of Specter palling around with President Bush and every other wretchedly unpopular GOP figure. The only way for Specter to distance himself from that stuff is to at least feign a change of heart on some key issues and seek a clean break from his former party. But if anything, he seems to be trying very hard to remind everyone of why he was a Republican in the first place. Not smart.

At some point, if he keeps this up, someone is going to release a poll showing Specter trailing Sestak (or any other actual Democrat) in a hypothetical primary contest. If nothing else, that will get his attention. If someone like Sestak actually announces their candidacy, even better. Pennsylvania is far too blue a state for someone like Specter to be allowed to secure the Democratic nomination without earning it.

Ultimately, I still strongly believe that Specter switching parties is a good thing for the Democrats. Regardless of what happens in the 2010 election, Specter will be a Senator for the next two years, and during that time, a lot of important votes will take place. Specter will undoubtedly disappoint most Democrats with his votes during that time, but on balance, he's virtually certain to cast more good votes as a Democrat than he would have as a Republican. Sooner or later he's going to realize that he has to position himself to win a Democratic primary, that he should stop worrying about the Club for Growth and start worrying about Moveon.org.

I hope that happens sooner rather than later, but it will happen eventually. Or else Arlen's tenure as a Democrat will be very short.

Benen: IT'LL TAKE MORE THAN JUST TECHNOLOGY....

We've heard quite a bit in recent months about Republicans embracing modern technology to help get the party back on track. House Minority Whip Eric Cantor (R-Va.) told CNN this morning that it's an area the party is beginning to take more seriously.

"President Obama is a great communicator. We understand that," he said in an interview that aired on CNN's State of the Union Sunday. "He's also been very adept at adopting the technology of today to access the youth vote and the younger population of this country. That's the future, and I believe we've got a lot to learn. The Republican Party can't keep doing things the way it always has in terms of technology."

If this sounds familiar, it's because it's become a principal talking point about the GOP's future. We've been told the GOP will mount a comeback "with the Twittering." We've seen candidates for the RNC chairmanship argue over who has more Facebook friends. The Republican Party, rumor has it, is going to go "beyond cutting edge."

This all sounds perfectly nice, I suppose. Last year, the Republican presidential nominee described the vice presidential vetting process as "a google." It certainly couldn't hurt for the party to get up to speed.

But I continue to think GOP leaders misunderstand what's possible with these applications. Yes, the left has generally been more adept at making use of technological advances, but it's been effective, at least in part, because of the substance and vision behind it.

Listening to Republican leaders talk about technology is a bit like listening to an inept advertising agency promising a business that they'll have a strong "online presence" because it'll have a blog and its commercials will be on YouTube.

Let's call it the Republicans' Underpants Gnomes' Innovation Agenda. It's a three-part plan:

Step 1: Embrace blogs, twitter, and social networking websites
Step 2: (awkward silence)
Step 3: Electoral victory!

The Republican Party has deep and systemic problems. Its ideas are unpopular, its policies have failed, and its vision for the future is bankrupt. The GOP's agenda and ideology are out of sync with the nation's needs.

Eric Cantor can tweet the hell out of a proposed five-year spending freeze to address the economic crisis, but it won't make the idea any less ridiculous.

C&L: A jury's hate-crime verdict in rural Pennsylvania reinforces the racial divide

David Neiwert Sunday May 03, 2009 9:00am

You don't have to have been from rural Pennsylvania to have been able to predict the outcome of this case:

Some satisfied, others outraged with verdict for immigrant's death

Friends and relatives of two teens accused in the beating death of a Mexican immigrant struggled to contain their relief as not-guilty verdicts were announced on the most serious charges against the former high school football stars Friday.

Gasps filled the courtroom and some had to be restrained by sheriff's deputies as they tried to rush the defense table after Derrick Donchak, 19, and Brandon Piekarsky, 17, were acquitted of aggravated assault, reckless endangerment and ethnic intimidation for the death of Luis Ramirez.

Piekarsky was also found not guilty of third-degree murder for the death of Ramirez, who died of blunt force injuries after an encounter with the teens last summer.

As Avery Friedman argues persuasively in the video from CNN yesterday, this was a pretty clear-cut case of jury nullification: the weight of evidence against the accused was so powerful that it's clear the all-white jury -- like similar juries in the South during the Civil Rights struggle -- was not going to convict two young white men of murdering a Mexican. Even if, as Friedman says, "the only reason he is dead is because he was Mexican."

Prosecutors alleged that the teens baited the Ramirez into a fight with racial epithets, provoking an exchange of punches and kicks that ended with Ramirez convulsing in the street, foaming from the mouth. He died two days later in a hospital.

Piekarsky was accused of delivering a fatal kick to Ramirez's head after he was knocked to the ground.

As they poured out of courthouse, the teens' supporters shouted "I was right from the start" and "I'm glad the jury listened" at cameras that caught the late-night verdict.

But Gladys Limon, a spokeswoman for the Mexican-American Legal Defense and Education Fund, said the jury had sent a troubling message.

"The jurors here [are] sending the message that you can brutally beat a person, without regard to their life, and get away with it, continue with your life uninterrupted," she said.

Considering some of the details of the killing, it's also inordinately clear this was a classic bias crime, with the incident instigated by racially charged taunts that made clear the victim was selected because of racial animus:

"Isn't it a little late for you guys to be out?" the boys said, according to court documents. "Get your Mexican boyfriend out of here."

... Burke recalled hearing one final, ominous threat as the teens ran. "They yelled, 'You effin bitch, tell your effin Mexican friends get the eff out of Shenandoah or you're gonna be laying effin next to him,' " she said.

That is, of course, the entire purpose of bias crimes: To hold the victim up as an example: "You're next." The purpose is to terrorize the target community, to drive them out, eliminate them.

Blue Texan (FDL): Orrin Hatch: Conservatives Have No Empathy

Interesting frame there, Orrin.

...the likelihood of a partisan debate over the president's first nominee for the high court already is clear, with a leading Senate Republican warning that Obama has spoken of finding a nominee with "empathy.''

"Usually those are code words for an activist judge... who is going to be partisan on the bench,'' said Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), on This Week. "We all know he's going to pick a more liberal justice.... A pro-abortion justice - I don't think anybody has any illusions about that.''

What Obama said:

"I view that quality of empathy, of understanding and identifying with people's hopes and struggles as an essential ingredient for arriving at just decisions and outcomes," he said.

We can therefore conclude Hatch believes Republicans have no understanding of people's hopes and struggles, and I doubt many people would disagree.

Big Tent Party!

Conservatism 2.0, bitchez!!!!

Think Progress: Sessions to take over top Republican slot on the Judiciary Committee.

With the switch of Sen. Arlen Specter (PA) to the Democratic party, the top GOP slot on the Judiciary Committee opened up. The Hill reports that Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL) has secured the spot:

Under terms of the deal, Sessions will serve as ranking member until the 112th Congress, when he will take over the ranking member post on the Senate Budget Committee. Current Budget Committee ranking member Judd Gregg (R-N.H.) is retiring at the end of the 111th Congress.

Grassley, the top Republican on the Finance Committee, will then become ranking member on the Judiciary Committee.

The Hill reports that the move is “likely to please conservative organizations around Washington,” who view Sessions as “the better spokesman, and more likely to lead the Republican charge in questioning the nominee.” In 2005, Sessions spoke out against the use of the filibuster to block President Bush’s Supreme Court nominees — will he do the same for President Obama?

Benen: INHOFE SEARCHES FOR A SILVER LINING....

The day after Sen. Arlen Specter switched parties, Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.) went on Fox News to explain why the development was ... wait for it ... good news for Republicans. Inhofe argued that Pennsylvania Republicans' reluctance to support Specter was evidence of Democratic overreach.

Yesterday, while explaining why gay Americans can't be allowed to serve in the U.S. military without hiding their sexual orientation, Inhofe repeated the Specter argument in more detail.

There is no evidence more visible that the American people are already rebelling against the far-left agenda than Senator Arlen Specter switching parties to become a Democrat. He did this for one reason, and that is his advisers told him he couldn't retain his Senate seat as a Republican. In other words, the same people who supported Senator Specter six years ago have soundly rejected him today.

This is nutty for a couple of reasons. First, Inhofe is equating the shrinking GOP base in Pennsylvania with the nation overall, as if the prior is fairly representative of the latter. If conservative Republican activists don't approve of a moderate Republican senator, then the only logical conclusion, according to Inhofe, is to assume that the "American people" have no use for a "far-left agenda." This doesn't make a lick of sense.

Second, there's the context of Inhofe's foolishness. As Brian Beutler noted, a DADT repeal is hardly a "far-left" idea -- a majority of Americans support ending "Don't Ask, Don't Tell," putting Inhofe outside the American mainstream.

I can appreciate why a far-right lawmaker like Inhofe may want to spin Specter's switch, but he'll have to do better than this.