Republicans Can't Help It...

Republicans can’t help being the Party of Stupid, for the simple reason that so many of them are genuinely stupid. I don’t want to mention names but I’m certain I could name many, especially in the House, who are (at least it seems to me), basically stupid. I base this on things they have either said or done. “Birthers” are a good example. Climate change deniers are another, as are those who believe “Government is the problem,” or evolution is an idea “out of the pit of hell.” And when you add those outside the party because they couldn’t get elected in the first place, you know, those who had to deny being witches, promoted the idea of paying your doctor with chickens, said truly stupid things about abortion, and etc., there are many, many more, those Karl Rove has now announced he will try to eliminate from consideration, only to find outraged opposition from those on the side of stupid.

In the past few years the Republican Party has engaged in a kind of reverse Darwinism. Where you might think they would have purged the stupid they have, in fact, done the opposite, purged those who were not stupid and promoted those who are. This process continues, consider for example the case of the Texas Representative who not only has suggested impeaching Obama over gun control but invited Ted Nuget to the State of the Union address. Personally, I think he should be held in contempt of Congress. But, alas, he is hardly alone in his stupidity. Even the one who has announced Republicans should not be the Party of Stupid has authorized the teaching of creationism in the schools, pretty damn stupid. It seems that any Republican in recent years who has not promoted the stupid is challenged by someone who will guarantee to promote it. Apparently they are too stupid to realize how stupid they are. As there is no cure for stupid I cannot see how they are going to change.

Even Marco Rubio, picked by the Republicans to give the rebuttal to President Obama’s State of the Union speech, and I guess regarded as the greatest Republican since Saint Ronnie invented fire, betrayed himself by giving the most sophomoric babble I have ever heard. Some seem to believe he is a Presidential candidate. Bring him on, I say, he’s no more qualified to be President than the Divine Sarah from Alaska who I hope has now gone back to her fishing, cooking Moose noses, and protecting us from the Russians, or whatever she does up there in the great beyond. I sincerely hope we never hear from her again (fat chance).

All State of the Union Speeches contain a great deal of “Pie in the sky” talk, pies that never seem to get baked. Obama’s speech tonight was little different in that regard, but oh how wonderful it will be if he manages to achieve even half of what he wants. I am not one for post-mortems, but I cannot help but wonder how different things would be if Al Gore had not been cheated out of the Presidency. But more pertinent to the moment, I will always wonder how much more Obama might have achieved, or perhaps still might achieve, if the racist House of Representatives stopped opposing him at every opportunity. In any case Obama has already secured a positive place in history, while the current House of Representatives “will live forever in infamy.”

He is not dead who departs from life with a high and noble fame; but he is dead, even while living, whose brow is branded with infamy.

Ludwig Tieck