A quick word about the week the Tea Party movement ate the Republican party out of it's own asshole

The other day I'd planned on taking a walk over to City Hall to get a first hand look at the Tea Party movement via the event that had been planned to take place here. I spent a good part of the day on Wednesday reading about these events and watching news clips from all around the country, both horrified and amused by what I saw and read. As anyone who reads this space regularly knows, I just didn't get it, don't get it, and probably never will get it, as I usually fail to mentally grasp things that defy every possible tenet of reason and rational thought. But whatever. My point is I never made it out to the protest. I just didn't have the stomach for it by the time Wednesday evening rolled around to be honest with you.

Part of the reason I'd grown disillusioned with the the idea of attending a Tea Party was that at some point, around mid-afternoon, I spoke to a friend of mine in Texas who'd attended one of the events in the Dallas area. When I asked him to list for me his reasons for wanting to attend a Tea Party, what he said was riddled with hypocrisy, half-truths and all around ignorance, but he was beaming with pride over having participated in an act of political protest and felt energized to be a part of something bigger than himself. Now, what did I do after hearing my friend express his thoughts and feelings...I just laughed at him. I couldn't help it, it was a spontaneous thing, I honestly tried to muffle it when I felt it coming on, but I just busted out laughing over the sheer absurdity of the Tea Party movement. I immediately felt like a prick, and it was honestly one of the bigger prick moments I've had recently. I suppose that involvement in the political process, no matter how deranged its motivations may be, deserves some applause. Polite golf applause, but applause nonetheless.

At some point during the conversation with my friend, after I'd gotten the prickish laughing out of the way, we were talking about Obama and how awful he thinks Obama is and how he doesn't understand how I could have voted for, and still support, the person he sees already as the worst president in American history. I asked him to list the reasons why he thought Obama was the worst president in American history, and while there was the requisite griping about Obama being a commie who will destroy America, many of the things he mentioned were actions and policies that were almost a direct reflection of Bush administration. When I pointed this out, it was almost as if I were speaking Mandarin or something, as he just didn't seem to hear me. One such point was his contention that Obama's bowing to the Saudi king was tantamount to an act of treason. I pointed out that President Bush used to hold hands with the same Saudi king, not to mention kiss him on the lips. This fact went virtually ignored. In his mind, bowing to the king was gesture akin to handing America's sovereignty over to the terrorists on a silver platter.

"Well what should have Obama done instead?"

"He should have walked over and kicked his ass!"

I think it was about this point that I started to laugh again, but it also signified the fact that this whole argument was one that I could never hope to win, that some minds, both on the left and the right, are so hopelessly lost inside of an echo chamber of similar thought, and so programmed to hate anything that comes with a "D" or an "R" next to it's name, that there's absolutely no reasoning with them. Barack Obama could heal the blind with his bare hands and in four years the Republican party could nominate a mound of horseshit to run against him and guess who my friend and others like him would vote for? The mound of Republican horseshit, naturally.

Yesterday I was emailing back and forth a bit with a long time reader of this here blog and he said something that made me pause..."I know you regret ever being a Republican." This is the furthest thing from the truth. I don't regret being a Republican. I regret that the Republican party has been taken captive by wingnuts! I suppose my "problem" is that having an open mind and being unafraid of listening to ideas and opinions that run contrary to my own, something that classifies me as "spineless" to the Rush Limbaughs of the world and other people who frown upon the notion of intellectual flexibility. Because of this, I'm a turncoat and a traitor, just as I was in 1992 when I supported Clinton. Whatever. This is not what I signed up for, and I really think that the Reagans and Goldwaters and Buckleys of the world would be horrified by what being a Republican has come to mean if they were alive to to see it.

Anway, here's my main point...if the Republican party continues to head in the direction it's heading, it's going to go the way of the Whigs. It's going to die. They've given the car keys to the Jesus freaks and conspiracy theorists, and all they're doing with the tea parties and the insane, hate-filled rallies that we saw during the campaign is pushing people like me, moderates and independents if you will, away by driving the car straight into the ditch. By continuing to marginalize this ever-growing segment of the voting population, not to mention an entire generation of young adults who find them repulsive, Republicans risk going extinct. People are leaving to become Democrats or Independents in droves, and it doesn't seem to be letting up any time soon. I really think that these Tea Parties did exactly that. I think a whole bunch of ideologically flexible people saw these Tea Parties and thought, "what the fuck is wrong with these people?"

I never really thought it'd be possible for such a thing to happen, but in this day and age a third party or an independent candidate can harness the power of the internet and rise out of nowhere to prominence. At this rate, with the Republican party hell-bent on destroying itself, I can actually see it happening. I can imagine sitting around a table with a bunch of people 20 years from now reflecting on what used to be the Republican party. And that makes me sad.

But then again, maybe it's just time for it to die.

(photo via mcpreacher & Ryan Corazza)