To the Right of Dumb

You don't really need sense to know that a lot of what you hear from the far right is pure intellectual garbage. I find statements such as Rick Santorum's about college being for snobs as amusing and ironic. Conservatives are decidedly against liberal colleges and universities, but what they fail to realize is that people coming out of college are more likely to be liberal BECAUSE they are educated. Colleges aren't indoctrination factories, they are institutions of learning, and once people learn things, they can easily see that most of what is being peddled by the Republican party is misinformation at best, and lies at worst.

With that in mind, I would like to comment on Timothy Egan's piece from the New York Times on August 23rd entitled "The Crackpot Caucus." Egan says most of the good stuff himself, but his scathing yet true commentary is only highlighted by another report today on the record low levels of sea ice in the Arctic Ocean at a time when most Republicans would have you believe that global warming and climate change are nothing but myths.

In the last week, the Republican assault on intelligence reached an ugly nadir when Todd Akin explained to the nation that in cases of "legitimate rape" a woman's body can shut down pregnancies. Grounded in nothing more than ideological fanaticism that clouds judgement, this most recent display of right-wing intellect was both nonsensical and abhorrent. As insulting as this is to both women and, more generally speaking, educated people who put their faith in science and real knowledge, it is only one example of how the Republican party is doing real damage to our country by propagating outright lies.

The new breed of science-denying Republican has moved to the right of dumb. Placing faith in faulty economic doctrine, while stupid, is far more acceptable than making outrageous and untrue claims about women's bodies and climate change. While supply-sided economics aren't going to fix our economic woes, false claims about pregnancies can do significant damage to women's rights - as has already happened in some states - and lies about global warming could potentially destroy the planet and everything on it. The stories Republicans tell are not just stupid, they are very scary.

America is the world's greatest nation, but imagine how great our country could be if we had two political parties proposing alternative ideas about how to move forward. Imagine if Republicans brought their good ideas to the table rather than their increasing visible and scarily misguided beliefs on issues that have already been proven otherwise.