This excerpt from today’s E.J. Dionne column in WaPo fits perfectly with the above cartoon.
But there is something far more troubling at work: the rise of an angry, irrational extremism -- the sort that says Obama is a Muslim socialist who wasn't born in the United States -- that was not part of Ronald Reagan's buoyant conservative creed. Do Republican politicians believe in the elaborate conspiracy theories being spun by Glenn Beck and parts of the Tea Party? If not, why won't they say so? Liberals who refused to break with the far left in the 1950s and '60s were accused of being blinded by a view that saw "no enemies on the left." Are conservatives who should know better now falling into a "no enemies on the right" trap?
When Texas Republican Rep. Louie Gohmert warns, with absolutely no proof, of the dangers of "terror babies" -- children whose mothers allegedly come to the United States to give birth so their offspring can have American passports for later use in terrorist activities -- have we not crossed into never-never land? Where are the responsible conservatives who should be denouncing such crackpottery?
~ Tom
1 comment:
Tom, the only thing I;d point out is that reagan did start a lot of this, or rather Lee Atwater. The whole "welfare queen" who collects her welfare checks in a new Cadillac etc. may not be as far reaching a lie as Obama is a Muslim etc. but it was the beginning of the right pushing the limits and for the most part the media letting them get away with it (Reagan was constantly lying and the press pretty much ignored it).
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