Quick On The Uptake
I’m dying over here:
The New York Times reports that Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.), a “Tea Party heroine,” plans to challenge Rep. Jeb Hensarling (R-Texas) for the post of GOP conference chair, the fourth-highest House leadership position, in the new Congress. According to the Times, “her candidacy vividly illustrates the central tension facing [incoming House Speaker John] Boehner and his team: balancing the demands of new lawmakers, some of whom ran against the Republican establishment and advocate a no-compromise stance toward the Obama administration and Democratic policies, against the need to deliver some accomplishments at a time of economic distress.” Honestly, I’m not sure what that means, but the thrust of the story is that Bachmann represents bold newcomers supported by the Tea Party while Hensarling represents the wishy-washy old guard.***In short, with the notable exception of his Medicare vote (a flaw shared by almost all of the Republican leaders who now claim to be budget cutters), Hensarling seems to be just the sort of legislator fiscal conservatives should want to see in a position of power. Assuming that the Tea Partiers’ preference for Bachmann, who seems not terribly bright and longer on rhetoric than action, is not merely a figment of her imagination, what good are they?
It’s almost as if the tea party isn’t really a libertarian minded grass roots uprising calling for more personal freedom, fiscal conservatism, and limited government, but actually might just be a slick re-branding of the lunatic wing of the GOP by wealthy billionaire businessmen to be used to propel the GOP back into power.
Jeesh, this is scary. Hensarling is a gold plated motherfucking wingnut of the highest purity, or so I once thought.
Peak Wingnut? shit, we ain’t even halfway up that hill.
November 5th, 2010 at 7:32 pm
I can’t stop thinking about Tea Party Heroin now.
Ride the Bachmann tiger!
November 5th, 2010 at 7:33 pm
I’m thinking your countertops need to be investigated by Citizen Journalists.
November 5th, 2010 at 7:34 pm
@2 BGinCHI:
you beat me to it. :-D
November 5th, 2010 at 7:39 pm
Fixed cuz just look at those crazy ass eyes.
November 5th, 2010 at 7:40 pm
@bleh:
They’re too busy doing lines of coke, after having managed to get Olbermann canned, for any of that.
November 5th, 2010 at 7:41 pm
but this isnt the best part…...now that Boner rode the Red Wave back to power, they HAVE to get rid of Palin.
Tunku and Rove already ganked her last week, now Douthat (the Limits of Palinism) and Noonan(Palin is a Nincompoop).
This is War.
She cant win, she is mathematically unelectable, but im not sure they can throw her overboard.
I think she is runnin’.
what was that thing COD said?
oh yeah….
what can they offer Palin? VP wont work. she drags down the ticket.
third party.
:)
November 5th, 2010 at 7:43 pm
CLASSIC!
November 5th, 2010 at 7:44 pm
What was Eisenhower’s opinion? I think something like, they are a few billionaires in Texas, and they are stupid.
Eisenhower couldn’t see this far into the future, I guess.
November 5th, 2010 at 7:44 pm
Her candidacy for the leadership post vividly illustrates why Minority Leader Boehner was an idiot when he didn’t ostracize her after she made herself famous calling for an investigation of communists in congress 2 years ago.
November 5th, 2010 at 7:45 pm
check out Captain Stupids poll.
go vote! lets get Bachman a seat at the table!
November 5th, 2010 at 7:47 pm
You don’t say…Never would have guessed that one.
November 5th, 2010 at 7:47 pm
@Cat Lady: I for one welcome our new wild-eyed, toothless, bugfuck insane would-be overloads. They will eat each other alive.
November 5th, 2010 at 7:49 pm
@BGinCHI:
I reflexively spanked the veins in my forearm.
November 5th, 2010 at 7:55 pm
Tea Party Heroine is the first thing I think of when I see Micheal Bachmann, too. Bad for you, but you can’t quit.
November 5th, 2010 at 8:02 pm
How about the comments at Reason. A spirited debate on the sexual attractiveness of Bachmann and various other political women.
November 5th, 2010 at 8:02 pm
@Zifnab: Tea Party Heroin, you mean.
poor junkies.
they have progressed from innocuous Sarah Palin skin-pops to chicking boo for breakfast with Backman and COD.
dooooooooooooom
November 5th, 2010 at 8:12 pm
John, what’s even funnier is going over to Reason and getting slapped in the face with their “Freedom isn’t Free! Donate to Reason!” crap.
Your libertarian magazine can’t sell enough subscriptions to support itself, so it has to beg for donations. What about Teh Free Market, hmm? Obviously there’s not enough interest/funds to keep your magazine going, so if you really believed in your supposed belief system, you’d accept the inevitable and Shut The Bloody Thing Down.
November 5th, 2010 at 8:14 pm
All I can say is that many of us are fucking glad that she’s not in the MN legislature any more.
She’s bad. She’s nationwide.
November 5th, 2010 at 8:21 pm
could it be that peak wingnut is just a bit farther up ahead? what do you think, sisyphus?
November 5th, 2010 at 8:26 pm
@Benjamin Cisco (mobile):
Bat Boy/Bachmann 2012.
November 5th, 2010 at 8:37 pm
@General Stuck: Sheese that’s what I thought. Sometimes the moving to the right by the Dems to pick up moderate votes made sense to win elections…but he’s now too moderate? He’s about as left as Paul Ryan.
November 5th, 2010 at 8:39 pm
Possibly the nicest thing anyone has ever said about Bachmann, including her parents.
November 5th, 2010 at 8:44 pm
The fuh? “We know you are looking forward to Keith’s return, and so are we.”
That’s IT?
November 5th, 2010 at 8:50 pm
@SiubhanDuinne: Who said that?
November 5th, 2010 at 9:03 pm
@debit: Whoever that was on MSNBC subbing on Countdown. Didn’t recognize him, didn’t catch his name. He was fluffing the Keith story earlier, but in the event it was about two sentences dropped quickly and embarrassedly in the middle of a couple of other stories.
FWIW, Rachel also promises to have something to say . . . ah, and it’s coming up right after this commercial break.
November 5th, 2010 at 9:26 pm
@SiubhanDuinne: Ah, ok. I’m not watching in protest, but have a morbid curiosity about what’s being said by his peers.
November 5th, 2010 at 9:34 pm
@gbear: Amen. At least she’s too busy to spy on gay people in St. Paul now.
November 5th, 2010 at 9:39 pm
@HyperIon:
yeah, that’s what i was thinking.
November 5th, 2010 at 10:02 pm
Money. Teevee face time. She’s not after power really. Not the kind where you have to make actual decisions and do work, she’s already proved that about as decisively as you could hope for.
No, she lives for the buzz of a crowd. She feeds off their fear and hate. Anger is like sweet nectar to her. I hadn’t thought about it before, but she’s kind of a b-list sith.
November 5th, 2010 at 10:07 pm
I love it, I’m all for it, and I live right here in Minnesota (though thank begeebus not in the 6th).
My limited impression is that Hensarling is teh stoopid, and a winger. But basically unknown, so he may get more benefit-of-the-doubt time with the public.
Everyone’s mind is made up about la Bachmann. Teh stoopid is patently obvious. Whether that is OK, or even excellent, seems to be a function of partisanship.
I say let ‘em have her as #4. The two year circus may as well be circus maximus.
Also, too, I can’t help but see an image in my minds eye of Major Kong riding the bomb.
November 5th, 2010 at 11:34 pm
@Ecks: disagree.
cuz ima grrl too and i can get inside her head….
hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.
she is out to get Obama for ignoring her, and she is going show him.
she is goin’ show Team McCain and Dr. K and Douthat and Rove and every one that is saying she cant make the cut.
when McCain refused to let her make a concession speech, when O ignored her offer of ‘help’ at the governors convention, when she didnt get invited to the WH like everone else, she got mad.
She offered to flat race O and got nuthin but crickets.
THAT is what all her Obama hatred is about now.
He dissed her.
She doesnt want money or tv…she has that…..She wants respect…..and….she wants revenge. Just watch. she is running.
November 6th, 2010 at 12:31 am
@grumpy realist:
Altruism for Reason does not help others: therefore it’s ok to give.
—Ayn Rand
November 6th, 2010 at 12:59 am