I finally am starting to understand the Republicans’ behavior – from your local teabagger to our ‘esteemed’ Senators.
I have been reading for months that a large part of this is due to racism, which I agreed with all along. But I still didn’t get how racism that had gone largely stealth could so suddenly be so publicly displayed and how people that actually have to interact with others – in their families, neighborhoods and jobs – could make such fools of themselves knowing they could end up on their local tv news, if not national news (I could understand that many of them don’t get the intertubes, as in you-tube).
But Deoliver’s earlier diary A prominent racist who got a Times Obit that spells out so clearly the thinking behind the racist crowd, made me see why they have literally gone berserk. They ACTUALLY still believe the crap touted by Putnam and they are afraid – very afraid, which actually makes them very scary.
The other thing that lit a little light bulb in my brain was Lefty Coaster’s comment in Meteor Blade’s FP piece: Mixed Messages.
Lefty said: "And that was before the Republicans ran our economy off a cliff a year ago." By no means a new concept, but in the context of what we saw throughout August and what we saw last night, I finally got these things on a gut level, as opposed to putting words to the actions we were seeing.
Those Republican faces you saw last night were not pouting (as I called them), or anger (as many saw) – it too was fear (okay, some pouting and anger mixed in – but MOSTLY fear). Yes, it is commonly accepted that Republicans know that if healthcare passes, their party is sent into the desert for 50 years (yup, 50, not 40!). But what they also know is that they have, until this point, managed to keep the fact that they are responsible for the economic woes of the WORLD pretty much below the radar. Oh yeah, we read it all the time here, and often in other places too BUT the common man i.e. their base, their tea-baggers, religious right, neo-cons and all the rest HADN’T GOTTEN THE MEMO. Passing healthcare will prove in short order that they are full of lies. That FOX is full of lies. Not plant seeds of doubt but blatantly expose them as liars (as our President so adeptly opened the door to last night – woo hoo!).
The fact that these people have not figured out that Bush’s tax cuts were not in their interest and that Bush lied himself into the Iraq war is amazing and sad, but true. But connecting the dots between tax cuts and their current economic situation or between things said by Bush and comrades, including FOX, many years ago and how a war played out halfway around the world is a bit beyond their grasp, especially for the incurious. But healthcare – where there is often not more than one degree of separation to a health care horror story – THAT they will be able to get. When a family member not offered benefits at their job can finally get benefits, when the neighbor with a pre-existing condition finally can get treatment, when a parent has their donut hole plugged (and is not sentenced to death) – THIS will be recognizable to them.
So, the fear of the Republicans is way more than the deep racism many hold, and way beyond fear of a beloved Democratic party that gave the country health care – their greatest fear is exposure for not only what they have become, but what they have been and what they have done.
Indeed, on reconsideration, they will not be in the wilderness for 50 years, they will truly be extinct. The Republican brand will be one of greed, lies and failure – to even the most simple minded of their base, incapable of resurrection until all current generations have passed.
They are all suffering right now from immense amounts of stress, not only because of what is happening TO them and their party, but because of the battle within their own minds where the denial of decades is now battling with the reality that is being exposed to others, and mirrored back to them. They cannot face their future – or lack thereof – nor can they face their past. As has been said, the GOP is rudderless – more important to the mania we might see is that so are the souls of the individuals within the GOP.