GOP Jumps on Train to Crazytown

With Mississippi GOP Senator Thad Cochran - hardly the most progressive members of the GOP at the moment losing by less than one point to Tea Party challenger Chris McDaniel, it is clearly too early to claim that the GOP establishment has regained control of the party from its most crazy elements.  The truth is that what only a few years ago would have left Congressional Republicans aghast now passes as nearly main stream.  A column in the Washington Post looks at this descent of the GOP into the world of the  crazies.  Here are excerpts:

This morning, former Republican Congressman and current Tea Party celebrity Allen West said: “the U.S. House of Representatives should file articles of impeachment against Barack Hussein Obama.”

The occasion in this case was the deal to obtain the release of Bowe Bergdahl, who had been held by the Taliban for five years, which you can add to the half-dozen or so other controversies that have led to conservatives advocating impeachment. Sure, West is a particularly nutty individual, but his call was just a bit more extreme than what lots of Republicans are saying today.

This illustrates one of their central political problems: even when they have a reasonable complaint about a decision President Obama has made, Republicans are so quick to jump on the train to Crazytown that they undermine their own legitimate arguments — among everyone other than the folks who already agree with them.

Yesterday, I looked at the four arguments Republicans are making about why the Bergdahl deal was a bad idea, among them the claim that he may have been a deserter; the size of the price in the form of five Taliban prisoners; and the failure to comply with the law requiring early notification of a Gitmo release. You may find some of these more persuasive than others, but on each count there’s a reasonable case to be made. Yet many Republicans find themselves unable to make the reasonable case, instead running immediately to unreasonable ones.

Take, for instance, the argument that the price was too high. Republicans are justifying this by claiming the five Taliban members are so threatening that we will be almost powerless to stop them from laying waste to Americans around the globe.

These five are certainly horrible people, but they don’t have super-powers. If you wanted to make a truly persuasive case that the price the U.S. paid for Bergdahl was too high, you could make it without exaggerating the threat posed by these five individuals. 

Republicans will never win that debate if one of the first things out of their mouths is “Impeach!” These days, they seem incapable of arguing in terms that anyone who isn’t already a Republican can accept. And that’s the essence of persuasion.

Sadly, I agree with the author.  On those occasions when I talk to former Republican colleagues - some I considered friends -  they are no longer capable of reasoned debate and launch into either personal attacks on me (who they view as a traitor to their cause) or they act like they have overdosed on "Kool-Aid."  Added to that is the fact that I continue to suspect that if Obama were white, some of the lunacy would not have gained so much traction.  It is very disturbing.