Something is Deadly Wrong With the "Conservative" Movement

Right wing nut case Dana Loesch.

Continuing on the theme of the last post, in a column in the Washington Post, Kathleen Parker - generally a conservative - is off the GOP reservation again and on a tear decrying the lunacy on display at the CPAC confab where Der Trumpenführer spoke for some 90 minutes yesterday.  What's perhaps most frightening is that Trump looks relatively sane compared to many of the other speakers, some of whom seemingly need a mental health care intervention. If CPAC gives a glimpse at the real GOP, it is nothing short of scary.  One spittle flecked speaker after another launching into utter insanity disconnected from objective reality.  One striking thing to note is how little one needs in terms of actual credentials to become a "leader" in today political right.  Here are excerpts from Parker's column:

Oh, for God’s sake.  What else can one say about the week after Florida’s high school massacre? Funerals for the 17 students and faculty were barely begun before rhetoric on the right descended into indecency.

Much of it came from the annual Conservative Political Action Conference, a gathering of the extreme right who snack on brimstone. Speaking to the mostly young crowd, politicians and officials from the National Rifle Association went ballistic over recent talk of gun control. Low points included characterizing the media as loving mass shootings and as wanting to advance its socialist agenda.

Is this really the best we can do? I ask this not as a member of the media but as someone who grew up with guns; lives in a house with guns; knows how to shoot and is good at it; doesn’t object to hunting for food; has friends in the NRA. . . . . I’ve weathered my share of gun spookiness, in other words, with the result that I’m neither anti-gun nor a socialist. I do not, however, feel the need to pose in pictures wearing a tightfitting dress and heels, while holding my very own AR-15, as NRA spokesvixen Dana Loesch does on the cover of her book.

A few highlights from the lectern:

Loesch, who gained prominence as a “conservative” radio host, projected a she-devil in Prada when she pointed to members of the media and said, “Many in legacy media love mass shootings. You guys love it. I’m not saying that you love the tragedy, but I am saying that you love the ratings. Crying white mothers are ratings gold to you and many of the legacy media in the back.”

[T]his vile idiocy is too much. . . . . What’s true is that school shootings seem to be the domain of white boys focused on killing their mostly white peers.
 To segregate grieving parents by race, essentially mocking the mothers we’ve witnessed of late, is disgusting. To applaud such distortionist propaganda should be beneath any serious adult concerned enough with these mass assaults to consider sensible alternatives to doing nothing.

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.), a human bellows (useful at campfires), criticized CNN’s town hall as an “infomercial,” and said calls for new restrictions were “tiresome.” As are so many people these days. 

No, actually, the media follows news. A school massacre qualifies. And, yes, people want to know more as a way of seeking solutions. But hating the media is how many Republicans pass the buck. Their accusations are a distraction, the roots of which can be traced to evil. 

Longtime NRA chief executive Wayne LaPierre cited the Democrats’ “socialist” agenda and, without irony, said, “As usual, the opportunists wasted not one second to exploit tragedy for political gain.” Check.

Therein lies the problem in any debate these days. We’re either on the slippery slope to serfdom or everybody gets an AR-15. Surely there is sane ground in between such extremes. 

When the final showdown is between the NRA and children who have just buried their friends, brothers, sisters, teachers and coach, something is deadly wrong in this country. Out of respect for the dead, wounded and grieving, the adults need to stop acting like children.