Newts & Grizzlies (2)

Today, the Roanoke Times ran an editorial called "The Party of Crazy," about how the Tea Party is driving the GOP very far to the Right--and wondering if anyone is paying attention. Most people still aren't, even though we are now fully launched into a corporate right wing coup against the government. The RT editors refer back to the moment in 2008 when John McCain was campaigning in a town hall meeting, and a weird, stricken look appeared briefly on his face when a woman in the crowd shouted that Obama scared her, because he was an Arab. McCain hastened to reassure her that, no, he wasn't. (Would he even dare to do that now?)

Spreading fear about Obama's "un-Americanness" and seeking to establish his illegitimacy as president, has burgeoned from a cottage industry of "birthers" to an industrial-strength anti-Obama, anti-Muslim culture war of crisis proportions. Last week one of the most outrageous examples of Republican Swiftboating ever seen occurred when former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich creamed in his jeans over an anti-Obama essay written by Dinesh D'Souza for Forbes magazine. The article is based on D'Souza's soon-to-be published book entitled "The Roots of Obama's Rage." (Obama's rage? Did I hear that correctly? Isn't everyone always complaining about Obama's inability to express rage?)

Anyway, Dinesh D'Souza (whom Maureen Dowd has irresistibly called "Ann Coulter-in-pants") puts forward the stunning thesis that Obama's policies are an inherited, genetic carryover from his African father. D'Souza suggests that the U.S. is now being ruled "according to the dream of a Luo tribesman of the 1950's...[a] philandering, inebriated African socialist, who raged against the world for denying him the realization of his anticolonial ambitions, [and] is now setting the nation’s agenda through the reincarnation of his dreams in his son.” Is this supposed to be taken seriously?

Obviously Gingrich thinks so. He has wholeheartedly endorsed D'Souza's goonish thesis, declaring it "the most profound insight I have read in the last six years about Barack Obama." Newt claims D'Souza shows how the Prez "is so outside our comprehension" that you can only understand him "if you understand Kenyan, anti-colonial behavior." OMG. Newt is one of the crazies out there, hoping and plotting to replace Obama in 2012. UGH.

I cranked myself up and went to Wikipedia to see what I could learn about newts that might be useful. Many newts, I found out, produce toxins in their skin secretions as a defense mechanism against predators. Some newts of the Pacific Northwest produce enough tetrodotoxin to kill an adult human and poison their enemies. Should you come in contact with a newt, proper hand-washing techniques should be followed due to the toxins they produce and bacteria they carry.

As the professed author of this blog, Virgil suggests you stop reading now and go wash your hands. Just to be on the safe side, I'm going to do that, too.