thoughts from an empty head

I was listening to Amanda Marcotte discussing the latest wingnut lynch-em parties (aka Sarah Palin rallies) with Lindsay Beyerstein today when they said something interesting, something that I should think would be common knowledge. IIRC, they were both wondering why the McCain campaign were continuing to stoke the fires of hate and risk alienating the rest of the country. I can understand this puzzlement. To the average, non-crazy person, such a path is akin to lunacy itself. Don’t these crazy people, one may think, realize that someone is going to get hurt or killed?

Of course they do. They’re playing the Long Game.

Call the Republicans many things, but the one thing they are very good at is winning elections. They could see the problem early in the election cycle (Bush) and decided to run up the white flag on 2008. They chose a sacrificial lamb who really wanted to be president, yet would have slim chance against Hillary Clinton, who conventional wisdom said was the odds-on favorite at the beginning of the year (and don’t think that the GOP didn’t have a deep portfolio on Hillary - I’m betting we would have heard a lot more about “emasculating man-hating bitches who didn’t know their place” if she had won the nomination), throw as much mud as possible on her reputation (which would definitely stick, because everyone “knew” that the Clintons are big fat liars), play the usual election-year vote-suppression games and hope that Bush didn’t do anything too stupid to deep-six their slim chances of making a respectable showing. Then, once Hillary made her historic ascent to the Oval Office, start the playbook that got her husband impeached - ratchet up the rhetoric, win back Congress and find a reason to impeach Hillary or at least force her to resign. Four to eight years later, a new Republican (hint: maybe even Palin) steps forward to “clean up Washington”.

Trouble is, a funny thing happened on the way to the White House - a black man showed up on the other side instead. Barack Obama changed the whole complexion of the race. Now, the election wasn’t merely about blue vs. red - the question was now black vs. white.

Still, no worries. The GOP would simply alter their game slightly to accommodate the new dynamic - dig into his Chicago roots (and there had to be some dirt there), woo the PUMAS who were extremely bitter about not being able to celebrate the first female president of the United States (hello, Hockey Mom), and scare people, Willie-Horton style, about everything the ooga-booga black man was gonna do to them.

And in most respects, the plan hasn’t changed. Of course, the rhetoric has gotten a good deal more heated in the last month or so, but all this does is play into the plan even more. Because, once you’ve said something enough times, no matter how much it may be a lie, people will start wonder if there isn’t something there after all.

Which is why we’re now seeing scenes like these.

And so the plan goes. The heat builds, the anger intensifies, the phony stories pile up, and on it goes. And if Obama should win the election (memo to all happy Dems: you need to play the rest of this election like your guy is 10 points down, because it’s a damn good bet that Old Man Surge and the Hockey Mom won’t be taking a three-week nap) , he easily stands to have at least 27% of the population of this country fuming mad at him. Hell, if some media nut somewhere doesn’t start bleating about impeachment before the inauguration, I’ll be very disappointed.

And that’s where the fun really begins. Because now, every time Obama meets with Pelosi and Reid to get soemthing done, a gaggle of Republicans will be right there, filibustering the hell out of everything. Reforming FISA? Yeah, right; what are you, a terrorist? Health care? In yer dreams. Balancing the budget? What, you hate the troops, too? Overturning all of those precious little signing statement Dubya filed? Why does Barack Hussein Obama hate freedom? Pull out of Iraq? TRAITOR! Obama will be lucky if Congress can get a dog-catching bill passed before the mid-terms in 2010.

Meanwhile, while all of this fun is going on, and while all the really crazy wingnuts are off in the woods, oiling up their guns for the upcoming race war, the GOP will be waiting for that inevitable slip-up by Obama. When he does it (and believe me, any excuse will do), BAM! IMPEACHMENT! Fox will start doing 12-part specials on why whatever-Obama-did-or-said is the most terrifying threat to America in its entire history. Congressional wingnuts and the right-wing punditry will howl from the rafters for his head on a pike. What’s that, you say? Nancy Pelosi said impeachment was off the table? You poor, dumb bastard. That was then and this is NOW, FOR GAWD’S SAKE!!! WE’RE ALL GONNA DIE UNLESS OBAMA IS IMPEACHED!!!11!!ONE!!!

And so, a weakened Obama, pressed by an economy in recession, hate groups running wild in suburbia, and a world that laughs at our tattered reputation, will trudge along, gallantly trying to salvage some sort of important legislation. If he isn’t impeached first, that is.

And then a real religious nutjob like Sarah Palin wins the White House. While people like Rush Limbaugh drop witticisms like, “Well, this is why black people shouldn’t be in charge of anything. Harumph.”

That’s the Plan as I see it, anyway. I really hope that, in four years, I’m proved wrong.

We’ll see, I guess.

9 lbs, 3.8 oz. 21 inches long.

Welcome to the world, Carmen.