Republicans Need an Intellectual Enema

The GOP is so full of shit, it's put us all at risk. Some worry about the dangers of going over the fiscal cliff, but it may be the only thing that can save us!

The GOP has gone off the deep end. It's been a long time coming, but went into overdrive sometime around Obama's election to the presidency. They went from merely advancing an ideology, which of course sometimes entailed bending the truth, to actively refusing to recognize the most basic facts of reality. Set aside their asinine beliefs about Obama himself, the UN black helicopter conspiracy paranoia, and other fringe nonsense. They GOP mainstream nearly shut down the federal government. They forced a downgrade of US debt, and brought the economic recovery to a halt. Over what? Economic policy!

In this state of insanity, the GOP is the greatest threat to our country we have seen in a long time. A lot more people die every year in the US due to not having health insurance than from terrorist attacks. Yet, when liberals set aside their desire for a Canadian-style system and instead advanced the broad outlines of the 1990's Republican/Heritage Foundation/Gingrich/Dole/Romney health plan, how did the GOP react? Instead of arguing over minutiae as a sane person would have expected, they screamed bloody-murder government-take-over death-panels!

It's not a matter of wanting to negotiate in good faith. How does one possibly negotiate in good faith with that?

The GOP is intellectually constipated. They need an enema, and the so-called fiscal cliff might just do the trick.

As we head for fiscal triggers negotiated hastily under threats from the GOP to force much worse economic consequences, we are told that this relatively mild "cliff" must be averted or else we will sink into another recession. Perhaps so, but the alternative may be worse. The triggers were negotiated knowing that it was a bad deal all around designed to deal with a problem that Republicans insisted they cared about: the deficit. The only way a deal could be made is if both sides consider it a better deal than going over the cliff, and remember deficit reduction was the GOP plan -- they demanded this! And yet the first demands of the GOP are to eliminate the the deficit reduction by taking tax increases for the wealthy out and keeping military spending. They want to take credit for reducing the deficit, but they want Democrats to take the blame for every unpopular step required to do so and give up the most prized Democratic policy achievements of the 20th century that haven't even contributed to the deficit [after campaigning with this silly premise that Democrats were the ones trying to cut Medicare against Republican opposition, Republicans are are now demanding that Democrats explain to the American people what entitlement cuts they would put on the table when most Democrats won't even accept any as part of this deal.]

The good and bad news is that there is no reason whatsoever for Democrats to take such a deal. Going over the fiscal cliff  is a much better deal! What's worse, this absurd start point is what we are being offered by the Republican leadership that their own far-right wing has now accused of selling out to big government socialists.

Hey you! Remember when you said we should not raise the debt ceiling and we asked "what does that even mean?" and you responded "I'm not listening."  Merry Christmas, asshole!