The World According to the Tea Partiers and The View

Some time ago, I scoffed at the possible influence of a bunch of elderly, middle-aged, often over-weight Americans wearing faux 18th Century costumes and waving American flags. They carried ridiculous signs declaring that granny was being shipped to a home or even worse, thanks to our monstrously over-extended Godzilla of a government. Their major theme was the gross indignity of having to pay taxes for government services. I wanted to ask if they were so independent that they wanted no repairs to roads, no traffic lights, no national parks, no free admissions to the National Gallery...well, you get my drift. My favorite moment in their diatribes came when one silly woman screamed, "Don't touch my social security!" These Tea Partiers had the timidity to compare themselves to the "patriots" who protested the English Tea Tax in 1773. But, I was so wrong, as can be evidenced by cowardly crumbling of the Republican Party, especially in the House.

Its slick and over-tanned chief negotiator, John Boehner almost convinced us and his party that he was working well with President Obama to come up with a reasonable debt-ceiling deal. We know how that worked out and we know why. For some inexplicable reason, the Tea Party has managed to bring the House to a stand-still. This next of vipers has dumped Boehner and followed an even bigger slime-ball, Eric Cantor. All of this would be amusing if it were not so dangerous to millions of people who don't have proper housing, jobs, health care, and lives. The next year will be more than interesting. It will be a battle between rational thinking and extreme reactionism. I shudder to think what may happen.

Another note of silliness and pessimism. Several days a week I go to my re-hab center and walk on the treadmill. I take my ear buds and a book, but I am still accosted by a group of five out-spoken women who seem to have an opinion on everything from Obama to who's sleeping with who and how much alimony is not being paid to the rich trophy wife. Yes, my treadmill faces two television sets, both showing ABC's THE VIEW, a hot air bonanza featuring former actress Whoopi Goldberg, former journalist Barbara Walters, talk show host Joy Behar (the best of the group, not necessarily a good thing), Elisabeth Hasselbeck (resident blonde), and Sherri Shepherd who seems to be there to fill up space.

With leaders like McConnell, Boehner, Cantor, Sen. Paul, and commentators like the gals on The View, we are drawn further and further into a quagmire of misinformation and rascals. Where is Mark Twain when we need him?