The right wing has simply become a crazed, lunatic cult.

[NRaleighLiberal]

Just watching the lies and hyperbole coming from the right during the house and senate debates on health care, watching the craziness and hypocrisy of the tea bag movement, the mania about all things Palin. Plain and simple - they are now a lunatic fringe cult.

And a dangerous one at that because so many Americans pay attention to the insanity.

The big issue to me is that you can't reason with people in the cult. Their mind is closed shut, reason rolls off of them like so much teflon.

[gratuitous]

1. "Become"?

That's okay, we on the left seem to be developing our own mindless group in response. A quick survey of DU threads will show you the topics on which reason has flown out the window. So fortunately, we're not going to face a mine shaft gap or a mindless gap.

[noiretextatique]

2. when you can show me the equivalent of sarah palin on the left

then i will believe the fringes are equal.

[SIMPLYB1980]

4. Easy DK.

Both ineffectual grandstander's that don't matter in the grand scheme of things.

:hide:

[noiretextatique]

10. right...DK's book is being hyped by the MSM as we speak

and of course he's been on Oprah and the teevee every single night. and of course, not everyone believes he's "fringe," just the pathetic compromisers. sorry...not even close.

[Common Sense Party]

11. DK doesn't have gams like Palin's.

[SIMPLYB1980]

12. I've seen DK plenty of times hawking his books on tv.

He did it on the Daily show. He also goes on FAUX news to talk about how horrible Obama is doing also. Setting himself up for another big fail in 2012 when he tries to take on Obama.

[noiretextatique]

15. right...he just like sarah palin

:eyes:

[SIMPLYB1980]

16. I my eyes "you betcha".

:P

[ljm2002]

23. Sorry but comparing Dennis Kucinich to Sarah Palin is just crap...

...unadulterated crap.

Dennis Kucinich is articulate, knowledgeable and principled. Sarah Palin is a vapid, mean-spirited ideologue who will manipulate anything and anyone to get her way.

Now you can certainly argue whether DK is, or can ever be, effective. I probably won't agree with you on that, but it does not offend me for you or anyone else to bring it up. However, I find it highly offensive and disingenuous (to say the least) to compare him with Palin as though he is the left's "equivalent" of her. Total rubbish.

[Warpy]

3. While I do run into the occasional person on DU

who thinks with his or her butt instead of his or her brain, they're a tiny minority.

That's why I'm here and and a few other lefty boards and not on a mixed board anywhere.

[NRaleighLiberal]

5. I just don't see on the left fringe the complete disconnection from reality that is on the right.

[aint_no_life_nowhere]

9. I'm not sure which threads you are referring to

but it seems to me that there's a lot of healthy back-and-forth arguing on DU, sometimes to an extreme degree. I don't think you see that much dissent among the ranks with Freepers or conservatives. I think we're anything but a lock-step mindless cult. Of course if you are referring to the obsession we seem to have with Palin here, you may have somewhat of a point.

[jonnyblitz]

6. does" the mania about all things Obama" bother you as well?

speaking of the c word....

or is that behavior ok with you when you agree with beliefs behind it?

[NRaleighLiberal]

8. I am behind Obama when I think he is doing the right thing, and am critical when not.

In principle, I believe the Democrats - at least in principal - have the best solutions for the country as a whole. But if Obama ups the troop level in Afghanistan, if he continues to let Bush and his minions off the hook, if he doesn't big the Bushies out of the justice system, and more - I will be disappointed.

[Echo In Light]

7. Up to now haven't had to collectively face backlash w/o apologetic middle o the roader's enabling

Bush/Cheney forever changed the face of it...removed, or, well, more clearly exposed the Right's true colors.

[Frustratedlady]

21. I think Obama brought out the true color.

He exposed the bigotry and greed...scared the beejeebers out of them, because they now realize it is possible that Blacks can attain power and they are terrified they will end up in servitude. They can only share to a point and then they must take back the power.

[Echo In Light]

22. I disagree. Our "elections" are staged, pre-determined

That's why, if you recall, the 'election cycle' began so early, and it was obvious that the Powers That Be had decided on either Hillary, or Obama, b/c either 'choice' was "unprecedented," which served the "Look Ahead!" meme quite well...it was a useful distraction. All that's happened now (aside from the first black president, which in itself is historic, no doubt, but it's not all it's cracked up to be as far the mythology surrounding it that's being sold to the public) is that the same vested interests of empire that have always, and still are, running the show, have applied a 'friendlier' face to the same-old. Last time that trick ran dry they gave us 9/11 as the 'justification' as to why the 'need' for a sharp Right turn. Bad shit, that.

[EFerrari]

13. Barry Goldwater is spinning in his grave.

I'm sad my dad had to see this. He was never a huge party supporter but in a quiet way, he was thoroughly a Republican. I hope he's not watching this craziness.

[Sinti]

14. Our nation has many cults - they are one

The Tea Party people along with the Third Wave Christians, C-Street Politicians (D & R), Rev. Moon followers (in Congress D&R), Ayn Rand Objectivists who are a cargo cult obsessed with the paper money tool we use to do trade...

Information gathering and entertainment itself strikes me as a revolving cult of personality these days. If we watch TV news, we don't watch it for information, necessarily, or judge things on their own merits. We first get the information with the personality that is most appealing to us, and then trust that information based on our trust of the messenger - this is also true for print media. Trust is something you give to people who you think mean you no harm, and are most like yourself.

The behavior is part of the culture, and distracts us from having any real impact on our own ability to survive. We need massive amounts of de-programming.

[joeybee12]

17. Replace "has become" with "has always been" and I will rec this! n/t

[Rick Myers]

18. Brad Blog has a great article about this today...

[Initech]

19. I'm waiting for Glenn Beck to tell his followers to drink the Kool-Aid.

:popcorn:

[callous taoboy]

20. Do you want to know what's really sad?

My folks, both of them life-long republicans but mainly in the fiscal sense of by-gone times, now subscribe to all of what is worst about the party. I really think that Faux News has done grave damage to them in that many years ago they would have laughed off all of the hyperbole Faux viewers subsist on. Sad.

[conscious evolution]

24. Its intentional

so they can infiltrate and subvert the Democratic party while we are busy laughing at the paloons.

[On the Road]

25. FIfty Years Ago it Was the John Birch Society

But even most Republican knew they were the crazies.

Now the same kind of people are front and center and no Republican dares to criticize them. It's unbelievable, and it cannot last.

[bridgit]

26. All *proper* weasels claw their way to the very bottom