Happy Hour Discurso

Today's opining on the public discourse.

Pretty thin gruel today, my darlings.  Which is probably for the best, because between the PMS and the Neverending Day o' Frustration at work, I'm pretty much wiped.

Still, there's a few items of interest.  Guess who CPAC's having to dinner:

In February, the Conservative Political Action Conference will get underway in D.C., and because CPAC has become the right-wing event of the year, the conservative movement's heavy hitters are anxious to be a part of it.

But let's note who, exactly, has become part of the conservative movement. For example, the 2010 CPAC gathering will be co-sponsored by the hyper-conservative John Birch Society. While JBS was, not too long ago, considered far too ridiculous for the American mainstream -- even Republicans considered Birchers a political pariah -- the bizarre group has slowly been welcomed into the fold as conservatives have become more extreme.

When Glenn Beck embraced the Birchers two years ago, Alex Koppelman reminded us, "The JBS is, after all, the group that believed fluoridated drinking water was a Communist mind-control plot. Oh, and its founder, Robert Welch, once accused Dwight Eisenhower -- and no, we are not kidding -- of being 'a dedicated conscious agent of the communist conspiracy.'"

And now the John Birch Society is co-sponsoring CPAC. When I talk about radicalism being mainstreamed by the right, this is what I'm talking about.

I remember, back in the day, when even rabid Republicans would vehemently denounce the JBS.  They wanted nothing to do with the insane pieces of shit.  Now, the insane pieces of shit are du jour.  This tells you pretty much everything you need to know about the current state of the Con party.

(Do click through and read the rest of the article.  There's potential for some hilarity brewing - you don't want to miss it.)

Teabaggers, meanwhile, are coming up with ever newer ways to let the country know how fucktarded they are:

This morning, Washington, DC residents have may seen a plane with a giant banner bashing President Obama flying overhead, courtesy of the Danville, VA Tea Party Patriots:

The group’s project coordinator, Susan Lee, raised funds during the last two months to fly a plane over Washington, D.C. morning traffic today with a nearly 100-foot-long banner reading “OBAMA STOP DESTROYING OUR COUNTRY” in five-foot-tall letters. [...]

Back when I was a kid, the local crazies usually just ranted in front of the grocery store.  Now they've taken to the skies.  Nowhere is safe.

And, finally, we report that a waahmbulance had to be called to Copenhagen:

Republican lawmakers who accompanied Speaker Nancy Pelosi to the climate talks in Copenhagen say they learned something about the speaker in Denmark: she's a Mean Girl. Citing slights like "not being helped in setting up their own media briefing," Republicans are smarting after being subjected to Pelosi's unique brand of bullying.

On the National Journal's Copenhagen Insider blog, the five GOP members of the delegation reel off the ways Pelosi has maliciously attacked them:

[It] includes not being invited to attend a press briefing today featuring Pelosi, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., and five other Democratic leaders; not being helped in setting up their own media briefing; and initially not getting access to top U.N. climate negotiator Todd Stern.

[snip]

Pelosi is such a terrifying bully she apparently has kept the GOP's own media staff frozen with fear, according to another Democrat who spoke to NJ:

A House Democratic aide also said that Republicans didn't struggle with Democratic staff to get a room for their press conference; they made a late request to the U.N. "They had press staff out here since the weekend and seemingly have not done any planning," the Democratic aide said.

Obviously, it's all Nancy Pelosi's fault that the Cons are a bunch of incompetent fools.

These people just make me tired...