So I'm at TPM reading about Michelle Bachmann's latest safari to the far borders of sanity and reason, and I'm shaking my head, because while I have, for the most part, been extremely pleased with everything that's been happening under My Black President (as we affectionately refer to him here at Castle Anthrax), I am at a loss to figure out exactly which of the many, many, many vitally important yet, to my mind, largely inoffensive and uncontroversial measures he or his Administration have taken to cause Republicans and conservatives to so thoroughly and publicly lose their bottles.  As nearly all of them have, over the last two months, at one point of another.

What fantastic outrage is it that, perpetrated by the perfidious Obama Administration, has sparked this avalanche of fury from the far Right?  Exactly what is it that the Bam Man has done to inspire these primal screams, these titantic tantrums, these wild eyed fist waving fits, these shrieks of Marxism and Socialism, these insane accusations of fascism and Nazism, these defiant bellows hoping the President fails, these latest ululating trumpetings for 'orderly revolution'?

What, what, what in the name of Fred n' Wilma Flintstone, has The Coolest Chief Executive In History done to get all these wingnut panties in such a great big piss stained bunch?

So I put this to my wife, who is a wise wise woman, much much smarter than I am (other than in her choice of lifemate, where I somehow completely bamboozled her).  "Babe," I said, "the Republicans have always been bananas but now they have come completely unhinged.  And can it really be just because Our Black President raised taxes incrementally on the wealthiest fraction of Americans?  Is that truly the reason?  He's slightly increasing taxes on people who make a whole lot of money back to their Bill Clinton levels, and because of this, the entire conservative movement has gone completely round the frickin' bend?"

My wife looked at me pityingly, and responded pithily. "No, honey.  It's because they can't stop him.  He keeps getting stuff done.  They try to get in his way and they can't.  That's what's driving them nuts.  They just can't stop him."

And of course, she is correct.

It's not resetting the tax rate for those who make over $200,000 a year to post Reagan, pre Dubya levels. It's not increased CAFE standards.  It's not the stimulus bill, it's not Gitmo, it's not the release of classified documents embarrassing to the Bushies.  It's not his ambitious agenda regarding energy policy, climate change, overhauling the financial sector, or education.  It's not any of these things.

It's just that they can't stop him.

Or, apparently, deal with it.

At all.

I mean, this has always been the Republican strategy.  When you're in power, loot and pillage.   When you're not in power, obstruct, spin, and blame the other guy until you get back in power.  World without end, amen, amen.

Yet suddenly it's not working any more.  They're doing all the stuff they've always done... they're throwing red meat to the base, trying to whip up a populist outcry, screaming all the usual hate words on Fox News and the talk radio shows, working all that good Roberts Rules of Order bullshit in the Senate, filibustering everything that walks, limps, or crawls... obstruct, obstruct, obstruct, obstruct. 

And they're spinning, too, and trying to blame the other guy right, left and sideways... this is the Obama Recession.  It's all Nancy Pelosi's fault.  The Democrats are not sufficiently bi-partisan.  They're taxing.  They're spending.  They're putting our great grandchildren's future in hock.    It's European style socialism, it's modern day one party fascism, it's Marxism, it's a betrayal of everything America is all about.  

But a weird thing happened this time on the way to the polling booths... the Democrats seem to have got some game from somewhere.  The progressive party is suddenly all mojoed up.  The Republicans go the talk radio route, and the Dems use Rush Limbaugh to make them look ridiculous.  The Republicans scream that America is less safe under Obama, and the Democrats say "9/11 didn't happen on our watch, buddy boy, and Osama bin Laden didn't escape when we controlled Congress and the White House". 

It's like judo.  They do the usual flashy flying high kick nonsense that's always worked before, and Our Black President grabs them by the ankle and drops them on their head.

So they're obstructing... themselves.  They're spinning... their wheels.  They're blaming... everybody else, as usual.   And it's not working.

And it's driving them absolutely bonkers.

The Republican Party has become the Party of Fail... and the American people are saying, in a great big scary Darth Vader voice, "You have failed us for the last time."

They're lost.  They're clueless.  They don't know what to do, where to look, what to say, who to turn to.   Their best and brightest are busy bitching at each other because in the last Presidential campaign, nobody prayed enough.   Or standing up in front of America and saying, with a great big Pee Wee Herman sneer, "Well, you know all that stupid stuff I did?  Well... I meant to do that."

That's their whole plan.  That's all they got.

So to them, I say this, and I say it with all sincerity and enormous good will:

Welcome to the margins, guys.  Welcome to the side of the road.

Get comfie.

DC:  I don't get it.  I mean, I just don't get it.
KR:  Get what, sir?  I mean, what's not to get?
DC:  This.  This thing.  This thing where people are... what do you call it...
KR:  I'm not sure, sir. Give me a hint.
DC:  Okay.  We used to say whatever we wanted.  You know?  We'd say "support the troops" when everybody knew we'd never let our kids join the military.  We impeached Clinton for lying to Congress... what was that thing we said...
KR:  "Rule of law!"
DC:  Right, right, 'rule of law', that was great.  ::snickering::  I mean, we'd say whatever we wanted.  Whatever sounded good.  And people bought it.  I mean, they bought it.  They'd swallow it whole, hook, line, and sinker.  They'd go right out and vote for us and it wouldn't matter that what we said was just some empty emotionally evocative phrase that was actually semantically meaningless.   Like, you know, what was that thing Ronnie ran on...
KR:  "Morning in America."
DC:  Right!  Morning in America!  What the @#&!! does that even mean?  But people bought it.
KR:  Family values.
DC:  Exactly!  You're a smart guy, Karl.  You try to define for me what 'family values' are.  Just try.
KR:  It's whatever we're pointing at at the time, Mr. Vice President.  "What about the victim's rights" is another good one.
DC:  Yes!  I mean, victim's rights?  What the hell is that?  Everybody has the same rights.   They just generally don't come into play when you're not being arrested for something... but, you know, good example, because that one got a lot of people completely outraged.  Totally up in arms.  And voting for us.
KR:  But now...
DC:  Now, not so much.  And I don't understand it.  I mean, what changed?  What is this thing people are doing now, that they weren't doing before?  Why is it that we say things... perfectly good things, we've got our people out there throwing around these great phrases like... like...
KR:  ::silence::
DC:  Okay.  Well, that's it.  Where are our great phrases?  What's happened to those great provocative yet actually meaningless conservative slogans we used to have to throw around?
KR:  Well, sir, we've got... um... "I hope the President fails".
DC:  It's... well, of course we do, but... I don't know... there's no real zing there.  Is there?  Is there zing and I'm not hearing the zing?  Is it me?
KR:  No, sir, there's no real zing there.  Plus, you know, it's the kind of thing where people outside the base hear that and they tend to think "Gee, when Democrats were questioning George Bush the Republicans were calling them traitors and none of them ever said anything like 'I hope George Bush fails'."  So that's working against us...
DC:  That's it!  You just said it!  That's what's going on now that wasn't going on before.
KR:  What?
DC:  You said it.  "They tend to think".  They tend to think?  Since when?  They never thought when I was in office.  When did they start thinking on us?  I mean, how does that work?
KR:  Well... sir... I mean... yes, I suppose, you're right, but... our people  don't tend to think.  I mean, I was saying, the people outside the base tend to think... but our people are still pretty... er... non-thought oriented. 
DC:  But that's it.  That's the difference.  We used to be a Big Tent.  We had a lot of people on our side, and none of them 'tended to think', they'd just vote the way they were told, and now our base has dwindled, and why?  It's because more and more people have started to think!  Even those goddam Christians!
KR:  Well, sir, we always knew there was a chance they'd wise up eventually.  You know, you can only throw them red meat during election years and then ignore their crazy ass demands the rest of the time for so long.  Eventually it's inevitable they're going to tumble to the game.
DC:  No, that's not true.  It's not true.  We strung those dumb bastards along for decades.  It always worked.  You'd say "gays want special rights so fags can marry your kids" and they'd suck it right down. Worked like a charm.   Never failed. Nobody in their right mind would ever have thought those mooks would ever start to think.  I mean, you can't be devoutly religious if you think.  Right?
KR:  I... well, sir...
DC:  So where did we go wrong?  How did we let more than half of the American people start to think?
KR:  Well, sir, I blame Keith Olbermann.
DC:  Olbermann?
KR:  Yes, sir.  And Jon Stewart.
DC:  Well.  Well.  Have them killed, then.  Use that special group I run out of my office.
KR:  Um... sir, you're not in power any more.
DC:  ::long pause::  ...I hate that.
KR:  Yes, sir. Also, sir, it's occurring to me that when Halliburton got so involved over in Iraq, they may have let that secret domestic project to put heavy doses of statins in the public water supply slip a little.  Plus, we weren't quite as diligent as we should have been weeding all the competent teachers out of the public education system.   Also, we keep recruiting our own people on the basis of, you know, how greedy and two faced they are, instead of looking for actual competence.  These things are incremental, but it's possible that they've added up.
DC:  And the end product is, we've let far too many people start thinking.
KR:  Yes, sir.
DC:  Well, that's terrible!  The conservative movement can't flourish in that kind of environment!  We have to do something!
KR:  We will, sir.
DC: What?  What are we going to do?  Does it involve killing people?  Or shooting someone in the face?
KR:  Well, we have that big mandatory digital conversion coming up, with all the broadcast television signals, sir.
DC:  Oh.  Are we going to modulate the frequencies to control people's minds like with that top secret Navy HARP program? I like that.  I like that a lot.
KR:  No, sir.  Our corporate donors are just going to give away a lot of free TVs.  And free cable.  To, you know... the poor.
DC:  And... TV will keep people from thinking?
KR:  ::shrugs::  Always has... we  just need to make sure Brett Michaels stays on the air, and I think we'll see a big Republican comeback in 2010.