In  Josh's feature reader post today, "Mainstreaming the Crazy"
 reader SG laments that the mainstream is responding inadequately to the preponderance of ridicule and violence we have seen promulgated by astroturfers and their lemming teabaggers.

While I agree it is certainly no longer a laughing matter, I disagree that the center OR the left can mount a resistance directly. It will only bring about more violence. These crazy people with guns and attitudes to go with it can only be subdued by one, or some, of their own.

I think the violent finger-biting debacle reported about here shows that no one on the left or in the center can change this, it will take the likes of McCain and Palin to turn to their rabid followers and convince them to stand down.

Anything we might say here, or anywhere these crazies consider to be left of their far right center, will only add fuel to the fire.

My blog post of a couple days ago, WHERE ARE THE REPUBLICANS with enough courage to talk this lunacy down? may have been too vague.

 I said then, as I am saying now, any advice from the center and the left is anathema to these 'baggers. The Republicans who lead them are the only ones who can stop this.  But instead, they (the Republican leaders) seem to be either encouraging it or silently abiding it.

WE can't change this. It has to be changed by people these wingnuts trust.

I sympathize with everyone who is ready to stop laughing about the inanity and intimidation of it and start "doing something" about it, but my point is, the people we are speaking of doing something about despise US, Obama, and everything else they consider to be left of Limbaugh.

My simple point is, it will take leadership from the Republicans and the right wing media to turn this boil back down to a simmer.

 Maybe we could encourage our lawmakers to legislate a new form of hate crime, or better yet,  advise sensible Republicans we know to step in and start denouncing the hateful rhetoric and public riots. We can also mount an editorial campaign, to dissuade the media from shamelessly providing them coverage. 

But in terms of directly interfacing with them, all we can really do is stand aside and watch and hope their leaders can control them.  

We sure can't. All we would get is more violence, because they are so locked and loaded, and half-cocked against anyone who disagrees. I feel quite confident, if I walked into a crowd of 'baggers during one of their media-driven feeding frenzies, and tried to reason with them, no matter how graciously, I would probably be taken out on a gurney.  

That is the most meaningful question any of us has posed here.

I think most of us agree, it is about time for the true patriots and the true Christians in the GOP to step in and lean hard against these extremists who have usurped their party's power.

I am from Kansas, and was raised in Iowa in a very politically involved Republican family, but I turned Democrat after ______ (fill in the blank) killed Bobby. (I was 16 at the time, and canvassed neighborhoods for local Dems at that tender age.) 

I reveal this personal history to assure everyone, I DO know lots of Republicans, I am now and have for a lifetime been surrounded and outnumbered by them, so I speak from experience.  Too many livberals criticize Republicans as a body of selfich, ignorant millionaires, because they do not spend much time in conservative circles not of their own choosing.  But some of us have no option, especially out here in the Red States..

And while I don't defend them often, in this matter, I will say that there are many good hearted, intelligent (though stubbornly attached to their misguided ideology) Republicans who are growing ever more ashamed of these miscreants in elephant's clothing.

I dare say, if you take the wingnut Palinites out of the Republican mix, what remains is a pretty bright remnant, and they are almost all Christians, or at least they humbly aspire to that label.

Seriously, when will the SINCERELY intelligent, patriotic and spiritually faithful Republicans put a stop to this madness?  Do they even have the power anymore to effect such a moderation, or have the crazies taken over completely?

I fear it may be they are so outnumbered by the frantic fanatics whose hearts constantly devise mischief against our new President and the changes we all hope for, that they will never regain the helm of their floundering vessel.

The evidence of this is that they would have done something long ago to stifle the crazies in their party, if they had the power to do so.

The day is coming, and may actually be upon us, when the only course an honest soul can make is to abandon the sinking ship and swim for shore. Clearly, the "good" Republicans are subject to the worst members of their party.

Once again, let me re-quote that very meaningful sentence; 
WHERE ARE THE REPUBLICANS with enough courage to talk this lunacy down???

But this is not the first time in history that Republican wolves in sheep's clothing have goaded their goats into subversive mischief.  

In the LA Times there is an interesting article this AM about something the author calls "Wirtism" and it is worth a read, if you want an insight into how the Republican Party has been gamed in the past by the pernicious rich who use that party as tool of greed, and foment dissension bordering on treason in the bottom ranks of uncouth, uneducated Republican Party loyalists.