A Modest Proposal

First — read this: Feast of the Wingnuts (How economic crackpots devoured American politics.) This is a great article (teasing Chait’s book on the same subject) from about a year ago — it is sorta long, but stick with it. Here’s some of the intro:

American politics has been hijacked by a tiny coterie of right-wing economic extremists, some of them ideological zealots, others merely greedy, a few of them possibly insane. The scope of their triumph is breathtaking. Over the course of the last three decades, they have moved from the right-wing fringe to the commanding heights of the national agenda. Notions that would have been laughed at a generation ago–that cutting taxes for the very rich is the best response to any and every economic circumstance or that it is perfectly appropriate to turn the most rapacious and self-interested elements of the business lobby into essentially an arm of the federal government–are now so pervasive, they barely attract any notice.

Just read the whole thing. The conclusions will certainly resonate now.

Second — why are we still listening to these guys? This glorious piece of video has been highlighted across the web, showing Grover Norquist being laughed off the air for claims that the current economic mess is due to the Dems taking over Congress in 2006 and some anticipatory tax increases in 2010. Seriously. But if you’ve just finished reading the TNR piece, what you know is that there is a fairly rigid right-wing ideology that, after working hard to get into place since Reagan, has rather spectacularly failed on all points. And yet, here is Grover, back talking the same old BS.

There is a long list of right-wing to wingnut commentators including Grover Norquist, Bill Kristol, the crew over at The Corner, Max Boot, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, everybody over at Fox News, all of the Pajamas Media whackos who have been just plain wrong on just plain everything. The Economy, Iraq, Afghanistan, domestic policy — you finish the list.

My proposal is that we just top listening to these people. Really, the only reason to listen to them in the past 8 years is because they had some access to or influence on power. Now they don’t. So why do we need to see them show up in the so-called liberal media? Of course, the so-called liberal media will continue their need for “objective” reporting so the he say/she say stuff will continue. But is it too much to ask media types to stop making pretend that the people who have been so wrong on so much have any credibility left? The wingnut chattering and pundit-class needs not just a time-out, but a mass notice that their 15 minutes is just plain over. And we need to start asking the so-called liberal media WTF? when they drag one of these guys or gals out to balance out a conversation. Every liberal or centrist person who is being asked for a reaction to some new piece of wingnuttery needs to ask why anyone would care anymore about what said wingnut thinks about anything — we already know it is wrong. Ignore them back to their Bradley, or Sciafe or Olin-funded cushy sinecures to make room for the folks who will join us in the reality-based world.