You doubt this?

Look at how Romney is running his campaign. He couldn't get further to the right on any issue if he tried. He's a human short circuit, always taking the path of least resistance. I've never in my life seen a more gutless, hollow politician.

The just concluded senatorial primary in Texas was won by a Tea Partier who accused a "severely" conservative candidate, Rick Perry's right hand man, of being "moderate" in a campaign ad. In these times, you don't ever want to be tagged with a moniker that might even hint that you plausibly have a speck of reason.

How could this happen? How is the insane "base" of the party now being allowed to play the tune for the whole party? And why?

Well, for one, this "base" is one third to forty percent of the party now. The party is not numerically viable anymore without these "people" (I'm giving them the benefit of the doubt).

The guys with the money still need enough numbers to keep their party "nominally" republican. So, they let them yell and scream about abortion and contraception and gay marriage and guns and religion and repealingobamacare. These billionaires don't care about day to day stuff like that. They can buy any result they want in their own life, they don't care about yours. If it makes their base happy to yell and scream about shit like that, they're all for it, as long as they continue to turn out at the polls.

In your fathers republican party, there were just enough reasonable adults to keep these kooks on the fringes. That is not the case anymore. What were looking at is a night of the living dead scenario where the zombie base is growing and the reasonable middle class people have headed for the hills. Unfortunately, these zombies are here to stay, and they represent a grave danger to our democracy because they have no desire to participate reasonably in governing. Their idea of compromise is bringing a gun to a political rally and deciding not to shoot anybody.

When Palin and the tea party emerged four years ago, my first reaction was laughter because I couldn't believe somebody and something so stupid could have a future in the political culture in this country.

I'm not laughing anymore.

My thanks to "Community Spotlight". Now that I've finally been "recced up", that's one more thing I can check off on my "bucket list"!