Today's Republican Party: Ignorance, Thuggishness and Racism

This year the mask has slipped from the face of the Republican Party. Now here's the thing. I believe that most Republican and Independent VOTERS are reasonable people. But the candidates that the Tea Party and right wing Republicans are offering are among the most ignorant, thuggish and racist bunch I have ever seen. From the Sarah Palin level ignorance of Christine O'Donnell to the violent thuggishness of Carl Paladino and his campaign manager Michael Caputo, today's Republican Party is nasty, dumb, racist and violent.

And in the end, I believe a vast majority of voters will reject this kind of thuggish racism and astonishing stupidity.

Think I exaggerate? I don't. Here is video of Carl Paladino, who is the Republican and Tea Party nominee for New York Governor, and his Campaign Thug Michaael Caputo actually threatening and pushing a CONSERVATIVE journalist (Fred Dicker of the NY Post):



And the irony is they are alienating the CONSERVATIVE media here. Wonder if the Post will still carry their water or if Paladino and Caputo just shot themselves in the foot big time by alienating their allies. But the key thing here is that Paladino and Caputo are complete idiots and thugs, and yet THAT is what the modern Republican Party embraces. Paladino is the poster child of the modern Republican Party and it is a disgusting picture.

But remember, this isn't even Republican/Tea Bagger Paladino's worst side. Paladino has PROUDLY expressed his liking for racism (e.g. use of the term "nigger"), pornography and, get this, bestiality. Carl Paladino, the Republican and Tea Party nominee for governor, apparently is in the habit of emailing racist emails and videos as well as videos of bestiality and pornography. According to Daily Kos (as well as an email I saw this morning), Paladino has sent emails that include:

# A popular video among white supremacists called "Obama Inauguration Rehearsal," that includes dancing African tribesmen.

# A video titled "Miss France 2008 fucking," that Paladino called "a keeper."

# An image of Barack and Michelle Obama dressed like a pimp and a prostitute, with the subject line, "White House ball."

# An image with the caption, "HOLY SHIT, run niggers, run."

# A bestiality video featuring a man and a horse.

And the sleazy Michael Caputo has DEFENDED Paladino's use of the word "nigger" and forwarding videos of bestiality. People, THIS is the face of today's Republican Party.

And then there is Christine O'Donnell, the Republican/Tea Bagger nominee for Senate in Delaware. This woman has claimed that scientists (I guess that includes me) have ALREADY created a mouse with a "fully functional human brain." From a 2007 interview with that other intellectual light weight, Bill O'Reilly:

O'DONNELL: They are — they are doing that here in the United States. American scientific companies are cross-breeding humans and animals and coming up with mice with fully functioning human brains. So they're already into this experiment.

Ummm...that would be complete and utter crap. There is no research anywhere in the world that is coming up with mice with fully functioning human brains. It doesn't even make sense given the fact that a fully functioning human brain is itself considerably larger than a mouse. As one fellow scientist pointed out the physics alone are blatantly impossible. A MOUSE is MUCH smaller than a fully functioning human brain. Even 5 seconds of rational thought would tell Republican/Tea Bagger O'Donnell she just said something incredibly stupid.

This level of ignorance...even worse, ignorance that is so convinced that it is right despite all evidence to the contrary, is another facet of today's Republican Party.

Finally, no fewer than 5 Republican/Tea Party candidates for Senate express the most extreme view of abortion: than it should be banned EVEN in cases of endangering a woman's health or in cases of rape or incest. Yes, these 5 extremist candidates want to FORCE women to carry the child of a rapist.

Currently, virtually each and every Senator, whether Democrat, Republican or Independent, pro-choice or anti-choice, are prepared to accept abortion as justifiable when a woman is a victim of rape or incest. Well, the right wing extremists are trying very hard to change that.

Five right wing Republican Senate candidates believe that women should be forced to carry the baby forced on them by incest or rape. Yes, FIVE REPUBLICAN SENATE CANDIDATES believe women should have no choice whatsoever after being raped or abused through incest. This is, by the standards of virtually every Republican, Democratic or Independent Senator currently in office, an extremist view.

Those five extremist Republican Senate candidates are: Rand Paul of Kentucky, Ken Buck of Colorado, Joe Miller of Alaska, Sharron Angle of Nevada, and Christine O’Donnell of Delaware.

Now the fact that some or all of these extremist nut cases claim they favor "libertarian" values doesn't get in the way of them using government to force women to carry a rapist's child. Somehow their small government claims disappear when they are talking about a woman's rights. I guess the rights of rapists to reproduce means more to the likes of Rand Paul and Christine O'Donnell than the rights of women.

From Booman Tribune:

here are five Republicans running for U.S. Senate who do not believe in any rape or incest exemption from their proposed ban on abortions. Maddow was able to document through video and surveys that Rand Paul of Kentucky, Ken Buck of Colorado, Joe Miller of Alaska, Sharron Angle of Nevada, and Christine O'Donnell of Delaware all hold this extreme view on reproductive rights.

I'm pretty sure that none of the 100 senators currently serving have publicly embraced this absolutist position. I would hope that holding such a position is sufficiently repulsive to make you unelectable to statewide office in this country. But Miller and Paul are ahead in the polls and Angle is within the margin of error.

Not too many people are focusing on social issues in this election, but we shouldn't fail to take notice of this disturbing trend. Anyone who wants to tell you that there is no difference between the parties is full of shit. The Republican Party was bad enough when Ronald Reagan was running the show. They were catastrophically bad under the latter Bush. But they are now worse than they've ever been. When you're pro-bestiality and anti-masturbation, when you're pro-rape child and anti-desegregated lunch counters...you've left the universe of the sane.

And here is the Rachel Maddow video on the extremism of these five candidates:



And Planned Parenthood is on top of this, trying to restore reason to these 5 Senate races:

It was easy to laugh at some of the crazy statements made by the newest Republican U.S. Senate candidate, Christine O'Donnell: "Masturbation is a form of adultery!" "Condoms are anti-human!"

But the laughing stopped — immediately — when I added it all up: Five Republican U.S. Senate candidates are running on the most extreme anti-abortion platform possible. They want to outlaw all abortion, even in cases of rape and incest.

...their position was considered fringe and their candidacies ludicrous just a few months ago. Now, they're mainstream...

On her show, Rachel Maddow asked Princeton University politics professor Melissa Harris-Lacewell for her thoughts on this alarming situation. Her comments drove home the fact that we are in an historic struggle.

"There is no place in the world, and no time in history, where restricting women's reproductive rights make a people or a nation more free or more equal. These extreme positions on abortion are without any question a war on American girls and women.

When you talk about the rape and incest clause, I suspect that many Americans, maybe even many pro-choice Americans, think that rape and incest and pregnancy resulting from it is a pretty unusual occurrence.

But the fact is that sexual assault is an embarrassingly common experience... in our country it's still true that 1 in 4 girls and women are likely to be sexually assaulted in their lifetime. We're talking about hundreds of women, thousands of women, and pregnancies every year."

— Melissa Harris-Lacewell, Princeton University on The Rachel Maddow Show...

The Planned Parenthood Action Fund needs your help now to educate voters, push back against attacks on pro-choice candidates, and continue to fight for laws and policies that protect women's health and rights. If we don't stand strong, the elections on November 2 will hand incredible power to those dead set on undermining reproductive freedom and family planning. And the women who count on Planned Parenthood to protect their health and defend their rights will pay a terrible price.

These are the stakes; this is the danger we face. So, I'm making this personal plea. Whatever doubts you have about the electoral process, please set them aside. Whatever frustrations you have with politicians and this mid-term election, move past them.

This year the level of extremism, racism and advocacy of violence coming from the Republican Party is at near record levels. The Republicans are no longer about small government and fiscal responsibility (if they ever really were). They are about racism, protecting the rights of rapists to reproduce, restricting our freedoms and giving tax breaks to the rich. That is their platform.

And I firmly believe that the average Republican and Independent voter is NOT in favor of this level of racism and violence.