My city of residence, Bloomington, IN, was the latest human population center to be infested with Teabaggers this past Labor Day Weekend. Evidently, there is some sort of Teabagging Express that moves around the country in a couple of large buses spreading and attracting stupidity wherever it goes.
The people that show up to these events and the stuff they say is very infuriating- it takes a great deal of self control for me to not explode into a profanity-laced diatribe lamenting the current state of affairs.
The local media coverage of this event-which may have drawn 100-150 people at most- made me even angrier. The reporter relied on the organizers own hyper-inflated estimates to quantify those in attendance. In addition- and this is a disease which afflicts almost all of the mainstream media- the story uncritically re-stated the claims and accusations made by the teabaggers.
In a way, I am glad to see the traditional media struggling so, as it has become glorified stenography instead of journalism- which involves research and that little thing known as WORK to do well.
But the most angering aspect of these teabagging events is the absolute, pure STUPIDITY that permeates them. I don't know who these people are and what made them so radicalized, but their behavior brings to mind the undying truth that the more ignorant a person is, the more sure they are of their beliefs.
What else could explain the man holding the "Impeach Obama" sign or the genius carrying the "Obama Lies: Grandma Dies" poster?
Any critical dissection of the aforementioned teabagger signs would reveal them to be completely baseless and FALSE.
And then there are the knuckleheads who claim that Obama's policies are unconstitutional. I want to ask them which specific part of the Constitution prohibits in any way ANY of the President's policies (absent the warrantless wiretapping and denial of due process to enemy combatants, which is NOT what the teabaggers have in mind)?
And why is there all of this sudden concern over government debt? Did these people have wool over their eyes the past eight years when Bush rang up $5 trillion in debt despite presiding over an economy that was not on the brink of collapse until the last year of his term? Those of us in the reality-based community understand that recessions cause tax revenues to drop, exacerbating existing budget deficits- as does a bloated military budget which the teabaggers ostensibly support wholeheartedly.
When I read about these Teabaggers, I weep for the world and how imperfect it is. I vacillate between sadness and anger. Why are these mental midgets given so much airtime and media coverage?