When you're looking at crumbs, you get desperate.
There's one thing to remember about all of the Tea Party nonsense in the past few weeks - heck, the past two decades: nothing raises political money like fear and anger. Even our side does it to some degree with its political mailings. But the far right has honed and perfected this concept into a marketing machine that has overshadowed not only the media but the entire government itself. Even the U.S. economy has been taken hostage, with every slight move in economic growth matched by nutter moves to slow it down, dragging out the meme of governmental failure by making us all fail.
With that in mind, though, the recent recklessness that turned the entire nation's fate into a mechanism for Ted Cruz' funneling of campaign funds into the hands of the Koch Brothers and their allies raises a key question: if they're so rich, why do they need money so bad? Potential answer: maybe their funding wells are going bust.
More after the break.
I did a Web search on the words "Ted Cruz Koch financing" and came up with some good articles on DK that really underscore the unraveling of far right finances. Credit keepemhonest with a great example of how Cruz-sponsored anti-Obamacare ads fuel the Koch fundraising machine directly, while Shockwave reminds us that this planning to use Obamacare opposition for fundraising is so not-freakin'-new. From opposing Obamacare to the government shutdown to the farcical sight of Sarah Palin and others protesting the (non)closing of the WWII Memorial in Washington, D.C. and even to the "last gasp" effort to oppose funding the national debt, the charade that has been the U.S. congress for the past two years has been about one thing: maximizing campaign funds donated from far right contributors to keep this madness going as long as possible.
But all is not well in far-right fund-raising land. As was revealed in recent days, Freedom Works, the cornerstone of Tea Party financing in 2010 and 2012 elections, is imploding, in part because of its hilariously corrupt management ($4,000 hotel bills versus $400 haircuts on an airplane, anyone?) and in part because even Dick Armey, the Koch Brothers and other far right stalwarts have flown the Freedom Works coop. It turns out that pumping out bull is a nasty business that attracts nasty businessmen, so nasty that they even offend the Kochs. There's a concept for ya.
So with Freedom Works waning, how do the Kochs continue to fund things? Apparently a bit more directly, and, as has been seen in this year's insanity, apparently with little regard to the welfare of anyone but themselves and their own twisted beliefs. Need a trained monkey to act like a madman to accomplish this with the entire world's economic fate in the balance? No worries, just crank up Ted Cruz, and he'll bash together his little tin cymbals obediently. In come the funds - voila. For now.
In other words, the ultra-rich masterminds of the far right have so little regard for politics and politicians being anything other than front men for their lobbyists conjuring up legislation to keep them on top that they have lost sight of the fact that real businesses and real people need government to do beneficial things. They never cared a whit about democracy, but now they cannot even figure out how to run a fascist state effectively. This seems to happen inevitably with fascism, for in the lives of people tortured by its stupidity, eventually even the most cowed victims of fascism learn that a well-fought fight to the death is better than life with this nonsense.
So, hence, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, once in the thick of pushing Tea Party nutterdom, is now threatening to fund more moderate (appearing) candidates in opposition to the far right's cadre of Faux News sock puppet politicians and would-be politician/spokesfunders. China's having second thoughts about financing U.S. debt - which will most certainly mean shifting back-door funding through other channels, or perhaps bypassing U.S. elections in general. In the meantime, embarrassing videos of Tea Party-sponsored rallies drawing mostly friends, families and a few stray Confederate Flag-waving sickos may appease the already de-brained loyalists but are creeping into the consciousness of people hurting from the economic mess that the loyalists have created.
In other words, it appears that the Democrats' denial of appeasement for this chicanery is having devastating effects on the Tea Party's ability to raise any sorts of meaningful funds from other than the most extreme elements of the Republican base - a base that seems increasingly synonymous with oil and gas interests, agribusiness, big banks and a few other wealth-hoarders. Eventually they're going to have to become more generous with the funding of their cause - a human trait that they're not too familiar with - or resign themselves to being but one voice in a pluralistic society. I imagine that the media will hang on to helping them out with the former until they stop getting funding themselves via ads and direct subsidies, but at some point pluralism soon begins to get the campaign dough.
So what to do? Follow Obama's lead - knock them on the ropes with a strong agenda. Show the American people that there's a way out of this mess and they can help to end it. Make the far right try even nuttier things - and by all means, encourage them to field as many of their candidates as possible, on Republican tickets if they must, but please, o please, force them to run independently in general elections to split the Republican vote. That's only fair, because there is very little left of the Republican party anyway as a political mechanism and they will then allow a wave of sane Democrats to march into Congress and statehouses across the nation.
As I mentioned in my post about General Robert E. Lee surrendering at Appomattox, revenge on an enemy that is starving for provisions is not important right now. It's more important to focus on seizing the opportunity to unite the nation in a just cause - and we certainly have a boatload of just causes to put in front of the American people. Push hard - real hard - for the positive things that Americans need, and that will draw both the funding and the success that will get more people in place to put a lasting end to this insanity. In response, the far right will get only more extreme, which is, from the perspective of accomplishing good things, great. They will only get more extreme, and less well funded.
With malice toward none, let's help the far right to burn out by focusing on a positive agenda to rebuild America. Those old "Hope" posters? Now is the time to start dusting them off. America needs - and is desperate for - real, honest hope. Let's give it to them.