You might say that extremists are everywhere these days. On the left, on the right, even in the middle, it's hard to find anyone who hasn't convinced themselves that anyone on the opposing side is not only wrong, but evil and hellbent on destroying America. One must look no further than the tea party movement to see this in action, or its de facto leaders Sarah Palin and Michele Bachmann.
As a Minnesotan, Bachmann's looming presence in our state has become a bit of a personal thing, especially living only nine miles away from her district. My representative, Erik Paulsen, isn't much better but at least isn't interested in becoming a national icon like Bachmann is. And there's the rub - there's certainly enough to not like about Bachmann just based around her views on how to properly run a country, but its her complete lack of interest in representing Minnesota that truly irritates me. Where she should be working towards creating jobs and funding projects in her sixth district, she'd rather grandstand and impeach a democratically elected president for... I don't know, giving poor people health care or something.
And the same goes for the threat she, along with the rest of the tea party, poses to our society. Yes, just looking at their views is frightening, but what really scares me is the way the media frames their beliefs - a principled division between liberalism and conservatism, deserving of honest debate. We should be dismissing these radical beliefs, but instead we give them a podium from which to spew them. When Palin opens her mouth about the hot issue of the day, the media's eyes light up with dollar signs, because they've got a story to run tomorrow. If the narrative were "Crazy ol' Michele Bachmann, what will she think of next?" then everyone would go about their business and not invest themselves seriously in the words of these women, save for a few on the far right who already align themselves with them.
But instead, we find America talking about issues that shouldn't actually be issues. What basis is there to repeal the 14th amendment? There is no debate, there never has been, and there never should be. As some of the more "moderate" (ha!) members of the GOP have stepped up to the plate to say "Okay, seriously, you've gone too far this time," that running gag seems to have lost its humor and they've moved onto attacking Muslims for building a community center near the site of the 9/11 attacks. I admit that normally I wouldn't be following this story because I don't care, but that's exactly it. The media has turned this into such a big scandal that I'm forced to care, because really, what else is there? And now fundamentalist Christians like Palin are heating up the rhetoric, attacking all Muslims outright, not just the ones who hijacked an airplane nine years ago. It seems like every time a new story like this pops up, they try their damndest to outcrazy the last model of crazy.
The president takes a more moderate position, that yes, they have their right to build this community center, but also that they might want to reconsider their location. These words represent his position since day 1, yet the media, the best friend of controversy, tries to craft the narrative that he's a flip-flopping Islamic sympathizer. You see, for how much credit they're giving the far right, the left has no voice. So on top of all this - possessing beliefs that on their own are completely loco, the media willing to take them seriously, and inventing problems before finding solutions, this might be the most dangerous factor of them all. There is no chaos to counter the chaos and provide balance.
Gone is yesteryear's GOP, which in some respects was just as bad as today's, but their positives can still shine through in men like Richard Lugar of Indiana. Men open to compromise, open to dialogue, and not as adamant about having everything their way. Most importantly, those who, while their beliefs differ from mine, are still based on a fundmental desire to help our country. These are the virtues that should be pushed by the modern day Republican Party, not jokes like Palin or Bachmann, who only want to further divide a polarized electorate for the purpose of their own financial gains.
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