Friday, June 4, 2010

I hate it when I poke my eye with this pencil

Like many of us, I've been watching this spring's internal GOP primary battles between moderate Republicans and the nut-case right. Surely many on the left are hoping for the far right to take over the party, but that's something I'd hate to have happen. I see little good coming from the end of the relatively balanced two-party system that has evolved in this country.

Spurring this worry today was the amusing painted cover of this week's "New Yorker" magazine. On it, in a congressional committee room, oil-covered fish, a dolphin, and several species of water birds sit behind the curve of congressional desks. In front of them, holding up his right hand to take the oath, is an older man wearing a gray suit, hair white except for a circle of baldness on the back of his head. No caption is necessary. We know who this man is. We can hear the dolphin, the oil-spattered "congressman" with its mouth open, asking: "Drill, baby, drill?"

Meanwhile, from this week's "Newsweek," comes the news that investigative reporter Joe McGinniss has moved in next to Sarah Palin in her hometown of Wasilla, Alaska. And Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, who got where he is by freaking out about Big Government, screams that Big Government isn't saving his shorelines.

In my state of Montana, Republicans of different stripes have taken out their knives against each other. From knives, I fear, it isn't very far from tatters.

Back in my youth, the radical left really, really damaged the Democratic Party. I hate to say it, but welcome to a similar but opposite story in 2010.

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