Sometimes I imagine the MAGA class of 2022 in group therapy with Mitch McConnell and his team. The marriage of cynicism and insanity is always volatile. This week, the group got bigger with the arrival of crazy General Bolduc. He is the MAGA candidate in the Granite State of New Hampshire. He believes that Covid vaccines contains government-tracking microchips. It’s possible he could have heard this from one of Herschel Walker’s 12 personalities, or picked it up from one of the doctors who JD Vance paid with his fake opioid charity, but unlikely. It’s probably just the voice in his head.
Who doesn’t want that in a US Senator? Some years back, New Hampshire had Bob Smith, a crazy senator who was convinced that the Vietnamese government was still holding American POWs after binging on too many Chuck Norris movies. This guy makes that guy look like Thomas Jefferson.
The Tea Party class of 2010 was famously loony. Christine “I’m not a witch” O’Donnell was a famous player, as well as Nevada’s Sharron Angle. She believed George W. Bush was responsible for orchestrating the 9/11 attacks. Today, her madness would be completely pedestrian.
The Republican 2022 nut pack is like the 1927 NY Yankees or 1985 Chicago Bears. It is an exceptional and historic team. It is unrivaled and unbeatable. The Yankees were a baseball team; the Bears, football. The GOP class of 22 is a MAGA loon pack. It may never be rivaled if American democracy survives — which is no guarantee given that less than half of Americans is unaware that there are three branches of government.
The good news is that the problem can’t last. Once that number gets high enough, government usually gets organized around just one branch of government. It’s easy to remember who runs it, as usually there are banners with his face, name and family all over the country making it hard to forget. The people who have had the misfortune of living in such places have traditionally tried to escape to America. It presents an interesting dilemma.