Lords of the Crazy

Every so often, we can't help but notice the wild and crazy antics on Capitol Hill. But now, they're wilder than ever. Even "The I Word" is attracting renewed buzz.

Wait... What?! Oh, yes. That's right. They're going there.

We even got a taste of it earlier this week, when Rep. Joe Heck (R-Henderson) held a town hall meeting in the Summerlin area. Several G-O-TEA faithful asked him about "The I Word". He tried his best to dance around it...





But several of his G-O-TEA colleagues in Congress are barely containing their giddiness. In May, Scandal-mania was in full swing. But now, it's gone from Scandal-mania to Impeach-a-palooza!

Never mind that they don't actually have a reason to impeach President Obama. They just to get rid of the twice elected Democratic President.. . Well, just because!

Salon's Joan Walsh tried to make sense of all this madness earlier today, but ultimately concluded by saying this.

[Senator Tom] Coburn’s [R-Oklahoma] impeachment rambling comes on the heels of similar musings by other congressional Republicans at their August town halls. Just Monday, when asked why not impeach the president, Sen. Ted Cruz [R-Texas] genially replied: “It’s a good question. And I’ll tell you the simplest answer: To successfully impeach a president you need the votes in the U.S. Senate.” Actually, the supposedly brilliant Cruz ought to know that to impeach a president, you need the votes in the House – the Senate then votes on whether to “convict” him.

But you know, maybe Cruz is getting ahead of himself because he believes his fellow Texan Rep. Blake Farenhold, who recently told his constituents that Republicans have the votes in the House to impeach Obama. “If we were to impeach the president tomorrow, you could probably get the votes in the House of Representatives to do it,” he said. “But it would go to the Senate and he wouldn’t be convicted.”

Of course, reindeer farmer Kerry Bentivoglio thinks impeaching Obama would be “a dream come true,” but he sounded more skeptical than Coburn about the chances of doing it – though he admitted consulting lawyers about possible grounds. “Until we have the evidence, you’re going to become a laughingstock if you’ve submitted a bill to impeach the president, because number one, you’ve got to convince the press,” he said.

So let’s recap: Coburn, one of the Republicans the Beltway media regularly use as an example of someone willing to work with Obama, sounds more convinced the president might be impeachable than a former reindeer farmer who resides on the party’s wingnut fringe. Reporters have to stop covering the supposed attempt of the GOP to heal itself, because it’s not happening. Real change in the party will require Republican leaders leveling with their base. That means standing up to nuts like Mark Levin and Rush Limbaugh and the delusional extremists organizing “Overpasses for Obama’s impeachment” (yes, that’s a thing) and showing up to rant at town halls.

Tom Coburn doesn’t have the guts to do that, so he can’t be counted among the last few reasonable Republicans. Let’s hope Time magazine leaves him off its annual list of 100 “influential” luminaries next year. Or at least let’s hope Obama declines to write the tribute to his GOP “friend” next time around.

Perhaps this was on Rep. Joe Heck's mind on Tuesday when he was trying to tamp down the local outburst of G-O-TEA Impeach-a-palooza. But of course, he still had to throw them some "red meat". So he promised even more investigations into long ago debunked conspiracy theories, as well as some sort of convoluted "Defund Obamacare " gimmick.

No wonder why the Republican Party has become such a hot mess both locally and nationally. It's as if they're reenacting "Lord of the Flies". Do they remember how that novel ends?