Your Opinion: "The crazies have taken the tiller'

Dear Editor:

"I wasn't happy about the country being controlled by the richest one percent, but I really hate it being controlled by the dumbest one percent." So says humorist Andy Borowitz.

It's sad listening to citizen's reel off Fox and Rush talking points on what is now transpiring in America.

Let's cut to the chase. If Vladimir Putin threatened to blow up an American embassy unless we negotiated with him over matters favorable to Russia, would this be any different than what Republican representatives are trying to pull off. I realize they have been tricked into an untenable position by Texas Senator Ted Cruz. That just means they are gullible to right-wing extremists.

The list of elected Republican officials and public figures that despise the current strategy of a Republican minority is growing hourly. That might or might not make a difference. When Grover Norquist and Karl Rove jump off the ship you know you are in uncharted waters.

We have been skating on thin ice for some time. President Obama is part of the problem. He is perceived as weak and will cave every time he is confronted with a challenge. This causes radicals to challenge him repeatedly. You can't say that is a wrong strategy. Except what is happening now is not in this country's interest or the world at large. The great unknown is will Obama stand his ground to save the world economy and just stiff the Republican jihadi's. We can only hope.

If the government shutdown winds into the debt ceiling issue then all bets are off. The sequester disaster is a slow moving process. Citizens do not realize how they are being robbed of their assets. The great irony is that the white anger fueling the tea party delusion is the lost income caused by four decades of plutocrats rigging the system to favor their selves. Plutocrats have funded the tea party mania, but now the crazies have taken the tiller. While this is delicious retribution, we are all in the same sinking boat.

Modern movement conservatism has one long range goal and that is to eliminate government as an organizing principal. You can call it libertarianism but the branch that infests the Republican Party is close to anarchist. The idea that 300 million plus citizens can be governed by business interests and civic organizations is an untested theory in the modern world.