It seems that the longer President Barack Obama is in the White House, the more deranged his right-wing opposition becomes. From Kenyan birth to being a secret Muslim to embarking on apology tours, Obama’s first term was marked by one convoluted conspiracy theory after another. Now that the president has won re-election, his opponents promise to become even more unbalanced.
With that in mind, The National Memo is launching a new weekly series to monitor the most absurd examples of wingnut wackiness: This Week In Crazy. It was pretty hard to narrow it down to just five, but here are our picks for the most certifiably insane outbursts of the past seven days:
Think we missed something? Tell us in the comments, or email us at editors@nationalmemo.com
5: Joe Walsh
(Photo by Gage Skidmore/Flickr)
Tea Party hero Joe Walsh was voted out of Congress, but that won’t stop him from bringing the crazy. At a rally in Chicago on Thursday, Walsh encouraged the crowd to “defy and/or break the law and engage in civil disobedience” to try to defeat the almost-three-year-old Affordable Care Act.
“We may have to shed blood every couple hundred years to preserve our freedoms,” Walsh ominously warned.
If we’re lucky, Walsh will try to explain his latest controversial remarks by returning to CNN.
4: Ted Nugent
(AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar, File)
Washed-up rock star, draft dodger, and NRA board member Ted Nugent confidently told right-wing nutjob website WorldNetDaily Wednesday that if the Obama administration enacts new gun control laws, “There will come a time when the gun owners of America, the law-abiding gun owners of America, will be the Rosa Parks and we will sit down on the front seat of the bus, case closed.”
Considering that Nugent wishes that the Confederacy had won the Civil War, it’s unclear whether the Rosa Parks comparison is intended to be a compliment. In any case, we only have to wait three more months until Nugent is either “dead or in jail.”
3: Alex Jones
Far-right radio host and noted conspiracy loon Alex Jones, who has had more than his fair share of wacko moments, managed to outdo himself during a Monday night interview with CNN’s Piers Morgan:
How unhinged was Jones’ rant? Even Glenn Beck reacted to it by labeling Jones a “crazy person.“
2: Frank Gaffney
Gaffney, a former Reagan administration official and noted birther, has a Michele Bachmann-like theory about defense secretary nominee Chuck Hagel. According to Gaffney, Hagel isn’t just an anti-Semite, he’s probably a straight-up Iranian spy.
“You couldn’t find a guy who has been more active in terms of promoting the interests of Iran at the expense of the United States than Chuck Hagel, other than somebody who is actually an Iranian agent,” Gaffney said on The Janet Mefford Show Tuesday.
Of course, like Bachmann, Gaffney wouldn’t fully commit to his insane accusation. “I’m not suggesting that he is, I don’t know,” Gaffney hedged. He’s just asking questions.
1: Newtown Truthers
(AP Photo/Craig Ruttle)
In the wake of the horrific Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre, a determined group of conspiracy theorists has advanced the truly depraved theory that the entire shooting was an elaborate hoax.
As Salon’s Alex Seitz-Wald reports, one of the leaders of the new truther movement, Jay Johnson, has compiled all of the conspiracy theories at the website SandyHookHoax.com. According to Johnson, the whole tragedy was manufactured, and is “brazenly and maliciously being used to brainwash the public about guns, regardless of FACTS.”
How do you know you can you trust Johnson’s bombshell theory? On his website, he writes –speaking about the TV show — “I am the only person in the world to solve LOST.” So obviously his word is gospel.
