REPUBLICANS TRANSMOGRIFIED

"Richard Nixon was the last Republican leader to feel a Christian obligation toward the poor," writes Garrison Keillor, in a call to arms to recapture the greatness that is America — and that's not one where liberties are subverted, the Constitution is perverted and fallacy become the basis for policy here or abroad.

What's slightly disturbing is that Nixon is hailed as the last in the line of decent, honorable man. But in comparison with the rabid ideologues and oft-failed businessman that comprise this administration, Nixon practically qualifies for sainthood.

Keillor takes his swipes handily:

The party of Lincoln and Liberty was transmogrified into the party of hairy-backed swamp developers and corporate shills, faith-based economists, fundamentalist bullies with Bibles, Christians of convenience, freelance racists, misanthropic frat boys, shrieking midgets of AM radio, tax cheats, nihilists in golf pants, brownshirts in pinstripes, sweatshop tycoons, hacks, fakirs, aggressive dorks, Lamborghini libertarians, people who believe Neil Armstrong’s moonwalk was filmed in Roswell, New Mexico, little honkers out to diminish the rest of us, Newt’s evil spawn and their Etch-A-Sketch president, a dull and rigid man suspicious of the free flow of information and of secular institutions, whose philosophy is a jumble of badly sutured body parts trying to walk. Republicans: The No.1 reason the rest of the world thinks we’re deaf, dumb and dangerous.

This is a great country, and it wasn’t made so by angry people. We have a sacred duty to bequeath it to our grandchildren in better shape than however we found it. We have a long way to go and we’re not getting any younger.

Keillor understands, perhaps, the concept that America is a liberal concept — where freedom of speech, religion, the press and assembly are inalieable rights, where government has no place in our churches or our bedrooms, and exists for the good of the people, not the other way around.

[Thanks to C.L. for pointing out this article.]