As much as I’d like to believe that this is a country of rational sentience, there are deep pockets of abject mental instability laying in wait. I can understand the temptation to ignore these outbursts of death panels and Nazi-Socialist warnings as just ravings of arch-racist nonsense, but let it wait. Let them have their time in the sun.

I’m not saying try to dialogue with them and convince them otherwise. That would be feckless. You could say something like, “there are no death panels”. Simple as that. It’s such an easy statement to counter with. “But you didn’t know about the FEMA Trailer Assembly meeting in August of last year that put together a proposal to massacre the elderly.” Is it true? Absolutely not, but who can argue with such detail. Every obscure theory and rabbit hole has been thoroughly and obsessively mined by these psychotic mole rats.

They are loud and crazy and they’re not going to take “it” anymore. “It” being an unknown quantity. These barnstorming barbarians braying at the gates have been kept down long enough and now they want to be heard. And I say let them. Glenn Beck already has an hour-long show on Fox, let’s give him two on prime-time television. In fact, let’s give him a whole daylong telethon to spout his dramatic fear-mongering hysterics. Even better, let’s give him and Lou Dobbs a big parade down old Broadway and through every Main Street in America surrounded by heavily armed militias and enough American flags to keep China’s garment industry running for years on end. They should have a right-wing Burning Man that’ll make Sturgis look like the Lilith Fair. Maybe they can get Lee Greenwood or that Rappin’ cowboy, or those two Nazi twin girls, and a whole slew of country stars to re-enact their own special right wing Woodstock. We’ll all sit back and watch it and deride their protest sign antics and yell at them to “grow some hair for goodness sake”. If they want to repurpose steal sixties radicalism techniques originally meant to stop wars and promote civil rights into psychotic pro-corporate messages against providing health care for the poor, they should take the whole sixties package with them.

But most importantly, we get as many dyed in the wool Red state senators to attend and be photographed amongst the hordes. Get them on record gallivanting about with Glenn Beck on a jingoistic meth bender. Pictures of a Congressman alongside militia members and Montana separatists might stop any future attempt of them hiding behind Nationalism and the flag. Just like how the more people watch Fox, the more the Republicans lose power, the crazier they get, the more fractured their base becomes.

Sure there are a lot of crazy people ranting against health care reform, and most of them shouldn’t be given drivers licenses let alone a voice in the public sphere, but the idea that their madness might be winning people over is unlikely. While talk show hosts know how to pander to an audience, unrehearsed ranting madmen don’t. When removed of their talking points and disruptive tactics, they really don’t have much to say. It’s not a matter of arguing with them but just letting them have their time moment in front of the cameras. Then let the people decide on that.

Then pray that there’s not a majority of psychotic conspiracy theorists out there in the world.