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It has gone beyond referring to the rabidly self-righteous group as the Tea Party. This is something out of Lewis Carroll. Call it the Mad Republican Tea Party.
Just when some believed that things could not get anymore weird, along comes Republican Mad Tea Party congressional candidate Rich Iott of Ohio. This challenger who, like other Mad Tea Party candidates, is running for office on the premise that he can help fix a broken political system, has an egregious hobby.
Iott explains that he is a history buff. This is his reason for dressing up in a uniform from the 5th SS Wiking Panzer Division of Adolf Hitler's German Nazi Army from World War Two. It was pointed out that this division was responsible for helping execute Hungarian Jews during World War Two.
Iott, displaying typical Mad Tea Party self-righteousness, blames critics for attacking him unfairly over a practice he can explain. Given his fervent interest in history, Iott often dresses up in uniform relative to historical battle re-creations that are harmless. In this case he earlier stated an admiration for Germany having demonstrated exemplary military expertise sufficient to almost achieve world conquest.
As for his practice of wearing uniforms for these historical recreations, Iott has news for his detractors. He has also dressed up for mock Civil War conflict and worn a Union Army uniform.
The Mad Tea Party has once more furnished a less then exemplary candidate for national office in a nation it plans to clean up. Given the past economic track record of the Republican Party for which it shills the result, if given the chance, will be more likely to clean out, meaning taxpayers.
When this story surfaced about the Mad Tea Party's Ohio congressional candidate and his hobby, which bears examination of both values and mental underpinnings, there was a tragic silence through Republican ranks. The silence was especially troubling in the case of the Republican Party's sole Jewish member of Congress, Eric Cantor of Virginia.
Cantor ultimately conceded that this was a practice he condemned, but look at what it took. Cantor, looking sheepish and thoroughly embarrassed, stated his disapproval in a joint interview involving another Jewish Member of Congress, Debbie Wasserman Schultz of Florida, after she had metaphorically pushed him against a wall.
Then there is the Mad Tea Party's candidate for governor of New York who, in his reformist zeal, has said he will take a baseball bat to the state capital of Albany to break up the current system if he is elected.
Millionaire property magnate Carl Paladino's baseball bat reference is right in the ballpark. It symbolizes what he did in a televised confrontation with a reporter that emerged like a scene from The Sopranos. The reporter, it should be noted, was not from the hated New York Times. He was from the New York Post no less, a Rupert Murdoch publication.
Paladino had helped spawn an out of wedlock love child while living the outward life of a devoted family man and practicing Roman Catholic. Remember the howl over Bill Clinton's affair with Monica Lewinsky? Are these same Clinton detractors coming forth to denounce Paladino? Once more there is that familiar stony silence of the selective morally outraged.
The reporter wanted to know about Paladino's proof over alleged marital indiscretions by his Democratic opponent Andrew Cuomo. When the reporter kept pressing his point Paladino threatened to "take him out." When he pressed further and asked Paladino what he meant, the response was another threat of keep up your actions and "you'll see."
Paladino has never come forth with a shred of proof to substantiate his charge against Cuomo. Meanwhile, however, he paid a visit to see some ultra conservative Hassidic Jewish believers to provide New York's voters with some more patented Paladino moralistic deliverance, this time on homosexuality.
It is one thing to weigh in on a topic. In this case Paladino, the man vowing to fix what ails New York state politics, shamelessly read from a prepared statement regarding the evils of homosexuality.
Later Paladino was asked to elaborate on the statement he read at the Hassidic gathering. He calmly stated that he had no problem with homosexuality as long as it did not relate to marriage laws. There was that harsh statement of a short time earlier but, then again, Paladino was engaged in a spontaneous reading exercise.
Such was another day from Paladino's busy schedule, the reformer who will fix things in Albany.
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