"Stop laughing", sayeth Krugman

It's hard to believe that a party which has been marginalized into a small band of Glenn Beck-fueled crazies, gun nuts, and the Christofascist Zombie Brigade, could ever return to power. Americans proved last November that enough of us are sane enough to realize that Sarah Palin is not a brilliant and insightful leader, that Joe the Plumber is not qualified to be an adviser, and that however much we may have thought John McCain really didn't believe much of what he was saying, the fact that he was saying it was distasteful enough to not vote for him. Besides, what do the Republicans offer but more of what we've seen over the last eight years that got us into this mess -- more tax cuts, more deficits, more wars, less respect in the world?

But we Americans are spoiled. That ad for widescreen TVs that screams "I want it NOW"? That's us. So far we've been willing to give this president the benefit of the doubt, particularly since the Republicans have shown themselves to be so utterly tone-deaf. But if economic conditions aren't significantly better by, say, 2011, there's no guarantee that the Glenn Beckians aren't going to rule the day and we won't find ourselves with some gun-crazed religious fanatic like Sarah Palin in the White House.

Paul Krugman warns today:

But here’s the thing: the G.O.P. looked as crazy 10 or 15 years ago as it does now. That didn’t stop Republicans from taking control of both Congress and the White House. And they could return to power if the Democrats stumble. So it behooves us to look closely at the state of what is, after all, one of our nation’s two great political parties.

One way to get a good sense of the current state of the G.O.P., and also to see how little has really changed, is to look at the “tea parties” that have been held in a number of places already, and will be held across the country on Wednesday. These parties — antitaxation demonstrations that are supposed to evoke the memory of the Boston Tea Party and the American Revolution — have been the subject of considerable mockery, and rightly so.

But everything that critics mock about these parties has long been standard practice within the Republican Party.

[snip]

...it turns out that the tea parties don’t represent a spontaneous outpouring of public sentiment. They’re AstroTurf (fake grass roots) events, manufactured by the usual suspects. In particular, a key role is being played by FreedomWorks, an organization run by Richard Armey, the former House majority leader, and supported by the usual group of right-wing billionaires. And the parties are, of course, being promoted heavily by Fox News.

But that’s nothing new, and AstroTurf has worked well for Republicans in the past. The most notable example was the “spontaneous” riot back in 2000 — actually orchestrated by G.O.P. strategists — that shut down the presidential vote recount in Florida’s Miami-Dade County.

So what’s the implication of the fact that Republicans are refusing to grow up, the fact that they are still behaving the same way they did when history seemed to be on their side? I’d say that it’s good for Democrats, at least in the short run — but it’s bad for the country.

For now, the Obama administration gains a substantial advantage from the fact that it has no credible opposition, especially on economic policy, where the Republicans seem particularly clueless.

But as I said, the G.O.P. remains one of America’s great parties, and events could still put that party back in power. We can only hope that Republicans have moved on by the time that happens.

I'm not optimistic about that. Are you?