Another primary day has come and gone, and once again, the right wing crazies have unseated viable, electable Republican candidates for national office. Everybody's favorite, I am sure, is Christine O'Donnell, now anointed as the Republican standard-bearer for the Delaware senatorial seat vacated by Joe Biden. O'Donnell is of course most famous for her strong stand against masturbation. O'Donnell's opponent, eminently electable Republican Mike Castle, has apparently declined to endorse her. As one wag put it, "Mike told her to go f**k herself, which of course she won't do."
The assault by the Tea Partiers on the Republican establishment is a threat and an opportunity. The threat is that in this dismal off-year election, these troglodytes will actually get elected, and spend the next six years making Jon Kyl and Jeff Sessions look sane. The opportunity is that if we can mobilize our voters, we can defeat these appalling characters, hold onto the Senate, and maybe even hold on to the House as well.
But to do this, we must get off our collective bums and start campaigning. It is not necessary to change minds -- always difficult in door to door canvassing. There are enough safe Democratic votes out there to do the trick, if we can just get them to the polls and let their reflexes do the rest.
This is not the time to rehearse your disappointments with the Obama administration. If you think it is not worlds better than what is slouching toward Bethlehem waiting to be born, you are seriously deluding yourselves. "The best lack all conviction, while the worst/ Are full of passionate intensity."
