An Encounter With The Alternate Reality

My wife was driving to the DC Pride Parade this afternoon. She's performing with a band her Aunt and her partner are members of. Sitting at a light on the Leesburg Bypass, an SUV pulled up next to her, and signaled for her to roll her window down. My wife thought maybe the gentleman needed directions, so she rolled her window down.

The gentleman said, "Do you have children?"

My wife immediately thought 'oh no, there's something wrong with my car!' and replied, "Yes."

The gentleman responded, "You've been deceived."

At which point my wife thought, 'oh no, this guy is some kind of religious nut.' She just looked at the man, who seemed to expect her to say something in response to this complete non-sequiter from the man in the next car at a light.

The gentleman continued, "Do you realize you're saddling your children with debt they'll never be able to pay off."

At this point my wife realized the man in the car next to hers was trying to induce a discussion of the fact that my wife is a supporter of President Obama, evidenced by the Obama '08 sticker still on the back bumper of her car.

Yes, that's right, He pulled up next to my wife at a light, had her roll her window down and in a roundabout fashion, tried to engage her in a debate on the long-term consequences of fiscal policy - starting from the false premise that the national debt and Federal budget deficit was somehow President Obama's fault.

And here's the fun part. After my wife looked blankly at the man, trying to figure out what in the world was going on (I mean, how weird is this?), the gentleman drove off.

How alienated, how frustrated, how completely disconnected must conservatives be feeling right now, for this kind of encounter to take place? There is a developing meme on many blogs about how disconnected from reality the rump Republican party is. How they listen to news that represents an utterly skewed version of reality, how they somehow believe that America is really a center-right nation, and how they're poised to retake Congress. (Just to be clear, these last two things are not true.) And somehow, in some of their minds, the answer is to assert their factually inconsistent beliefs even more frequently, in ever-more odd and inappropriate circumstances.

This can't be healthy.

At this point, I have to let Lowell have the last word, because he's right, and it's important.

I believe our country is best served by the existence of two healthy, sane political parties (right now we have one - the Democratic Party; the other has gone completely off the deep end). - Blue Virginia