Mental midget and US President George W. Bush made yet another speech on Tuesday in the "al Qaeda is like the Nazis" genre in an attempt to rile up his idiot voting base for the midterm elections. Of course, al Qaeda folks bear some similarity to the good old "Love to Hate 'Em" Nazis — they aren't known for their snappy attire, and neither are much fun at parties. But at a fundamental level, it just isn't true. There's nothing new about this comparison, but we find it funny (not "ha ha" funny, mind you) that the rallying cry that Republicans have chosen for this election season is a platform that showcases the very ignorance that has us stuck tits-deep in Iraq with no way out.

No, Mr. President, al Qaeda is not like the Nazis — for many reasons. One reason is that the Nazis of World War II were, in effect, Germany. It was a national power (um, National Socialist Party, anyone?), complete with a government and specified location and mapped borders and official passports — all those keen things that come with the package when you're in control of an entire country. If that was the case with the terrorists — if al Qaeda lived in the nation of Qaedastan — then it would be a lot easier to fight a war against them — wars are much easier to conduct when you know your opponents' forwarding address. Sadly, this administration chose to behave as if this was the case, only they swapped out "Qaedastan" and stuck in "Iraq" for no readily apparent reason (that's tongue-in-cheek, folks — we know Dubya has plenty of reasons for going into Iraq, but none of them have anything to do with his stated reasons). Maybe — and we're just spitballing here — maybe if we started combating terrorists by treating them as terrorists instead of pretending that we're fighting World War II, Mark II, we'd have some measure of success. (Hmm, World War II, Mark II...WWIIMII™? Hey, sure, we can pronounce it "weemee" — and we'll register the trademark before Nintendo does.)

That particular stupidity aside, there were some interesting tidbits in Dubya's recent speech:

Bush cited what he called "a grisly al Qaida manual" found in 2000 by British police during an anti-terrorist raid in London, which included a chapter called "Guidelines for Beating and Killing Hostages."

Sorry, but we're going to need a judge's ruling here. Do you really need a whole chapter on beating and killing hostages? Isn't that the sort of thing where, once you skim a paragraph and a bulleted list or two to get the general idea, you just kind of wing it?

"Hey, I have three hostages, two cronies, a tire iron, and a feather duster. I want to beat some people to death, but I'm not sure how to do it. Let's see what the book says!"

On the other hand, it is good to see that the chapter just delineates guidelines for hostage beating and killing — we understand that terrorists hate micromanagement.

Here's another revelation from the lost diaries of al Qaeda:

He also cited what he said was a captured al Qaida document found during a recent raid in Iraq. He said the document described plans to take over Iraq's western Anbar province and set up a governing structure including an education department, a social services department, a justice department, and an execution unit.

Holy hell! Do you know what this means? It means that these terrorists had more of a plan for rebuilding Iraq than we did! Maybe we should thumb through their book for ideas. Or arrange a seminar. Maybe a casual lunch meeting? Just a thought.

This next Bush quote also made our foreheads wrinkle:

"The terrorists who attacked us on September the 11th, 2001, are men without conscience, but they're not madmen," he said. "They kill in the name of a clear and focused ideology, a set of beliefs that are evil but not insane."

Yeah, we know that Bush is trying to convey the idea that these are not people acting without a plan, and that they are capable of coordinated and complex acts of violence, and we agree. But why the repeated assertions that these radical Muslims are "not insane"? They are insane. They are perpetrating acts of unspeakable violence in the name of a fantasy belief system, against those who don't share that belief system; that's as idiotic as killing anyone without teeth in the name of the Tooth Fairy. That IS insanity. They are every bit as insane as the lunatics thumping their bibles on the street corner, screaming about "those evil fags" who want to get married and turn us all gay. That kind of shit is pretty much the definition of insanity (and/or sociopathy, depending on the actions stemming from the idiotic beliefs). Remember, we're not talking about your average religious believer here — we're talking about the ones who have clearly lost their grip on reality, and who are therefore quite insane.

And that's the depressing bit, really. You see, because Bush is pandering to a voting base that itself is largely comprised of insane idiots, he can't call out the insane beliefs of others as insane lest he ruffle the insane feathers of his own insane constituents. It's enough to drive us insane.

It's also a strong argument for the separation of church and state, and a good motivation for recognizing that religious considerations shouldn't ever enter into any political or governmental decisions. When you're fighting an enemy that is all about mindless psychopathic zealotry, you can't fight them effectively when you yourself are saddled with mindless psychopathic zealotry. Two mindless psychopathic zealots don't "balance out" to make a happy, harmonious world — they make utter fucking chaos, and all the rational people are trapped in the middle.

In fact, this speaks to one way in which al Qaeda is like the Nazis — both are driven to do stupid, harmful, terrible things by their demonstrably false and patently insane ideologies. But if we make the comparison that way, then we have no choice but to include the religious right under the same umbrella. And we somehow don't see Bush pulling out the line that "al Qaeda is like the Nazis is like you" in his next speech. How do you think that would play with his base?

I loved the line about the terrorists having a better plan for reconstruction than Dubya.

I think I lost my sanity about halfway through the rant.

Of course, I'm on the same wavelength as TPC on most issues, but even so, when anyone is able to patiently demonstrate the ludicrous nature of a given (Dubya's in this case) exposition, you have to think to yourself "Well, see, that's just silly". But I have this ever-growing (paranoid?) fear that too many people in this country are not listening or, even worse, are no longer capable of comprehending the plain facts when they are sitting right before their eyes.

With the massive evidence of this administration's harmful, hateful policies toward the large majority of Americans, not to mention Iraqis, Afghans, etc., I can't help but be depressed at the thought that November's election results may demonstrate that the American population is, by and large, a group of ignorant sheep asking for more of the same.

They are insane.

I don't think so. Insane - and I'm only a layman - people are those completely unable to function in the world, or so I've read.

The crew that planned and pulled off 9/11 (and previous outrages) were capable of operating and getting by in the world just fine.

They were capable of operating and getting by in the world until their insane beliefs led them to crash airplanes into tall buildings, at which point they ceased to be capable of operating and getting by in the world.

There may be a correlation betwenn sanity and functioning in the world, but it's not the definition. The accepted definition of Insanity is more along the lines of "A semi-permanent, severe mental disorder typically stemming from a form of mental illness." (from Wikipedia)

This might not actually fit, though, unless we're willing to claim that religion is a mental illness (which, seeing as it doesn't appear in the DSMMD, would be quite difficult).

Pool Guy: Most people aren't listening — they're watching "reality" TV and getting their news from morons with egos overinflated more than a Macy's Thanksgiving Day Garfield balloon. But that's okay, because most people aren't capable of or interested in any kind of intelligent debate about anything other than who's who on American Idol. These are the people who couldn't even get the Reuben/Clay controversy voted out correctly; why would anyone trust them to vote on the leader of the free world? Really, our only hope in 2008 is that all of the available options are better than Bush and friends. Luckily, that shouldn't be too hard.

— • —

Brian, Chayanov, Infophile: We really weren't talking about a strict clinical definition of insanity. According to Mirriam-Webster, the definition of "insane" is:

1 : mentally disordered : exhibiting insanity 2 : used by, typical of, or intended for insane persons 3 : ABSURD 4 : EXTREME

Since insane people exhibit insanity, we also checked that definition:

3 a : extreme folly or unreasonableness b : something utterly foolish or unreasonable

So someone who is absurd and extreme, who exhibits extreme folly or unreasonableness, and who embraces things which are utterly foolish or unreasonable can be said to be insane. We think that describes both the radical Muslims and the evangelical Christians pretty well.

All that said, our interpretation of insanity includes those who can function in the world in many cases, but whose tenuous grip on reality significantly impacts their actions in unreasonable ways in other cases. That's really what we were talking about. Of course, who are we to judge? Some of these pricks may actually be clinically insane.

(Note to self: Stop using Wikipedia for everything)

Using the typical evangelical Christian/Muslim terrorist:

Extreme folly: Check
Unreasonable: Check
Utterly foolish: Check

Yep, using that definition, I would wholeheartedly agree with your characterization of these people as insane.

Your point is taken concerning the focus of the unwashed masses.

I guess the real point I'm trying to get to is why the Main Stream Media has disengaged from it's primary purpose of creating an enlightened populace. Since TPC was able, in a matter of days, to come up with a lucid, reasoned complete rebuttal of Dubya's Muslim/Nazi equation, why can't the MSM do the same? They can report what Dubya said and then add (it doesn't have to be in any great detail) that his conclusions are not logical.

It seems that we, as a nation, are being abandoned, one by one, by the institutions that are needed to keep us free and great. Oops, there goes the free press. Oops, there goes the rule of law. Oops, there goes the constitution.

Besides, many would probably be clinically mentally ill as well -- after all, many people who act as these folks do would meet diagnostic definitions of obsessive-compulsive disorder or antisocial personality d/o, among others, if they doing things in the name of something other that an organized religion.

Pool Guy: We couldn't agree more with your statement that the institutions that we need most seem to be letting us down, and the frontman for that plague of disappointment is the mainstream media. Don't get us wrong: we see why they're doing what they're doing — we just don't like it.

Seriously, if most people aren't interested in or capable of an intelligent discourse on important issues, then continuing to present the news as such would lose the MSM their audience. In addition, if they correctly abandon their poorly-named "fair and balanced" approach to news (we're talking about the approach that has them give equal time and credence to creationism, for example), they could offend a portion of their viewers, again losing part of their audience. Since ratings are the be-all-end-all for the MSM, they have morphed into what most of the American populace seems to want — a fluffy, politically correct, totally useless but ostensibly entertaining circus.

In effect, the news is just another crappy reality show, with runaway brides and celebrity scandals.

jay: We agree — many of the true religious zealots could be clinically insane as well. Is religion a mental disorder? Well, that can be argued. But we think that religious belief past a certain extent does qualify. When killers are deemed to truly believe that god is talking to them and telling them to kill people, they are generally judged to be insane. That's an example of an extreme religious belief. So it isn't a question of whether folks draw a line beyond which religion equals insanity — very few would argue that the god-inspired serial killer isn't insane — but rather how far along they place that line.

Maybe I'm just misreading the rant, but I thought snappy dressing was the one thing that most people agree the Nazis got right.

That 1:1 scale bobblehead Pat Robertson is clearly insane. Inability to distinguish fantasy from reality on a continuing basis (this conveniently excludes the phenomenon of beer goggles) seems like a pretty good definition of insanity. Can you function in the real world if you think everybody has an invisible devil on one shoulder and angel on the other? Sure, but your parallel fantasy world is getting the better of you if you can't shake your head and make those little critters disappear.

Is W insane? Of course. He thinks moving America in the direction of a theocratic police state will protect us from those who favor theocratic police states. He thinks bankrupting the treasury will pay for itself in no time. He thinks the Constitution is toilet paper. Oh, wait. He does wipe his ass with it. Mmm, parchmenty soft and absorbent...