Craziest Republican of the Day: Allen Quist

By Michael J.W. Stickings

This pretty much speaks for itself:

Allen Quist, a Republican who is seeking to defeat Rep. Tim Walz in southern Minnesota's First Congressional District, told attendees of the Wabasha County Republicans Christmas Party in mid-December that beating the "radical" liberals in Washington, D.C., is a bigger battle than beating terrorism.

"Our country is being destroyed. Every generation has had to fight the fight for freedom... Terrorism? Yes. That's not the big battle," he said. "The big battle is in D.C. with the radicals. They aren't liberals. They are radicals. Obama, Pelosi, Walz: They're not liberals, they're radicals. They are destroying our country."

Quist also railed against the health care reform bill. "This is the most insidious, evil piece of legislation I have ever seen in my life... Every one of us has to be totally committed to killing this travesty... I have to kill this bill."

Quist, who has a background as a religious right figure, has been working to align himself with the Tea Party movement.

I wonder if all those who lost loved ones on 9/11, and then in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, realize that Democrats are the real enemy, not al Qaeda.

Funny, though, eh? When Democrats criticized Bush after 9/11, Republicans called them traitors. But when Republicans like this moron not just criticize Obama but hurl completely unfounded attacks and accusations both at Obama and at leading Democrats, well, that's just fine.

Isn't attacking the president like this akin to giving aid and comfort to the enemy?

Now, to be fair, this is just one Republican, and a rather insignificant one at that. But make no mistake, he is far from alone in thinking this way, and in thinking these things, and we've seen how Republicans, significant ones, seem to put much more effort into and take much greater sense of purpose from attacking Obama and the Democrats than they do working constructively to combat terrorism. Recently, some conservatives even seemed to express open glee at the prospect of a terrorist attack on the U.S. on Obama's watch, seeking to score political points in response to Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab's near-successful underwear bombing. Did they wish the attack had succeeded? No, maybe not. But their overriding concern seems to be partisan gain, not the security of the American people.

And so I take Quist to be representative of his party, which, lest we forget, has become an extremist party of the paranoid right, populist-theocratic in orientation and viciously illiberal and anti-liberal -- and un-American -- in ideological and political outlook.

This is what Quick would bring to Washington, where he'd join up with like-minded fellow Republicans who have taken it upon themselves not just to kill health-care reform -- and it should hardly surprise us that Quick is knee-jerkingly against it -- but to turn their weapons on their own government.