The Right Wing Does Not Understand What Racism Is and What It Isn't.

The host of HBO's "Real Time with Bill Maher" has come under fire from the right again after a short post he made to the show's blog page on Monday.  In it, Maher criticized the Republican party for becoming more extreme with each passing day, and blamed them for our current dysfunctional government.

Well, uh, agreed.  You'll see no arguments from me there (or really anywhere in regards to his post).  I will say this, though: Right-Wingers are incredibly talented when it comes jumping gaps in logic.  Here's a great example.  At the beginning of the post, Maher writes:

"The idea that the blame for our government’s dysfunction is equally shared by the parties just is a giant, steaming mound of horseshit and anyone who has paid attention to politics over the last 20 years knows it. Or as I like to call it, 'The Rise of the Party of the Apes.' "

Towards the end of it, Maher calls our Representative Allen West for his remarks on there being around 80 card-carrying Commies in the pool of Congressional Democrats:

"Take Allen West. Seriously, take him to the padded cell and give him 20 CCs of the high test. Ornstein and Mann start off their Post op-ed by noting that recently Rep. Allen West said that there are '78 to 81' Democrats in Congress who are members of the Communist Party. And not one Republican said, 'Allen, come on. You’re making us look dumb.' Not one of the Republican candidates for president said anything. Because in today’s Republican Party, that’s not even edgy anymore."

The jump?  Well, apparently Maher called Allen West an ape.  Don't you see?  I certainly don't - there is a huge amount of middle ground between the two concepts.  And yet the comments section is chock-full of anonymous assholes pounding the ground with their fists as they strive for attention, demanding that Maher fight West and see who walks out the victor.  The irony is that they are proving Maher's point - the Republican party is, intellectually speaking, becoming a party of apes.

There's also the well-played out routine of, "Of course it's not racist if a liberal says it," in the comments section.  This always makes me giggle.  It proves that those on the right really don't know what racism is or how it works.  Using Maher's post as an example, his remarks were obviously not racist - he did not specifically call West an ape, nor did he once note the color of his skin. 

This is a tired shtick, guys.  Maher made a solid argument and all of you right-wingers knew it, so you did what you do best in order to discredit him.  You made 1 and 1 equal 3, and connected two dots part of completely different puzzles, all with the end goal of charging Maher with racism.

One word comes to mind when sorting through the comments*, Maher's post, and the Politico article about Maher's post: pathetic.  



*I briefly thought of including a few comments for shits and giggles, but decided against it.  They were all from anonymous nobodies unqualified to comment in the first place.