Forget global warming: Hell just froze over!

There have been plenty of similar posts on the left, but The American Conservative has a post which rips the curtain off Fox News' wizard's lair: The tea parties may have been counterproductive:

Having the right emotional response to war or taxes is not enough. You must also know how the world works and how you can change it — or prevent others from changing it around you. Broad emotional responses cannot make necessary critical distinctions between, say, opposing war and opposing Republicans, or supporting Ron Paul and supporting Rick Perry, both of whom may say things that hit the right emotional buttons, but who stand for very different philosophies and policies.

There is a reason why the scoundrels of Fox News and talk radio and the neocons in the press can get behind the tea parties. The reason is that these protests pose no threat to the Republican and neocon establishment — they are thoroughly tame and impotent diversions of populism. They reinforce the power of the establishment by redirecting popular discontent into mere sound and fury. If the Right had learned anything at all from the Bush years, it should have learned that neoconservative and Republican elites are adept at manipulating emotional populists — proud patriots, heart-on-the-sleeve social cons, enthusiastic Christians. And now people who are "mad as hell" about economics are falling for the same trick. Get mad about busing — and elect Richard Nixon. Get mad about abortion — and elect George W. Bush. Get mad about the bailouts — and fill in the blank. Any folksy-demeanored Republican hack who has mastered the Right's talking points will do.

I truly expect the author to be (a) ignored by the scared lefties, and (b) univited to rightie parties.