The GOP is thriving off of them, because Tea Partiers are ignorant enough to believe any lies they put out there, joined by conspiracy theorists like Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh. Bob Herbert explains it in his OpEd today:
For decades the G.O.P. has been the party of fear, ignorance and divisiveness. All you have to do is look around to see what it has done to the country. The greatest economic inequality since the Gilded Age was followed by a near-total collapse of the overall economy. As a country, we have a monumental mess on our hands and still the Republicans have nothing to offer in the way of a remedy except more tax cuts for the rich.
This is the party of trickle down and weapons of mass destruction, the party of birthers and death-panel lunatics. This is the party that genuflects at the altar of right-wing talk radio, with its insane, nauseating, nonstop commitment to hatred and bigotry....
The G.O.P. poisons the political atmosphere and then has the gall to complain about an absence of bipartisanship.
