Tea Party Derangement Syndrome

I’ve noticed lately, in talking to liberals, that their frontal lobes have been taken over by the Tea Party.  Sadly, when I say this I don’t mean that they’ve embraced the Tea Party’s commitment to smaller government and greater individual freedom.  I mean instead that the idea of the Tea Party sits in their brains, stimulating them to bizarre flights of rhetorical fancy.  Two examples:

First example:  I was talking with someone about vaccinations (in which I strongly believe).  I mentioned that in my neck of the woods, despite the high level of education, many people are hostile to vaccinations, preferring “holistic” remedies, none of which have a strong track record when it comes to measles, polio, small pox, etc.  The person to whom I was speaking instantly said, “Well, educated people often have completely irrational beliefs.  Look at Nazis or the Tea Partiers.”  A more accurate observation might have been that the people near me, most of them Ivy Leaguers, didn’t get a lot of bang for their bucks when it come to learning logical, scientific thinking at their expensive Ivory Towers.

Second example:  I overheard someone talking to a colleague about someone with whom they both worked:  “Ignore him.  He’s a completely fruitcake.  When it comes to this project, he’s like one of those insane Tea Partiers.”  Tea Party = Crazy.

This is not a local phenomenon.  David Letterman is playing the same game:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ePlXsjvu9Bs[/youtube]