You can count on the Daily Kos to be embarrassed by how America's Republican presidential contenders have ruined the country's image in the eyes of socialist Europeans -- to be specific, the hard-left German magazine Der Spiegel and its latest diatribe against Republicans, tenderly headlined "A Club of Liars, Demagogues and Ignoramuses."
The blogger "Downeastdem" cannot believe these GOP leaders dare present themselves on the debate stage: "It's horrifying because these eight so-called, would-be candidates are eagerly ruining not only their own reputations and that of their party, the party of Lincoln lore. Worse: They're ruining the reputation of the United States."
The Kos post began:
Did you ever have a crazy relative - an Aunt Mabel from Tupelo or an Uncle Archie from Queens - who made you cringe whenever he or she would open their mouth? When they came to visit you would live in fear that a friend or classmate would drop in and overhear some racist or inappropriate comment your relative would make, and then everyone would know the secret that your family is really crazy. That's how I feel about the Republican Party.
The GOP debates make me cringe. I fully expect that Mitt Romney will make some stupid remark about "American Exceptionalism", that Rick Perry or Michelle Bachman will espouse their Christo-Fascist worldview, that Herman Cain will display his total ignorance about everything, and that Newt will make a total ass of himself with his bombast. I just wish the rest of the world wasn't watching as well, for the GOP performance this election cycle diminishes our nation in the eyes of the world.
Then it's off to Der Spiegel, where their New York-based U.S. correspondent Marc Pitzke sounds just like a Kosmonaut:
Welcome to the wonderful world of the US Republicans. Or rather, to the twisted world of what they call their presidential campaigns. For months now, they've been traipsing around the country with their traveling circus, from one debate to the next, one scandal to another, putting themselves forward for what's still the most powerful job in the world.
Downeastdem lamented, "It's bad enough that they are an embarrassment to any thinking Republican - if there are any left in the party. But these individuals are competing for the most powerful job on the planet. What does it say about America?" Pitzke puts on every snobbish air a European could possibly spew, that these Republicans are a squalid squadron of Kardashians:
What a nice club that is. A club of liars, cheaters, adulterers, exaggerators, hypocrites and ignoramuses. "A starting point for a chronicle of American decline," was how David Remnick, the editor of the New Yorker, described the current Republican race.
The Tea Party would take issue with that assessment. They cheer the loudest for the worst, only to see them fail, as expected, one by one. Which goes to show that this "movement," sponsored by Fox News, has never been interested in the actual business of governing or in the intelligence and intellect that requires. They are only interested in marketing themselves, for ratings and dollars.
So the US elections are a reality show after all, a pseudo-political counterpart to the Paris Hiltons, Kim Kardashians and all the "American Idol" and "X Factor" contestants littering today's TV. The cruder, the dumber, the more bizarre and outlandish -- the more lucrative. Especially for Fox News, whose viewers were recently determined by Fairleigh Dickinson University to be far less informed than people who don't watch TV news at all.
Memo to Bill O'Reilly: You should invite Pitzke in for a candid interview about how the bankrupt Eurozone could run this country so much better than these alleged greedhead Republican reality-show morons.
The blog David's Medienkritik has the number on Der Spiegel.
(Hat tip: Pandlbrau)
