Michele Nightmare

Matt Taibbi has the brutal truth about serial liar and Oral Roberts University-trained extreme rightwinger, Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN). The article is a must-read, with passages like:

Bachmann is a religious zealot whose brain is a raging electrical storm of divine visions and paranoid delusions. She believes that the Chinese are plotting to replace the dollar bill, that light bulbs are killing our dogs and cats, and that God personally chose her to become both an IRS attorney who would spend years hounding taxpayers and a raging anti-tax Tea Party crusader against big government. She kicked off her unofficial presidential campaign in New Hampshire, by mistakenly declaring it the birthplace of the American Revolution. "It's your state that fired the shot that was heard around the world!" she gushed. "You are the state of Lexington and Concord, you started the battle for liberty right here in your backyard."

And:

The theme of socialists scheming to herd children into a factorylike system of predetermined occupations still comes up often in Bachmann's rhetoric. In a recent speech in Iowa, for instance, she talked wistfully of the early Midwest settled by her Norwegian ancestors, a place where "we can choose whatever profession we want, and no one tells us what profession we go in." Bachmann likewise rejected AmeriCorps as an attempt to build "re-education camps for young people, where young people have to go and get trained in a philosophy that the government puts forward," and blasted a schools program started by Bill Clinton for trying to brainwash kids into accepting "government central planning of our economy and our way of life."

And more ominously:

It has taken just over 10 years for Bachmann to go from small-town PTA maven to serious presidential contender, a testament to both her rare and unerring talent for generating media attention, and to her truly astonishing energy level and narcissistic tenacity. Minnesota politicians who have squared off against Bachmann all speak with a kind of horrified reverence for her martial indomitability, her brilliantly fortifying lack of self-doubt, even the fact that she hasn't appeared to physically age at all in 10 years. "She will not stop," says Cecconi.

She's currently running very close to former Massachusetts Mitt Romney for the Republican Presidential nomination and could steal the Iowa Caucus crown -- the neighbor state of Minnesota and her birthstate. Bachmann is fervently anti-choice and anti-gay, and known for pathological lying to bolster her wingnut arguments (the list is huge).

Like a more focused version of Sarah Palin (and one who I believe is already eclipsing Word Salad Sarah, making her seem obsolete literally this week), she's telegenic as she relentlessly mangles history for her truthiness needs. With her mistaken comparison of herself to serial killer John Wayne Gacy today in Iowa, it was actually unintentionally hilarious:

What I want them to know is just like John Wayne was from Waterloo, Iowa, that's the spirit that I have too. It's really about not being ashamed of America. It's embracing America.

Uh, Michele, the John Wayne from Waterloo, Iowa isn't the John Wayne you're thinking of. It's John Wayne Gacy, one of the most notorious serial killers in American history.

Yes, the serial killer responsible for over thirty sexualized murders and was known for dressing in a clown suit at children's parties.

I'll leave the metaphor to you, valued reader.