Or has the Stupid Party decided that stupid actually works for them?

It has been several weeks since Governor Bobby Jindal of Louisiana took to the podium in Williamsburg, VA and encouraged his Republican brothers to stop acting as if loopy were a requirement for party membership. Thus far his message has gone largely unheeded. Perhaps he should buy some ad time on "Swamp People". Southerners are fond of saying "you can't fix stupid", a condition with which they are all too well acquainted. It would now appear that Governor Jindal is the only member of his party to even recognize the "stupid" problem.

For proof that the message isn't getting through, one need look no farther than the events of this week. To wit:

The face of the GOP has recently morphed from orange to bronze in the person of Florida's Senator Marco Rubio. Senator Rubio was chosen to present the sane Republican response to the President's State of the Union message on Tuesday night. The Stupid-wing Republican rebuttal followed immediately thereafter. That task went to Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky.  In this dubious role, Paul was following in the erratic  footsteps of such revered statesmen as Herman "9-9-9" Cain, Michele Bachmann of Minnesota and the singing fish from the McDonald's ads. Seriously, if your party can't even chose one person to espouse your beliefs, you had better start making a short list of  rebuttal speakers for year 2017 and beyond.

Anyway, Senator Rubio delivered his address in Spanish as well as English. Who said those Republicans aren't reaching out? However, no sooner had Rubio intoned  "y que continue bendiciendo a Los Estados de America" than some Republican luddite who missed the memo criticized Rubio for forgetting that English is America's language. No doubt he said it in a dialect no Englishman would understand.

While Senator Rubio was using his prime-time moment to  express Republican inclusivity toward a voting block that ruined Election Day for his party, he was a bit slower to represent for another constituency that went against the GOP...women.  On Tuesday, as he was putting the finishing touches on his Valentine to Hispanics, Rubio took time to join 22 other Republican Senators in attempting to scuttle a reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act originally past in 1994.  Apparently Marco's largess extends just so far. Fortunately, there were 72 other Senators who felt that violence against women was a moral priority, not just an opportunity to show off your language skills. Rubio and the other 22 numskulls in the Senate would be well to remember that women speak English and they heard loud and clear all of those "no" votes.

Because Senators and Congressmen are forbidden to bring explosive devices into Congress for the President's speech, Congressman Steve Stockman of The Peoples Republic of East Texas, bought his own whoopee cushion. Stockman, who represents all that is daffy about the GOP (his next-store neighbor in East Texas is Louie Gohmert) invited Ted Nugent to attend the State of the Union speech. Nugent, who hasn't been a force in music since Hall and Oats were popular, has nevertheless kept busy  as an obnoxious spokesman for gun violence in America. Mostly noted for shooting off his mouth Nugent has nonetheless attracted the attention of the Secret Service. It seems that people who mention guns and the President in the same sentence get special attention from law enforcement even when they have the demonstrated intelligence of a guitar pick. Anyway, Nugent sat in the gallery glaring but causing no great fuss and Stockman, his host, just looked foolish.

But looking foolish is what Bobby Jindal was talking about in his speech. Every time a Republican espouses some crackpot idea (guns in church comes to mind) the entire party looks crazy. Like it or not, people tend to take voting seriously. Why is it that only Karl Rove gets this? Folks may complain about Harry Reid or Claire McCaskill but when they close the curtain in the voting booth they tend not to vote for people who appear uninformed, unaware or unhinged. We like our elected representatives to at least appear normal, not on a two day pass from the "home". Conservative die-hards may rail against reporters who ask hard questions of their candidates but bad answers make an impression.

And so when the clown car pulls up in front of the Congressional Office Building, don't be surprised to see all those teabagger Republicans pile out. They're really easy to spot. They will be armed to the teeth, toting Bibles and texts on creationism. They'll be the ones droning-on about how climate science is a hoax and Barack Obama is a socialist Kenyan. But pay them no mind. They will be gone shortly, replaced with a new gaggle of even crazier loons. Texas alone could keep Washington in crackpots for years. So best of luck to Bobby Jindal and Karl Rove. Maybe they can't fix stupid but they can at least quarantine it to East Texas.