More thoughts on Crazification

The crazification factor as posited at Kung Fu Monkey is one of the more interesting lenses through which to examine current US politics. However, I think there are some problems.

First, the 27 percent figure given at KFM is a bit inexact, and is only relevant to compare to opinion polls if they use the same formula for likely voters that panned out in Illinois in 2004. What's interesting is considering what the real number is in terms of absolute population - the 1,390,690 Keyes voters represent only 14.8 percent of Illinois' 9,395,376 adults in 2004 (calculated from Census estimates). So that's the percent of America that can be counted on to actually get out and vote for right-wing Republicans no matter what, if we are to believe the basic premises of crazification theory.

But there may be some problems with those assumptions. I know a number of the crazified, for instance, who insist on not voting within their party should it "betray" them (which is easy enough to do, since all this means is doing anything not completely right-wing nuts at any time). Because of this, I imagine that Bush's recent poor performance is not necessarily a precipitous drop towards the crazification factor, but perhaps the result of some percentage of the crazified actually turning on him due to the whole Miers fiasco and his failure as yet to install Phyllis Schlafly or Robert Bork on the Supreme Court. These, after all, are people who killed Miers' nomination, weakening their president and party, just because she wasn't proven to be exactly as crazy as the kind of justice they felt they were promised.

I think crazification is still useful in understanding the appeal and continued above-zero approval of President Bush, but we shouldn't underestimate pure stay-the-course idiotness, either. It's the solid, apathetic middle of the Republican party, not the moderates or extreme, Keyes-loving crazies, who are making up Bush's current base.