With the news of Michele Bachmann’s retirement, we must acknowledge
that we have lost a great one… for mining comedic gold. I can hear the
moans of pain from Letterman and Leno, Fallon and Ferguson; Kimmel,
Conan and Maher. There will certainly be other politicians who will
provide fodder for the late night comic crowd – there always are – but
our ‘Shelley’ had a certain je ne se qua, a middle-American quality that set her apart.
With her first big moment on Hardball With Chris Matthews,
we knew she would be entertaining. With one statement, she flew to the
top of our Most Crazy list. Just watch Chris’ expression as Michelle
calls for investigating Congress…. here’s the video:
When Obama was elected, Bachmann had some things she could sink her teeth into, lying through them as she went:
“I want people in Minnesota armed and dangerous on this issue of the energy tax because we need to fight back.” (Source)
“One. That’s the number of new drilling permits under the Obama administration.” (Source)
“This (the 2009 stimulus bill) is a pork buffet, and the American
people caught on when they saw all the political payoffs in the bill,
and they rejected it.” (Source)
Her hatred of the Affordable Care Act,
dubbed “Obamacare” by the right, moved her to propose bills and vote to
repeal it 37 times. What’s the definition of insanity? Her last
desperate attempt to repeal the ACA she left in God’s hands. Looks like God likes Obamacare.
“The big thing we are working on now is the global
warming hoax. It’s all Voodoo, nonsense, hokum, a hoax.” And “Carbon
dioxide, Mister Speaker, is a natural byproduct of nature. Carbon
dioxide is natural.”
But the pinnacle of Bachmann’s career was undoubtedly her run for
president in 2012. She geared up for that early on, spending much of
2010 and 2011 campaigning. Some of her best gaffes occurred during that
period.
In New Hampshire, she spoke about how the opening shots of the Revolutionary War were fired there.
And her stop in Waterloo, Iowa
was the occasion of her mistaking John Wayne Gacy, the serial killer,
with John Wayne, the American icon. Watch this great bit of oops… here’s
the video:
When allegations about her accepting subsidies for her family farm
came up, as she railed against other folks getting government help, she lied:
“The farm is my father-in-law’s farm. It’s not my
husband’s and my farm. It’s my father-in-law’s farm and my husband and I
have never gotten a penny of money from the farm.”
Her campaign
was full of gaffes and outright lies and it was a blow to all of us
(okay, just us political writers) when she dropped out of the
presidential race in January of 2012. Politifact had kept track of her statements
and there were an unsurprising number of false and pants-on-fire
ratings there for her.
But that didn’t faze Shelley. After one
particularly egregious batch of falsehoods in a primary debate, she actually said that Politifact confirmed “that everything I said was true.” Only they didn’t.
And who can forget her response on behalf of the Tea Party to Obama’s
State Of The Union Address in January of 2011? Here’s the video:
Her opposition to marriage equality didn’t save her state from
joining the rest of us in realizing that equal means equal, no
exceptions. Michele was butthurt:
“This will change our state forever. Because the
immediate consequence, if gay marriage goes through, is that K-12 little
children will be forced to learn that homosexuality is normal, natural
and perhaps they should try it.”
And her views on the minimum wage left us facepalming:
“If we took away the minimum wage — if, conceivably, it
was gone — we could virtually wipe out unemployment completely because
we would be able to offer jobs at whatever level.”
We followed her comments
about President Obama being wrapped up in the “Islamist agenda.” Her
obsession with Benghazi is legendary and didn’t escape us, though
Shelley tried to escape a reporter asking her about comments she’d made about the subject.
Bachmann’s presence on the House Intelligence Committee was covered. Her latest appearance at CPAC and her hilarious ideas about curing Alzheimers were highlights in March. Heck, one of my first pieces was on Bachmann’s tenuous grasp on reality when it came to the UN and Obama.
There’s no denying that Michele Bachmann made a great target. Her
craziness, her lack of a filter, her revisionist history and her
complete and utter indifference to her gaffes and lies… these are what
we will remember about Michele Bachmann.
As she bows out
of her Congressional tenure, we wish her well. I suspect that she will
be availing herself of “wingnut welfare,” winding up in a think tank,
working for a huge corporation or as a “pundit” on Fox News. Whichever way she goes, I’m sure we have not heard the last batshit crazy remark from her. See ya around, Shelly!
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