There has been plenty of bandwidth wasted to the effect that both sides are to blame for the current failure to pass a continuing resolution. It is being suggested that the Democratic party bears as much blame as the opposition party for allowing the government to shut down - that their refusal to negotiate is in some way the work of leftist extremists, bent on imposing the Affordable Care Act on the unwilling American populace.
That got me thinking. Regularly, extremist elements within the Republican lunatic fringe insist that leftist, Communist extremists are trying to impose their world view on the rest of us. They shriek that they are being oppressed, that a well-financed cabal of Leninists are trying to destroy their way of life. Trying to take their guns away, or trying to discriminate against Christians, or some other kind of Reichstag Fire drivel.
Frequently, however, the obverse is closer to true. Meanwhile, the suggestion that reasonable people in the center and on the left are actually extremists goes unaddressed. Maybe it's time to call their bluff.
