The stupid has been so thick (and thicc, the new cool spelling) that yours spewly has recently taken to bed sickly-like, at least intellectually.

Let’s just review briefly what we know to be true:

Republicans have been sliding down a slippery slope of stupid for two generations since they allowed ideological charlatans like Stone, Helms, Reagan, Vigourie, Falwell, Atwater, Gingrich, etc. take one of the two (just two, take it or leave it) national parties, formerly lead by statesmen and people of good will, down a twisted rabbit hole of bullshit and gang tactics so that now they are lead by a pathological liar and conman. Say what you will about the GOP, but their devolution to a completely irresponsible criminal enterprise has been truly efficient. Less than 50 years from the party of Lincoln to the party of Trump.

One big facet of the Republican slide to fraudulence has been their changing attitude towards government itself, adopting a more libertarian (read: irrational) take on regulations. From the Eisenhower view of government as necessary, however restrained in its scope for the protection of the individual, to the modern GOP’s belief that government should do EVERYTHING the red team wants it to do, for the benefit of its political base regardress of science, math, ethics, rationality or sustainability and NOTHING the blue team values, because liberal tears are delicious.

Famously, the putative party of small government, as Reagan named it, has now long stood ready to restrain spending on the commons or human needs, but give a blank check to the Pentagon.  They reverse regulation they formerly saw as reasonable regarding big business, but demand that every uterus be inspected and every public bathroom be monitored.

The freaks running the Trump kakistocracy are engaged in a crazy chase of their twisted, stupid base’s rabid devotion to guns as a way of life. An idea whose basic irrational premise can be tested by repeating the previous sentence and substituting the word “guns” with any other noun. … rabid devotion to toasters as a way of life. … rabid devotion to floor lamps as a way of life… rabid devotion to doorknobs as a way of life… Modern pluralistic democracies do not adopt any one noun as a touchstone of life. That’s for the shamanistic leaders of pre-historic tribes mesmerizing their followers with a magic totem that they’ve imbued with mystical (and mythical) power.

But that’s who they are now – cavemen in suits – rallying support for icons against the misguided nonbelievers who would destroy us all with their elitist facts.

Which brings us to the delicious irony at hand of Republican lawmakers, who stood against Elizabeth Warren and the creation of the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau, and look the other way as Mick Mulvaney burns it down, turning to said CFPB to protect gun manufacturers from activist banks that are making it harder for the gun makers to use financial services.

Major banks have taken a series of steps this year to prevent guns from falling into the wrong hands. They are restricting their credit card and banking services to gun retailers and halting lending to gun makers that do not comply with age limits and background check rules determined by the banks.

It’s quite a brilliant reversal as those most powerful of entities, the financial institutions that Republicans believe should be as unregulated now as they were before 2008 (hell, pre 1929 would suit them fine) listen to their customers and their consciences and turn their sites on the gun makers that create weapons of death with Congressionally decreed impunity.

Asset managers and institutional investors have divested in gun stocks the same way they divested in South African businesses 30 years ago as the public, then as now, was out ahead of our government in recognizing a bad actor and demanding action.

“If you’re going to turn us into a nation of red banks and blue banks, you’re making a mistake….”

Said Sen. John Kennedy of Louisiana.

Kennedy said he planned to file complaints with the Consumer Finance Protection Bureau against banks that are effectively restricting gun sales by setting their own rules…

You know what, conservative tears are not tasty. I do not need them or their salty self-righteousness.  If banks, which have grown to eat our economy and are otherwise hurting our democracy, can impair businesses that profit on human misery, like they put a crimp on apartheid in an earlier age, then I applaud.

For those afeared that this action by banks are problematic actions taken against lawful industry, I point to the cannabis business. A burgeoning business made legal by popular demand but blocked from the full panoply of banking services because of fear by the banks in getting into business with entities that profit from a Schedule I drug. Government could listen to its citizens and help those businesses bank freely. The same Republican senators standing up for guns, are silent for pot, a much larger constituency by the numbers. As the numbers of legal cannibis users grows daily, the number of gun owners contracts with fewer people owning more guns every year so that 3% of Americans own 50% of the guns.

Republicans – defending the indefensible, protecting the people from the products and services they would choose in a real free market, shielding their donors from accountability and making a mockery of democracy.

May God have mercy on their soullessness.