Putting the Children in Charge

With the exit of George Dubya from the world stage, it's comforting to see that the Republican leadership aka Michael Steele aka "Iron" Mike Tyson's former brother-in-law hasn't let a little things like knowledge, history or facts get in the way of doctrine.

From the Huffington Post...

And when a listener scoffed at the notion of global warming, Steele eagerly ran with the baton.

"Thank you, thank you," he said. "We are cooling. We are not warming. The warming you see out there, the supposed warming, and I am using my finger quotation marks here, is part of the cooling process. Greenland, which is now covered in ice, it was once called Greenland for a reason, right? Iceland, which is now green. Oh I love this. Like we know what this planet is all about. How long have we been here? How long? No very long."

Greenland, for the record, likely had forestation some 450,000 to 800,000 years ago. But its name was derived, as is most commonly believed, from Erik the Red, who wanted to trick people into going to that island as opposed to the more hospitable Iceland.

The Greenland gaffe was not Steele's most glaring. Earlier in the program a caller asked him about the importance of education. The RNC Chair responded with a curious comment about the need to understand the differences between Hitler and Mussolini, as opposed to FDR and "his honor, the honorable Winston Churchill." Only, he spoke of "Roberto Mussolini" -- an obscure essayist, it seems -- as opposed to the much more infamous fascist, Benito.

"Education is key," said the RNC Chair. "It is where it begins, for all of us... If we understand the difference between Marxism, socialism and capitalism; if we understand the difference between a Roberto Mussolini, an Adolf Hitler, and a Franklin Roosevelt, and his honor the honorable Winston Churchill, if we know those differences than we can appreciate what these times mean. And how history is a precursor of things to come.