Is Stupid A Republican Value ?

The presidency of George W. Bush is not so far in the past, and every American should remember just what the Bush administration did to this country. The Bush administration followed policies that created the biggest gap between the rich and the rest of America since before the Great Depression, deregulated Wall Street causing a meltdown that robbed the American people of trillions of dollars (and then bailed out the giant banks responsible for it), kicked off a recession that caused the loss of millions of American jobs, encouraged the outsourcing of millions more American jobs, gave massive tax cuts to the rich, and started two unnecessary and prolonged wars.

Now anyone with even a tiny bit of common sense would not want to repeat those mistakes. But the Republicans seem to have learned nothing from the mistakes of the Bush administration. Instead, they have now nominated a clone of Bush to be their nominee in the upcoming presidential election. Now some of you may think this is simply ignorance (a lack of knowledge of the facts) instead of stupidity (knowledge of the facts but refusing to accept them). I would disagree. Romney does not use Bush's name, but he has made it very clear that he will follow the same foreign, economic, and social policies instituted by George W. Bush.

As I said, the Bush administration was not that long ago. Anyone of voting age knows what happened during the Bush presidency -- they saw it with their own eyes. And yet they have decided to support a man who has nothing better to offer than a repeat of the failed Bush presidency. To me, that fits the definition of stupid. But there is more evidence that "stupid" may have actually become a Republican value.

About a month and a half ago, Dartmouth University commissioned a poll. The poll was done by YouGov Polling between April 26th and May 2nd (and had a margin of error of 3.18 points). A couple of the poll's questions show that Republicans refuse to accept facts that have repeatedly been proven to be true. Here they are:

DID IRAQ HAVE WEAPONS OF MASS DESTRUCTION WHEN INVADED BY THE U.S. IN 2003?
Yes...............62.9%
Don't know...............19.6%
No...............17.5%

WAS BARACK OBAMA BORN IN THE UNITED STATES?
No...............63.6%
Don't know...............14.7%
Yes...............21.9%

It is absolutely incredible that anyone could still have either of these beliefs today. Iraq was scoured for any kind of mass destruction weapons, and none could be found. And that fact was widely reported by all news media. And the birthplace of President Obama has long since been proven by the release of both the long and short form birth certificates, and repeated statements from Hawaiian officials (not to mention newspaper accounts from the time of his birth).

Anyone believing Iraq had weapons of mass destruction or Obama was born in a foreign country is not ignorant of the facts. They know the facts, but just refuse to accept them (especially since 79.3% of them claim to closely follow the news). And that is just stupid. Even worse, they seem to be proud of their stupidity.

That's why I asked whether stupidity has become a Republican value. For at least a large majority of the current Republican Party, I think the answer to that question is quite obvious.