Five Symptoms of Republican Schizophrenia

The Mayo Clinic, the world famous institution cited by all sides in the contentious health care debate, defines schizophrenia as a serious brain disorder "in which reality is interpreted abnormally" resulting in "hallucinations, delusions, and disordered thinking and behavior." Apparently, that affliction is now running rampant among supporters of the Republican Party. As recent polling about conservative beliefs regarding Medicare, taxes, supposed "death panels," President Obama's citizenship and more shows, the crisis of Republican schizophrenia has reached epidemic proportions.

Here, then, are the five symptoms of incurable Republican schizophrenia:

(If you exhibit one or more of these warning signs, see your physician immediately. If you don't have health insurance - and if your state voted Republican, you're much more likely not to - Democrats will try to provide it for you.)

1. "Keep Government Out of Medicare." In July, Rep. Bob Inglis (R-SC) described an angry constituent who confronted him at a South Carolina town hall meeting, "keep your government hands off my Medicare." Despite his best efforts to explain that Medicare is a government program, the voter, Inglis lamented, "wasn't having any of it."

But as new data from Public Policy Polling revealed, that same cognitive failure is now far more widespread than swine flu. While 39% of all Americans responded that the government should "stay out of Medicare," 59% of self-identified conservatives and 62% of McCain voters hold that oxymoronic view.

2. "Barack Obama is a Muslim." An April survey by the Pew Research Center showed that 11% of Americans believe Barack Obama is a Muslim, a figure largely unchanged since its polling started in March 2008. Yet 17% of Republicans and 19% of white evangelicals (74% of whom voted for John McCain) insist the President is an adherent of Islam, despite his repeated pronouncements and decades of church attendance to the contrary.

3. "Barack Obama Was Not Born in the United States." This contagion is running rampant among the ranks of Republicans. And even with repeated treatments of birth certificates and Hawaiian newspaper announcements from 1961, there is apparently no cure.

A DailyKos/Research 2000 poll found that a stunning 58% of Republicans did not believe (28%) or were unsure (30%) that President Barack Obama was in fact born in the United States. To be sure, this is a Southern pathology, a region home to 69% of all birthers and the only part of the country to increase its Republican presidential vote in 2008. This week's PPP survey only confirmed the chronic birtherism plaguing the Republican Party:

Only 62% of respondents reported believing that Obama was born in the United States. 10% thought he was born in Indonesia, 7% thought he was born in Kenya, 1% thought he was born in the Philippines, and 20% weren't sure. Among Republicans 44% think he was not born here while just 36% believe that he was.

(In a promising development, only 10% of respondents weren't sure if Hawaii is part of the United States. On this score, conservatives were only slightly more confused than liberals and moderates.)

4. "Government Death Panels Will Euthanize My Grandma." Sadly, the Republicans' Birther and Deather psychoses represent a cradle-to-grave illness.

Despite the vaccinations administered by PolitiFact, ABC News, the New York Times and countless other care-givers, Republicans persist in their virulent health care death panel delusions. This out-of-control CTD (conservative transmitted disease) has spread like wildfire, thanks to vectors like Betsy McCaughey, Rush Limbaugh, Newt Gingrich and Sarah Palin. (Even a Republican like Senator Chuck Grassley, previously diagnosed by President Obama as sane, came down with the deather flu.)

An NBC poll this week quantified the deather madness: a staggering 45 percent said it's likely the government will decide when to stop care for the elderly.