Jim Hightower

While it's hard to fathom right-wing nuttiness, it's sure not hard to find it these days.

We saw it in full bloom recently when it popped right out of the head of Todd Akin, the GOP's senate candidate in Missouri. The learned Congressman gave America a twisted tutorial on the imaginary science of "legitimate rape," including an astonishing assertion of medical mojo. Akin explained that raped women don’t get pregnant because – again, speaking scientifically – the female body has ways "to shut that whole thing down."

Whoa! Screamed Mitt Romney and the entire Republican hierarchy, as they rushed to declare Akin out-of-bounds and… well, nutty.

But wait – guess who's presently co-sponsoring legislation with Akin to impose this theological witchcraft on America's women? Why, it's Romney's choice to be our vice president, Paul Ryan! And guess which party has just fully embraced Akin's nuttiness by including his absolutist "no-abortion-even-in-the-case-of-rape" provision in its national platform? Yes, the Romney-Ryan Republicans. Yet, that same party's panicked poobahs have pronounced Akin's views so extreme that he should withdraw from the Missouri Senate race. Excuse me, but – logically speaking – doesn't that mean Ryan should also withdraw from his race?

Of course, in the fantasy universe of the far right, logic is an alien intruder, barred from interfering with either approved doctrine or political expediency. Indeed, here's their idea of logic: Todd Akin, a devout worshipper of junk science, is a member of the House Committee on Science.

And if you find that surreal, let me add that it's hardly the only illogical perversion in the doctrinal right's carefully-constructed NutLand – Michele Bachmann, for example, is a member of the House Intelligence Committee.