Image courtesy of twolf1

It was only a matter of time, really.  When CNN contributor (!) Erick Erickson derisively referred to the (excellent) first night of the DNC as “The Vagina Monologues,” which did have the rather uncharacteristic charm of being a tiny bit funny, at least compared to what generally passes as humor in righty circles, he gave voice to what is probably Republicans’ biggest problem with that 51% of Americans with vaginas.  The right, at least those below the age of 80, have some serious issues with their own masculinity, which makes them as toxic to women as they are ridiculous to normal men.

This embarrassing affliction is always rearing its head, if you’ll pardon the pun, at the least opportune times.  Just days after Paul Ryan’s gobsmacking lies about his marathon times were exposed to be OVER AN HOUR OFF (guess which direction), some lovesick schoolgirl wrote this in the Denver Post:

Ryan’s youthful energy at 42, the intellectual command that has propelled him into House leadership, his steely courage as a truth-teller about our fiscal peril and a pathfinder away from the precipice toward prosperity, as well as his unapologetic faith at a time when religious freedom is under attack, make the vice-presidential nominee a clear asset for Republicans and a feared opponent for Democrats.

Add to this the hard-charging congressman’s love for the Colorado high country (he has climbed 40 of the state’s 54 peaks over 14,000 feet) and you have the most potentially transformative VP selection since President William McKinley put Theodore Roosevelt on the ticket in 1900. (Not the genteel Roosevelt, squire of Hyde Park, but his “strenuous life” cousin who ranched in Dakota and hunted bear in Glenwood Springs.)

Why does it matter that Paul Ryan is a mountain man, at home above timberline on the fourteeners? Because there is no better index of character. It tells of someone’s backbone under pressure, resourcefulness in facing adversity, and trustworthiness for power. Conservative or liberal isn’t the point. The high peaks simply test your mettle. Declinists and defeatists need not apply. Excuses are for flatlanders.

Indeed.  And I hasten to add, this does not make Paul Ryan more likely to let you give him a blowjob, Miss Andrews. (She calls herself “John,” but that must be short for Jacqueline.) I haven’t been this revolted since Chris Matthews and Oliver North went on and on about the sexiness of the potato George W. Bush shoved into his crotch for his “Mission Accomplished” moment.

Is everyone in the Republican party secretly on Craigslist looking for Daddies, or does it just appear so?  There’s a reason that the Republican clubhouse has a “No Girls Allowed” sign, and it probably isn’t the one they’d like you to think it is.  Back in his Air America days (and in his hilarious book about the Bush administration, FUBAR), Sam Seder advanced a theory that today seems all but irrefutable: the American right is a fever swamp of repressed sexuality, with dire consequences for the rest of us.

Those among them who are nominally heterosexual are the most fervent about controlling women’s sexual lives, something they could never accomplish by charm alone, and the ones obsessing over gays are, well, like the writer featured above.  You’ll notice, for instance, that Erick Erickson looks a lot more like J. Edgar Hoover than Michelangelo’s “David,” a fact undoubtedly not lost on the lifetime’s worth of women who fled from him like the cat fled from Pepe Le Pew.  Is it any coincidence that, irrespective of his poisonous public views, that Family Research Council’s Tony Perkins makes Gretchen Carlson look butch?

A lot of Republicans’ problems, both personal and political, could be solved overnight if the poor things could only get laid, and America would be a better place for it, to boot.  But as patriotic as I am, I’m not about to volunteer.