GOP Candidate Rick Perry Threatens Ben Bernanke's Life

It didn't take long for Rick Perry to jump the shark. Less than two days after entering the race for President, Texas Governor Rick Perry seemed to threaten Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke with a lynching. Yes, seriously. Perry said, “If this guy prints more money between now and the election, I dunno what y'all would do to him in Iowa but we would treat him pretty ugly down in Texas. Printing more money to play politics at this particular time in American history is almost treasonous in my opinion.” Watch the video at thinkprogress.org, here. Treason, you might recall, is one of the few crimes punishable with death. We already know Perry loves executing people (including innocent people!). He has killed 234 people in his term as governor, and he shows no sign of slowing down. Would he really relish the opportunity to string Bernanke up and show him some Texas Justice? God, who knows. He's just crazy enough to think it's God's Will. Despite the rhetoric, I think people are missing the larger point here. We now have, on record, a candidate for president saying that attempting to stave off a recession before the election is treason. Think about that. According to Rick Perry's own words, anything that is done to help the economy that might tangentially help Barack Obama in the election is now considered treason. That is a huge statement, and it needs to be blared from the rooftops of every media organization across the country. Ben Bernanke is not in the business of seeing to it that one political party or the other wins. Bernanke's job is to keep the American economy from going off the rails, steering it between inflation and unemployment. The Federal Reserve is an independent institution, and Rick Perry ought to know better than to try and bully the Fed into a different decision. Is this really the Republican strategy for 2012? To let the economy fail so that Democrats get blamed for the mess and the GOP can get elected. The whole debt ceiling debate makes a lot more sense if you consider the possibility that the Republican Party WANTS the economy to fail in 2011 and 2012, so they can blame President Obama and the Democrats in the election. Tell me again: Who's the treasonous one in that equation? It sure sounds like the Republicans. It also takes a tremendous amount of psychological twisting for Rick Perry to ever call anyone else treasonous. Why? Rick Perry has actually suggested that he would commit treason while governor of Texas. On April 15, 2009, Rick Perry told a Tea Party crowd that Texas might go ahead and secede from the Union if Washington didn't govern the way it desired. "Texas is a unique place. When we came into the union in 1845, one of the issues was that we would be able to leave if we decided to do that... My hope is that America and Washington in particular pays attention. We've got a great union. There's absolutely no reason to dissolve it. But if Washington continues to thumb their nose at the American people, who knows what may come of that," he said. Aah, great. Republicans flirt with secession, want to relive the Civil War, refuse to play along with anything Washington does (unless it suits their needs), and believe doing anything to help the economy is treason, because it might get the black guy re-elected. It's a wonder anyone takes these fools seriously anymore. You can reach the author by email john@benzinga.com or on twitter @johndthorpe.