To answer a somewhat earlier question from DtG:

> The more ridiculous his policies become, the more
> I wonder who is allowing them to pass.

It's the boil-the-frog method. We suffered, and are still suffering, from that in the UK: the more rabid the right-wing papers made their headlines, the more everybody thought it had become normal. (Small boats, anyone?) It's *just* possible that this State of the Drivel farce may have woken some of them from their stupor, but I'll believe that when I see Capitol Hill raining jumping frogs.

There's historical precendents for this sort of thing. Cato the Elder, for example, ended every speech he made in the Roman Senate with Ceterum (autem) censeo Carthaginem esse delendam ("Furthermore, I think that Carthage must be destroyed"), for so long that this eventually became a self-fulfilling prophecy.