June 6, 2011

Michele Bachmann, Sustainable Development, and “Tenements”

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I have a story up today on Rep. Michele Bachmann’s history of saying absolutely ridiculous things—from the time she opined that Melissa Etheridge’s battle with breast cancer was an opportunity for the lesbian songwriter to turn away from her sinful lifestyle, to the time she suggested letting Glenn Beck fix the federal budget deficit. But a reader emailed to let me know I missed his favorite quote. And it is a pretty fantastic one: here is Bachmann, circa 2008, warning against the eight-headed chupacabra of sustainable development:

“This is their agenda. I know it is hard to believe, it’s hard to fathom—but this is ‘mission accomplished for them’: They want Americans to take transit and move to the inner cities. They want Americans to move to the urban core, live in tenements, [and] take light rail to their government jobs. That’s their vision for America.”

Tenements? Really?

The idea that sustainable development is some sort of nefarious plot actually has pretty deep roots in the tea party movement. MoJo‘s Stephanie Mencimer reported last spring on concerns, among some on the right, that the United Nations is working in league with progressive activists and politicians to return rural America to nature.

Anyway, if your favorite Bachmann-ism didn’t make the cut, feel free to post it in the comments.

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WE'LL BE BLUNT

It is astonishingly hard keeping a newsroom afloat these days, and we need to raise $253,000 in online donations quickly, by October 7.

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