Does the Daily Beast have an Anger Management program for its writers? If so, then Christopher Dickey is in dire need of that service.
The fire-breathing Dickey is apparently so full of hate that he attacks political groups he disagrees with even when writing on completely unrelated topics. Take for example the subject of Robert E. Lee. Even though the Confederate general died almost 150 years ago, Dickey manages to twist his Daily Beast book review about him into an attack on the Tea Party that is chock full of hate. Think I exaggerate? Even the title of fire-breather Dickey's book review is How I Learned to Hate Robert E. Lee. We shall skip over most of Dickey's hate to concentrate on the portion of his book review that focuses on his hatred of Tea Party supporters:
...Lee’s nobility and charisma, and the carnage that he commanded, gave cover to all those incendiary Southern politicians who did not, in fact, feel ambivalent about slavery. These “fire-eaters,” as they were called, not only wanted to perpetuate their peculiar institution, they wanted to reopen the slave trade with Africa...
The fire-eaters were a minority then, as the Tea Partiers (their spiritual descendants) are today, but like today’s Tea Party they promoted extremist agendas and pounded down on wedge issues that sundered the nation and very nearly destroyed it.
The link he provides goes to his 2010 Newsweek story where fire-breather Dickey again obsesses over the Tea Party in a similar manner:
These basic facts about a moment of history that Obama obviously holds dear are worth going over again right now because, in fact, the secessionists of 1860 are the ideological forebears of the Tea Party movement today. No, the United States is not on the verge of another violent breakup, not close at all, even if Tea Party icons like Gov. Rick Perry in Texas or some of Sarah Palin’s friends and relatives in Alaska may toy with the notion of secession. But there is in American politics today a discourse of such cupidity, bigotry, and self-delusion about the role of government that it would have been familiar to anyone following the rhetoric of the Southern “fire-eaters” pushing the country toward a conflagration 150 years ago.
So can fire-breather Dickey be cured of his obsessive hate of the Tea Party? Perhaps he should take a cue from the Anger Management movie and pull his car to the side of the road and gently sing "I Feel Pretty." Any sign of angry hatred on his part means he has to sing the song all over again plus spend an extra week with Dr. Buddy Rydell.
