Last week the  Syrian-level war within the conservative “movement” got a little bloodier and a lot more public.

On the front lines, Rush Limbaugh, Bill O’Reilly and Laura Ingraham frightened the straights when Bill broke ever so slightly with the party line over gay marriage. After O’Reilly suggested that opponents of gay marriage need to rise above being mere “bible thumpers”, Limbaugh responded on his radio program by telling O’Reilly  to “<insert whatever that chunk of ass blubber has said every day for the last 25 years>“, which was then followed up by Ingraham appearing on the O’Reilly Factor to back Limbaugh’s play.

Ingraham may be a frequent guest host on O’Reilly’s radio show, but that didn’t stop O’Reilly from talking over her, down to her and basically farting in her face. It is a beautiful thing to watch the right wing eat it’s own. Do watch.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VO32JMd7l_g[/youtube]

On the more far-flung battlefields, things were heating up as well. Breitbart.com contributor John Nolte threw a hissy when another conservative, Ben Howe, dared to critique what initially appeared to be the trailer for the funniest fucking fail project ever:  A Movement on Fire (below is the extended edition, which includes a music video).

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w22n1wRiUUw[/youtube]

What looks like a sweded version of The Matrix is, in fact, a faux-movie trailer that was shown at the recent CPAC conference (and which we can be sure was rewarded with roof-shaking applause, foot stomps and mongoloid grunts). Ben Howe did not realize this fact when he took to Buzzfeed.com to condemn this schlock for being the biggest embarrassment to conservatism since President-He-Who-Will-Not-Be-Named. Howe’s act of heresy incensed Nolte, who lambasted Howe for airing his thoughts on a non-movement approved website.

Going postal over someone’s critique of what appears to be a disaster in the making is hilarious enough, but are Howe’s objections to the trailer any less relevant when you realize it is merely a commercial for a right wing website? Howe’s fears that  A Movement on Fire would damage ongoing efforts by conservatives to conquer Hollywood are well-founded. Despite the ersatz nature of the project, the trailer is still an accurate window into conservative delusions about art and politics. John Nolte isn’t really upset over the criticism; he’s worried that this crap will get wider exposure.

In his editorial “Another Terrible Conservative Movie”, Howe points out Movement’s similarity in tone to The Hunger Games (its name even evokes the spirit of Katniss Everdeen, the “Girl on Fire”), then worries aloud that general audiences will roll their eyes at this portrait of a manicured, post-Obama dystopia. But if  this were a real movie, worse would be in store for conservatism than detached retinas. If  A Movement on Fire really did hit the big screen, audiences exposed to it would probably turn the nation Bolshevik overnight out of spite. Even North Korea has classier propaganda than this! 

First we are shown a woman (who looks like the prettier of Cinderella’s step-sisters) overlooking a city while a non-professional voice actor tells us that 15 years ago, “…Freedom died,”… or liberty or individuality or whatever. Then some jackbooted thugs come up from behind her to play peekaboo. We are supposed to want to rescue this Avatar of American Exceptionalism, but come on! Would you really risk a police beating for this ugnaught?

 

Lady Liberty or a white CCH Pounder? 

Next we discover that the country of Shining City on a Hill is under the tyrannical rule of the Development Party, which has conquered freedom or self-reliance or whatever using the power of vinyl banners. (Banners are to this movie what telescreens were to 1984.)

 

The Neo of our tale isn’t going to take this lying down, though. Like the tyrants, he also has access to a Kinko’s, and  after breaking his oppressive taxation card he and a team of revolutonaries embark on a campaign to overthrow despotism through the power of 99¢ color copies!

A society where a QR code is scannable? That’s hella futuristic!

Surplus Romney signage, do your thing!

What is interesting is that every act of “rebellion” the trailer shows is something that conservatives spit on in real life. Hacking computers…like Anonymous? Fighting authority with empty symbols… like V for Vendetta masks and Che T-shirts?  And what’s all this about standing up to the police??

Who knew the Tea Party was so jealous of Occupy?