The attached photo shows the latest example of tea parties intellectualism: anti-tax snowmen that one of their groups created on the lawn of the Michigan state Capitol (link; promoted of course by Glenn Reynolds, instapundit.com/94447). This is definitely cute, but it shows yet again how imperative it is to work towards a situation where the tea partiers can be ignored.

Groups like the Center for American Progress and the like are wrong about most things, but at least they try to come up with solutions. Those solutions are usually counter-productive and self-serving, but at least they to some extent try to engage their brains.

The most the tea partiers have been able to come up with is the absurdly bogus Contract from America and some bad questions. Everything else has been one cheap, anti-intellectual stunt after another, whether it's throwing tantrums at townhalls, swarming politicians, holding bunny ears behind politicians' heads (rather than trying to discredit them), waving loopy signs, or all the rest.

No one expects some random member of a political group to have an expert policy opinion on some specific topic, but the difference between the partiers and all the other groups is that the partiers seem to not even be aware just how tough it is to keep the government running. The federal government can only get so small, and in order to avoid planes falling out of the skies it needs qualified grown-ups running both day-to-day operations and long-term planning.

But, almost the only response the partiers have been able to come up with is completely based in emotion, incredibly childish, and unattached to reality. They aren't qualified to offer advice on governing and they aren't qualified to keep the Obama administration in check. We need to work to a point where they can be ignored.