Someone please tell me how this is any different than a rant by the crazy guy on the subway (boldface mine):

Across the country, activists with ties to the Tea Party are railing against all sorts of local and state efforts to control sprawl and conserve energy. They brand government action for things like expanding public transportation routes and preserving open space as part of a United Nations-led conspiracy to deny property rights and herd citizens toward cities.

They are showing up at planning meetings to denounce bike lanes on public streets and smart meters on home appliances — efforts they equate to a big-government blueprint against individual rights.

“Down the road, this data will be used against you,” warned one speaker at a recent Roanoke County, Va., Board of Supervisors meeting who turned out with dozens of people opposed to the county’s paying $1,200 in dues to a nonprofit that consults on sustainability issues.

No, sir. They already are [Mad Biologist chuckles sinisterly in deep Christopher Lee voice].

But this lunacy couldn’t possibly be affecting policy, could it? Well:

Local officials say they would dismiss such notions except that the growing and often heated protests are having an effect.

In Maine, the Tea Party-backed Republican governor canceled a project to ease congestion along the Route 1 corridor after protesters complained it was part of the United Nations plot. Similar opposition helped doom a high-speed train line in Florida. And more than a dozen cities, towns and counties, under new pressure, have cut off financing for a program that offers expertise on how to measure and cut carbon emissions.

Because it all comes back to the paranoia about Agenda 21, “a sweeping, but nonbinding, 100-plus-page resolution… that was designed to encourage nations to use fewer resources and conserve open land by steering development to already dense areas.” More lunacy:

In January, the Republican Party adopted its own resolution against what it called “the destructive and insidious nature” of Agenda 21. And Newt Gingrich took aim at it during a Republican debate in November.

Yes, please, encourage the crazy people. No, please do:

Until a few years ago, he had few followers beyond a handful of farmers and ranchers in rural areas. Now, he is a regular speaker at Tea Party events.

Membership is rising, Mr. DeWeese said, because what he sees as tangible Agenda 21-inspired controls on water and energy use are intruding into everyday life. “People may be acting out at some of these meetings, and I do not condone that. But their elected representatives are not listening and they are frustrated.”

Fox News has also helped spread the message. In June, after President Obama signed an executive order creating a White House Rural Council to “enhance federal engagement with rural communities,” Fox programs linked the order to Agenda 21. A Fox commentator, Eric Bolling, said the council sounded “eerily similar to a U.N. plan called Agenda 21, where a centralized planning agency would be responsible for oversight into all areas of our lives. A one world order.”

For those of you old enough to remember the Clinton era lunacy and the militia madness, it’s the same old black helicopter shit (complete with U.N. Mongolian shock troops–I kid you not about the Mongols), just in a new form:

At a Board of Supervisors meeting in Roanoke in late January, Cher McCoy, a Tea Party member from nearby Lexington, Va., generated sustained applause when she warned: “They get you hooked, and then Agenda 21 takes over. Your rights are stripped one by one.”

Echoing other protesters, Ms. McCoy identified smart meters, devices being installed by utility companies to collect information on energy use, as part of the conspiracy. “The real job of smart meters is to spy on you and control you — when you can and cannot use electrical appliances,” she said.

Just like the dastardly lightbulb vigilantes.

But, as is often (if not always) the case with movement conservatives, they get away with babbling this shit because there are no consequences to their actions:

“The Tea Party people say they want nonpolluted air and clean water and everything we promote and support, but they also say it’s a communist movement,” said Charlotte Moore, a supervisor who voted yes. “I really don’t understand what they want.”

My advice, as always, is to ignore what they want, since they are not arguing over things like balancing state budgets, but Top Sekrit spy devices beaming all our information to the U.N. Mongol strike forces*. This is not a policy issue, but a mass, public manifestation of psychosis.

Ignore them and fix the damn country.

*It’s all the more perverse, seeing as many police departments will Taser anyone at the drop of a hat, which, to me anyway, seems a lot more dictatorial than energy efficiency.