#2008: Joe Miller

Most famous for being the Tea Party favorite in the 2010 U.S. Senate election in Alaska, Joe Miller actually beat Lisa Murkowski in the Republican primaries, but lost to her (with Murkowski running as an Independent) in the general election – a sign of troubles ahead, perhaps? In any case, Joe Miller is a serious loon, as he also amply demonstrated during his Senate run. The details of his antics are well covered here and here. His campaign was to a large extent focused on asserting that various things he didn’t like were unconstitutional on the grounds that he didn’t like them, as well as promoting various paranoid delusions, including claiming that refugee children are “something that does put the very survival of this country at stake.” Miller is currently, it seems, a radio host.

After losing to Murkowski – who won as a write-in candidate – Miller filed several charges of voter fraud, e.g. alleging that hundreds of convicted sex offenders and possibly other felons were allowed to vote in the election, and numerous creative (and insane) claims to have votes in favor of Murkowski discounted. The courts were very much not impressed.

Miller is also a conspiracy theorist, and received some attention for his claim, in the WND, that Obama should be impeached for secretly “giving away seven strategic, resource-laden Alaskan islands to the Russians.” This claim is, needless to say, incorrect. Miller also suggested that Obama had ties to the Muslim Brotherhood, implicating the IRS as well in the process. (The idea was based on a conspiracy theory touted by Jerome Corsi; listening to Jerome Corsi is itself sufficient to qualify as a loon, and Corsi is far from the only conspiracy theorist to whom Miller has lent an ear). Of the war in Syria and subsequent refugee crisis, Miller suggested that “this was the plan all along, to create conflict in the Middle East, have a refugee crisis and inundate this country with radicals.” Miller is also a global warming denialist.

Indeed, Miller is also a creationist, and has argued that creationism should be taught in public schools.

Diagnosis: Apparently too crazy for Alaska, Joe Miller is seriously crazy. Though denied a position with legislative powers, Miller is still around, though it is doubtful that anyone listens to him who is not already firmly on board the shuttle bus to paranoid insanity.