It’s nights like last that make me miss covering politics full time. Election nights when voters get their crazy on and act like kids.

I’m mad! I want lower taxes! I’m not doing what the adults tell me to do! I want cookies for breakfast! And I don’t wanna get fat. And of course, I HATE YOU ALL!

The American press loves to place the voter on the highest pedestal. After all our little experiment in (sort of) direct democracy has, on balance, worked out pretty well over the last 230 odd years. But let’s be honest. Voters can be really stupid.

Take the voters of Harlem, for instance, or at least the 44 thousand that showed up Tuesday to ensure that Charlie Rangel would get chance to defend himself against a series of ethics charges brought by the generally reticent-to-act House Ethics Committee. They gave him a huge victory over the (relatively) respectable Adam Clayton Powell IV whose father Rangel beat oh so long ago by running as new blood against the old guard. Last night the new old guard hung on.

Rangel has been accused of, among other things, getting a long-time sweetheart deal for an office in a rent stabilized apartment building — an apartment that could have been used by one of his needy constituents. That kind of abuse of power directly impacting his own voters was not enough to get them to check the box for someone new. You gotta wonder what it would take?

Then there’s the action in “The First State” — Delaware — that has after last night made it the first state in crazy. Delaware Republicans — okay 57,000 of the 183,000 registered Republicans in the state — went big for Christine O’Donnell who besides being very conservative in a fairly moderate state, is as nutty as an Almond Joy. Speaking of joy, she is against masturbation and not afraid to make it a campaign issue. That should be fun.

O’Donnell’s win has all the cable “news” gasbags atwitter. So much to talk about! By beating the GOP party favorite with an endorsement from Sarah Palin she’s a symbol of “Republicans in turmoil” or… since she is so conservative and crazy she can’t win the general election dashing GOP hopes of a Senate seat pickup much to the delight of Democrats or… she represents a real movement that crosses party lines and represents dire threats to both parties. Well how about this: She’s a nut and the 30,000 Republicans who voted for her are stupid, petulant children.

I’m guessing I won’t be a guest speaker at the next Delaware Tea Party dinner.

Don’t get me wrong: I understand why people are angry. I got laid off by a giant money-grubbing corporation 18 months ago and watched with quiet glee as they’ve made one ridiculous error after the next. I’m angry about all the executives there and elsewhere that get big bonuses, excellent health care, lavish expense accounts, generous stock options, and fat paychecks for making shitty decisions at best, and often failing miserably at worst. The people in charge are always eager to talk about people under them taking responsibility for their actions but can’t seem to walk the walk. But let’s get something straight — there’s informed angry and stupid angry and an awful lot of voters seem to be stupid angry.

Like all those seniors who’ve been screaming socialism for the last two years any time anyone so much as mentions the health care reform bill that Obama signed into law. How’s your Medicare gramps? Since you’re opposed to the “government takeover of health care” let’s start dismantling said socialist product by taking away your Medicare card and your ridiculously expensive prescription drug benefit. Otherwise you’re gonna bankrupt your kids and grandkids.

Like all those Westerners who gather at anti-government Tea Party rallies demanding that the government “get off their backs”. Okay. First let’s start charging market prices for all the water that allows Arizona, Nevada, Colorado, Wyoming, eastern Washington, Idaho, and New Mexico to support human life as our fat suburban asses know it. All that life-giving, housing-tract-creating water is courtesy of the damn government. And while we’re at it let’s get all those military bases out of the South (where they represent 20%-30% of most states’ economies) since that’s just government getting in the way.

Like all those out-of-work folks in the area formerly known as the Rust Belt and in the Northeast who are still mad about the bank and auto industry bailouts because the government gave away the store to those least in need. Now anyone in either party who supported either is tarred with their “vote for socialism”. Yeah! Because if those damn politicians in Washington hadn’t acted we’d all be so much better off. I know I’d be much happier waiting on soup lines and watching foreclosures reach Florida levels.

Like all of us who complain about our “high taxes” and lap up the “no new taxes” pablum politicians regurgitate with predictable election-year regularity. Yeah taxes are too damn high. So let’s cut those and all that wasteful spending. Like Medicare for seniors. Like the military, which consumed a trillion dollars in the pursuit of “victory” in Iraq. Like the subsidy for homeowner mortgages that are huge giveaways to the wealthy (we could keep them for the real middle class). Like agricultural subsidies that don’t lower prices nor save farm jobs but enrich giant farmbelt corporations. Like the 8 billion a year we send to Israel and Eqypt — let ‘em pay their own way. Like the school systems that still provide a pretty decent education — let families choose private schools and pay for what they think their kids need — or they could home school! And of course let’s do something about Social Security — maybe we could just stop indexing for inflation because after all, seniors are good at clipping coupons and penny-pinching. Or better yet let’s just pay them back what they put in and call it a day. They can live off their juicy 401k accounts.

Stupid angry voters. Fed by gutless politicians and venal, corrupt media outlets that have long ago given up any notion that news ought to be based on facts. Hell, many shows, blogs and stories don’t contain any facts. And yet we drink it in. Like kids who have yet to face the responsibilities of adulthood. Ay but there’s the rub.

As parents and adults we teach kids that life is about choices. Some easy, some hard. But all part of what it means to be a thinking, breathing, responsible citizen of the United States and, I daresay, the planet. You can have ice cream for dinner every night but there will be consequences. You can skip doing your homework but there will be consequences. You can have sex without protection but there will be consequences. You can have temper tantrums and lash out but there will be consequences.

Stupid angry voters meet the consequences of your actions: Incompetent, incapable public servants driven to destruction.

Smart not-so-angry voters meet the consequences of your inactions: See above.