That's what David Rothkopf is bemoaning here in Foreign Policy and it's what outgoing Republican congressman Bob Ingliss is warning about in his comments yesterday at the House Subcommittee hearing on climate change. Rothkopf, perhaps reminded of this movie (that was awful but also dead-on), offers his own metaphor for the virus overtaking parts of the Republican party :
In just the past couple of weeks since the election we have seen half a dozen examples of this next generation know-nothingism, this translation of a dumbed-down zeitgeist into a new movement that might be called Snookiism.
Go ahead and have a read of his examples. You might then ask yourself what it'll take to burn out this strain of Snookism.