At a meeting with “well-heeled” Republicans at the GOP Lincoln Club in Irvine, CA yesterday, former House Majority Leader Dick Armey (R-TX) promoted his book, “Give Us Liberty – A Tea Party Manifesto,” and outlined many of his familiar political arguments. But he also shared an odd conspiracy theory:

Armey bashed Barack Obama and Democrats even harder – the former economics professor said the president was “economically ignorant” and accusing Democrats of widespread voter fraud, saying it bad votes accounted for 3 percent of elections.

“I’m tired of people being Republican all their lives and then changing parties when they die,” quipped Armey, 70.

The idea that dead people are voting Democratic is even more of a reach than popular and well-debunked ACORN conspiracy theories. While it’s true that many states have dead people on their voter rolls, it’s simply an administrative problem that is easily resolved by checking voter rolls against the Social Security Administration’s national death list. While some far-right outlets like CNS News scare-monger over supposed “zombie voters” being used in fraud schemes, there has been no evidence of any widespread practice of voters pretending to be dead people.

Armey seems to believe that not only does this happen, but that it accounts for 3 percent of votes cast during elections. In the 2008 general election, 132,645,504 people cast a vote, which means that if Armey’s theory is correct, almost 3.8 million of them were dead.

It’s hard to imagine how Armey came up with this conspiracy. Perhaps he took the title of Jason Mattera’s recent anti-Obama screed literally.

Former House Majority Leader and FreedomWorks Chairman Dick Armey is making the rounds this month to promote his new book, “Give Us Liberty: A Tea Party Manifesto.” In proselytizing for the conservative agenda of the “leaderless” Tea Party, Armey touts the humble foundations of the movement’s agenda, saying the “best practices come from the ground up, around kitchen tables, from Facebook friends, at weekly book clubs, or on Twitter feeds.”

In trying to reestablish the conservative brand, Armey is attempting to throw President Bush under the bus. In an interview aired last night on the O’Reilly Factor, Armey dismissed the qualifications of Bush who pushed for the 2008 financial bailout funds. When right-wing pundit Bill O’Reilly tried to defend Bush’s decision, Armey told O’Reilly that “Bush isn’t a big thinking guy” and he lacked “adult discipline,” unlike Armey, who knows better because “he read Hayek and Mises”:

O’REILLY: So you think the federal government should just step back and let it go?

ARMEY: Yeah the whole notion of too big to fail is simply a rationale for government intervention mostly.

O’REILLY: Bush isn’t a Big government guy..

ARMEY: No Bush is… Bush isn’t a big thinking guy either. Quite frankly He’s not well-schooled on economics. [...] Look I’m an economist by training, I studied it all my life. I have an advantage over them because I read Hayek and Mises. But the fact of the matter is the most critical affliction that came to the economy for those few days was the nations see in the secretary of treasury and the president in a total panic. If they would’ve had an adult discipline.

O’REILLY: So if you were there, you wouldn’t have done anything, no intervention. You would’ve let whatever happen happen

ARMEY: Absolutely right. You’ve got to let..you can’t privatize profits and socialize loss.

Watch it:

Armey is not shy about his current contempt for the former president. At a Christian Science Monitor lunch last month, Armey dubbed Bush the “quickest, biggest bitter disappointment.” But, during Bush’s administration, Armey found plenty of policies to praise Bush about. In 2001, Armey even touted Bush’s “rare ability to ‘tune out the noise’” to get things done:

House Majority Leader Dick Armey said yesterday President Bush has a rare ability to “tune out the noise,” which is helping him define and organize the new initiatives of this administration. “There’s a new demeanor in Washington,” Mr. Armey told a group of constituents at a breakfast coffee klatch. Mr. Bush “knows what he wants to accomplish and is busy going about it.”

While he now slams Bush’s No Child Left Behind policy, Armey published an op-ed in the Washington Times in 2001 to congratulate Bush for “finally changing the way Washington views education.” Blaming President Clinton for “simply talking about a failed education system,” Armey said Bush “is doing something about it.” When Bush pushed to privatize Social Security in 2004, Armey saluted Bush’s “strong leadership” in “clearly understand[ing] the profound issues at stake.”

As ThinkProgress noted, former House Speaker Dick Armey laid out a plan this week that would effectively dismantle Social Security and Medicare “as you know it” by privatizing a large portion of these critical social safety net programs. On Meet the Press today, Armey and Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm (D) discussed a different Republican plan to privatize and dismantle the social safety net, Rep. Paul Ryan’s (R-WI) “Roadmap for America’s Future.” Granholm calls Ryan’s plan “far outside the mainstream,” noting that 85 percent of Americans don’t want to cut Social Security to solve the deficit.” Armey responds by laughing, claiming that “no one is talking about dismantling these systems:”

GREGORY: Governor, is this an example of what they called a mainstream political movement, some of these candidates and their views?

GRANHOLM: No. I think it’s far outside of the mainstream. In fact, one of the things, you just held up Paul Ryan’s proposal regarding Medicare and regarding Social Security, I think a lot of which you’ve jumped on to as well. There was a recent poll out that says 85 percent of Americans don’t want to see Social Security cut to solve the deficit. … If you care about democracy and what every citizen believes and you want to empower them, and they don’t want the social security system to be dismantled, and they don’t want the medicare system to be dismantled because your picking and choosing and this is a contact between generations to be able to make sure all of our seniors have the funds when they retire, that they’re not going to be homeless, that they’re not going to have to go to a shelter. I’m not kidding you. The idea that 85–

ARMEY: [Laughing] You just crack me up. No one is talking about dismantling these systems.

GRANHOLM: You just crack me up too, man. Well if you ask every actuarial that’s looked at it says you effectively dismantle the system.

Watch it:

As has been repeatedly noted, Ryan’s plan would destroy Social Security and Medicare as we know it, whether or not its advocates are talking about it that way. And while Armey laughs insensitively when Granholm brings up elderly homelessness, the problem was no laughing matter before the passage of these programs. Social Security and Medicare “ultimately made poorhouses obsolete.” Meanwhile, elderly homelessness is projected to rise by a third in the next ten years, and as the National Alliance to End Homesless notes, “Social Security, Medicare, and housing programs targeting the elderly will be critical for meeting the challenge and reducing risk of homelessness.”

Last week, President Obama accused Republicans of trying to destroy Social Security, noting that they are “pushing to make privatizing Social Security a key part of their legislative agenda if they win a majority in Congress this fall.” Of course, conservative talking heads denied this, claiming, “There’s no Republican, basically, standing up and saying that,” as GOP strategist Ed Rollins told CNN.

But on CNBC this morning, former GOP House Speaker cum tea party leader Dick Armey had no qualms about calling for cutting Social Security and Medicare. He advocated making these critical programs optional — and even suggested they are “flab” and “waste” — something that would almost certainly destroy them, despite his “guarantee” that that social security under his scheme would be “as you know it today”:

ARMEY: Let me say that flab is a good word in government. It is wasteful, counter-productive flab that not only does not good for America, but actually diminishes America’s ability to function. [...]

HOST: If you had your druthers, where would you cut?

ARMEY: Where would I cut? First thing I’d do…let Social Security be a choice. … I will give you a guarantee you will get your social security as you know it today, with no change other than a proper cost of living index if you choose to stay if you let those of us who want to leave it. And if it’s such a great deal, why can’t it be voluntary? Why must the government force people to accept their benefits whether they need them or not or whether they want them or not.

Let Medicare be voluntary. I mean, why is that so hard?

Watch it:

While this might be a winning talking point for Armey’s tea party followers, his half-baked idea would almost certainly collapse the vital American social safety net. These programs need younger, working people to contribute to them, so letting millions of people opt-out would likely yank retirement benefits from older Americans who paid into the system on the promise that they would be taken care of upon retirement. Moreover, wealthy people who can afford their own retirement plans would likely opt-out, slashing revenues and leaving less-affluent Americans stuck in underfunded or totally insolvent programs. And as former Vermont Governor Howard Dean, who was debating Armey, pointed out, some people who opt-ed out on the expectation that they would make enough money to support themselves in their old age would inevitably be unable to do so, leaving the country with a “moral obligation” to care for them, but with no means of doing so.

And much like the many other doomed conservative privatization schemes, replacing Social Security savings with private market funds could be disastrous during a period of financial turmoil. As a Center for American Progress Action Fund analysis found, under a privatization plan like the one proposed by President Bush, an October 2008 retiree would have lost $26,000 in the market plunge of that year, and if the U.S. stock market had behaved like the Japanese market during the duration of that retiree’s work life, a private account would experience “an effective -3.3 percent net annual rate of return.”

Much like the individual mandate in the Affordable Care Act, mandates for Social Security and Medicare are absolutely necessary, if unpopular, to support the entire system.

Freedomworks’ Chairman Dick Armey and President Matt Kibbe have authored a new book, “Give Us Liberty: A Tea Party Manifesto,” which advocates “a hostile takeover” of the Republican Party. Both Armey and Kibbe are long-time Republican operatives. Armey of course served as a Republican congressman from Texas and as House Republican Majority Leader during the so-called “Republican Revolution” in the 90s. Kibbe worked at the Republican National Committee and as a senior staffer to a Republican congressman.

Armey’s mission has grown more ideological, though not any less political, in the past few years. As ThinkProgress has documented, Armey has manipulated the heated emotions and anger of tea partiers and organized them to help push his corporate-friendly agenda, which includes advocating tax cuts for the rich, defeating clean energy reform, defending health insurers’ worst practices, and weakening regulations designed to protect consumers. Armey has been endorsing right-wing Republican candidates who are willing to take up his corporate-backed agenda.

This morning, Armey appeared on C-Span to tout his new tea party manifesto and was asked what he thinks about RNC Chairman Michael Steele. Armey couched his criticism of Steele in general terms:

C-SPAN: Mr. Armey, what do you make of the tenure of Michael Steele as head of the RNC.

ARMEY: Well again, he works with the Republican Party. You know, Armey’s axiom is “politics sooner or later makes a horse’s rear out of anybody.” Anybody that gets involved in a political party deeply and lets their behavior be governed by politically-defined choice criteria is gonna make some bumbling choices. While he’s done many good things, he’s made some fairly dramatic stumbles too.

Watch it:

Armey’s criticism of Steele comes in the wake of Republican strategist Ed Rollins’ comments this weekend that the RNC chairman’s tenure has been “a disaster.”

Armey and Steele teamed up in a failed effort to defeat the passage of health reform late last year. And Armey has advised Steele to make inroads into the tea party movement by fully embracing “taxing-and-spending issues.”

Mark Williams, the former chairman and current spokesperson of Tea Party Express, went on MSNBC today to again deny that there is any racism in the tea party, and to bash the NAACP for daring to point out the obvious examples of bigotry within the movement. When host Tamron Hall asked why not “move forward” by condemning extremism in both camps, Williams instead pointed fingers, blaming all cases of racism on agent provocateurs Crash the Tea Party. Even more absurd, Williams said it is “impossible” for the tea party movement to contain racist elements:

HALL: Do we move forward by either side calling out extremism in their party? [...]

WILLIAMS: It’s impossible — it’s impossible for there to be a racist element in the tea party, you don’t get it! The tea party is about human rights, it’s about the United States constitution. The United States constitution mankind’s foremost human rights document.

HALL: What about the signs of the president as an African with a bone in his nose? What is that? Is that about the constitution?

WILLIAMS: Those signs were brought by Crash the Tea party, the coalition of anti-tea party groups, google crashed the tea party. You will find it all there. … Buy my book!

Watch it:

Of course, as ThinkProgress has documented, Williams needs to look no farther than himself to know that it is not “impossible” for the tea party movement to contain racist elements. Moreover, William’s pathetic attempt to dismiss every single example of tea party racism as the work of Crash the Party is complete nonsense. If he took his own advice and googled Crash the Tea Party, he would see that the group didn’t even exist until April of this year — a year after racist and bigoted signs began appearing at tea party rallies. Beyond this, the counter-protesters never really materialized, and basic common sense should tell Williams that the group couldn’t possibly be responsible for every single racist sign.

Yesterday, NAACP president Benjamin Jealous called out tea party leaders, like Dick Armey, saying, “Dick we don’t think your racist, we’re just disappointed that you’re being silent in at the racism amongst your ranks.” A good place for Armey to break that silence would be with Williams.

Read more about racism in the tea party in today’s Progress Report.

Speaking on Fox News this morning, former GOP House Majority Leader and Tea Party profiteer Dick Armey falsely claimed that Republican Kentucky Senate candidate Rand Paul’s opposition to the federal ban on whites’-only lunch counters is something much more benign:

ARMEY: [H]e says I am for the civil rights amendment; I am for civil rights. But had I been in the Senate, I would have examined the constitutional issues related to some provisions of the act. Is a senator not supposed to examine the constitutional provisions of a complex law under consideration?

KILMEADE: Right. Gotcha.

ARMEY: Now, the fact of the matter is the guy’s getting, he’s getting harangued unreasonably for what is in fact the reasonable expression of I would have done my duty as an elected senator had I been in the Senate at that time.

Watch it:

For the record, Armey’s claim that Paul was merely explaining that he would examine a law for constitutional problems before supporting it is false. In Paul’s lengthy interview with Rachel Maddow, he stated that he supports only “nine out of ten” parts of the Civil Rights Act, and that he would “modify” the law to accommodate his opposition to the provisions governing private actors. Lest there be any doubt about Paul’s opposition to laws prohibiting discrimination by private institutions, in a 2002 letter to the editor Paul unambiguously stated that a “free society” will maintain “the distinction between private and public property” by “abid[ing] unofficial, private discrimination — even when that means allowing hate-filled groups to exclude people based on the color of their skin.”

Even if his claims about Paul’s views were accurate, Armey’s statement that there are “constitutional issues” with the Civil Rights Act of 1964 not only places him in the lunatic fringe today, it also represented a fringe view when the Act became law more than 45 years ago.

President Johnson signed the Act into law on July 2, 1964. Less than six months later — a shockingly fast pace for major litigation — the Supreme Court handed down two unanimous decisions upholding the law against constitutional challenges. Likewise, outside of the eleven former Confederate states — where opposition to the Act was driven entirely by support for segregation — over 90 percent of Congress voted in favor of the law. A tiny handful of non-Jim Crow members of Congress did raise constitutional concerns about the law, but these fringe lawmakers cut against the unanimous view of the Supreme Court and the nearly-unanimous views of non-southern lawmakers.

It’s not clear whether Armey is referring to the non-Southerners crankish objections or the objections of unreconstructed Southern racists when he cites “constitutional issues” with the Civil Rights Act.  Either way, Armey’s views would have put him well outside the mainstream even in 1964.

Today, at a luncheon at the National Press Club on the future of the Republican Party in Washington, FreedomWorks chairman and tea party strategist Dick Armey slammed former Rep. Tom Tancredo (R-CO) and other anti-immigration activists for “alienating a ‘natural’ constituency [Latinos] that could help the party win elections.” Armey admitted that as House leader, he made sure Tancredo didn’t have a stage to speak on. The Daily Caller reports:

Former Republican House leader Dick Armey said staunch anti-immigration opponents such as Rep. Tom Tancredo are destructive to Republicans — and are alienating a “natural” constituency that could help the party win elections. “Who in the Republican Party was the genius that said that now that we have identified the fastest-growing voting demographic in America, let’s go out and alienate them?” Armey said, referencing Hispanics, during a luncheon in Washington at the National Press Club.

“When I was the majority leader, I saw to it that Tom Tancredo did not get on the stage because I saw how destructive he was,” Armey said of the Colorado congressman and 2008 Republican presidential candidate known for his opposition to illegal immigration. [...]

Armey also said “the Republican Party is the most naturally talented party at losing its natural constituents in the history of the world.” “This party was born with the emancipation proclamation and can’t get a black vote to save its life. How do they do that?”

In an interview with Charlie Rose that aired earlier this month, Armey listed Tancredo (R-CO) as representing part of the “tea party tent” that he feels “uncomfortable” with. In 2006, Armey referred to Tancredo as the “cheerleader of jerkiness in the immigration debate.”

Armey’s remarks have clearly made “nativist-extremist” groups that are trying to exploit the momentum of the tea party movement nervous. Americans for Legal Immigration (ALIPAC) quickly came to Tancredo’s defense and started urging its members to attack Armey’s immigration position. According to ALIPAC, Armey has been fighting to “keep the illegal immigration issue out of the Tea Party movement.” On an organizing conference call hosted by NumbersUSA, callers dismissed Armey as not being a “true tea party patriot,” but also sought tips on how to translate their anti-immigrant views to fit the tea party narrative. “We’ll be a whole lot better off if when [sic] we talk about illegal immigrants we leave off the Hispanic-Latino stuff,” advised NumbersUSA executive director Roy Beck.

More on The Wonk Room.