Look out, half-governor Sarah Palin has emerged from her bunker to spread the right wing fairy tale that the federal government is stockpiling ammunition to use against American citizens when civilization breaks down and the US becomes a nightmare hellscape where the law of the jungle rules the streets. We’re doomed.

If we are going to wet our proverbial pants over 0.3% in annual spending cuts when we’re running up trillion dollar annual deficits, then we’re done. Put a fork in us. We’re finished. We’re going to default eventually and that’s why the feds are stockpiling bullets in case of civil unrest.

This gun-crazed far right paranoid fantasy has been debunked over and over and over, but here’s Sarah Palin mindlessly parroting it to the world once again. Talk about your epistemic closure.

In fact, the “stockpiling ammo” wingnut myth is so bogus (how bogus is it?), it’s even been disavowed by the National Rifle Association. Now, that’s bogus.

The email cites a “drastic spike” in the Department of Homeland Security’s bullet purchases and asks: “What is the US federal government preparing for?” The email also claims that “federal management agencies are looking more and more like a military army every day.”

DHS has indeed ordered hundreds of millions of rounds of ammunition. But there is less here than meets the eye. And that’s according to the National Rifle Association and the office of Republican Congressman Lynn Westmoreland of Georgia.

The Department of Homeland Security recently contracted to buy up to 450 million rounds over the next five years. But DHS was making a first-time bulk order for all of its law enforcement agencies to save money. Those agencies include the Secret Service, the Transportation Security Administration and U.S. Customs and Border Enforcement, among many others.

The NRA describes the assertion as “incendiary.” It says the suggestion that the Obama administration is “preparing for a war with the American people” displays “a lack of understanding of the law enforcement functions carried about by officers in small federal agencies.” The NRA, which is no fan of the Democratic president, concludes that “there is no need to invent additional threats to our rights.”