It’s hard to say who will be hurt most by Michele Bachmann’s announcement that she will not seek reelection – The congressional Tea Party Caucus or America’s comedy writers.

There is no doubt that Bachmann has been the source of endless material for mockery. Her surreal extremism, coupled with a passion for self-promotion, combined to pack a walloping punch of political psychopathy. But according to Bachmann, her exit from the congressional stage must not be viewed as any sort of weakness on her part as a candidate (despite nearly losing last November), nor any commentary on the fact that investigations into her finances have blossomed from the congressional ethics committee to the FBI.

ThinkProgress has complied an entertaining review of Bachmann’s career in congress. And here are a couple of choice morsels they left out:

Bachmann proclaimed her intention to be subservient to her husband were she to be elected president: “…the Lord said, ‘Be submissive. Wives, you are to be submissive to your husbands.’”

Bachmann signed a pledge circulated by a radical evangelical asserting that life for African-Americans was better during the era of slavery.

Bachmann gushed her admiration for a serial killer: “Just like John Wayne was from Waterloo, Iowa, that’s the kind of spirit that I have, too.” Actually, it was murderer and clown painter John Wayne Gacy who was from Waterloo.

Bachmann will now be free to pursue an even greater ambition than gumming up the work of congress. Look for her to make more frequent appearances on Fox News and perhaps even score her own program (watch out Greta Van Susteren). She has plenty of evidence of the profitability of being a right-wing, Teabagging, fruitcake, in the works of her comrade, Sarah Palin. It’s a safe bet that she will journey down the same path and participate in the fleecing of the flock and the lining of her pockets. Because that’s what grifters do.