More tea baggers

[Ed W]

The tea baggers are not unlike the Know Nothing Party prior to the Civil War.  Where the tea baggers are largely anti-tax, the Know Nothings were mostly against Irish and German immigration.  They were an offshoot of the Whigs, and in the 1840s and 1850s they managed to siphon votes away from the Whigs, seriously damaging them, eventually leading to the formation of the Republican party.

I have to wonder if the tea party will do much the same to the Republicans, not that I have any great sympathy for the party, but I think it ill serves the country to have an opposition that is viewed as an extremist group.  I'm hardly alone in that view.  I've started reading the Frum Forum, a conservative blog recommending that the Republican Party jettison the right wing crazies.

http://www.frumforum.com/  

(Here comes the obligatory swipe!)  When the Tea Party has Victoria Jackson as one of their intellectual luminaries, you know they're going to be a temporary phenomenon.  

[guido911]

(Here comes the obligatory swipe!)  When the Tea Party has Victoria Jackson as one of their intellectual luminaries, you know they're going to be a temporary phenomenon.  

And then there's this:

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0710/39848.html

[Ed W]

At least Bachmann has more gravitas than Victoria Jackson, Guido, and I seem to recall she was the one who said she could see Russia from her house....in Minnesota.

[swake]

And then there's this:

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0710/39848.html

And so likely ends the power of the Republican Party, the fringe is now completely taking over and it remains to be seen if Tea Partiers can be elected in any numbers at all even in local general elections much less in state wide and national elections.

[nathanm]

Come on, politics is a bloodsport. That's why I care very little about politicians who get their feelings hurt over labeling.

Nobody said anybody's feelings were hurt. I said that the reason the poll you cited showed over 50% of respondents believing Obama is a socialist was because of the repeated misapplication of the label by elected Republicans and conservative pundits. That response has nothing to do with the truth or falsity of the statement, only that it's been repeated endlessly.

Ed, I completely agree that the fringes, but especially the right wing fringe because it's so prominent at the moment, have got to go. There is no more a mandate for a full on socialist economic system than there is for full on libertarianism. (or whatever the hell the Tea Party wants..they seem to have difficulty communicating concrete goals)

[bugo]

Nobody said anybody's feelings were hurt. I said that the reason the poll you cited showed over 50% of respondents believing Obama is a socialist was because of the repeated misapplication of the label by elected Republicans and conservative pundits. That response has nothing to do with the truth or falsity of the statement, only that it's been repeated endlessly.

In the grand scheme of world politics, Obama is a center-rightist. 

Ed, I completely agree that the fringes, but especially the right wing fringe because it's so prominent at the moment, have got to go. There is no more a mandate for a full on socialist economic system than there is for full on libertarianism. (or whatever the hell the Tea Party wants..they seem to have difficulty communicating concrete goals)

I predict that the GOP will nominate a more moderate candidate like a Mitt Romney.  This will anger the Teabaggers and the Fundamentalist Christian wing of the GOP who would never vote for a "socialist" from Massachusetts or a Mormon.  They will convince Sarah Palin to run as a third party candidate.  This will split the vote, leading to an easy Obama victory.  If it happens, you heard it here first.

[swake]

Palin's asking the NAACP to remove the resolution condemning the tea party for racism.

Well, Sarah has been part of the Tea party Express. I wonder if she's going to change her mind about the NAACP resolution now?

This is a "joke" from Tea Party Express spokesman Mark Williams (and the Tea Party Express has refused to fire Williams)

Dear Mr. Lincoln

We Coloreds have taken a vote and decided that we don't cotton to that whole emancipation thing. Freedom means having to work for real, think for ourselves, and take consequences along with the rewards. That is just far too much to ask of us Colored People and we demand that it stop!

In fact we held a big meeting and took a vote in Kansas City this week. We voted to condemn a political revival of that old abolitionist spirit called the 'tea party movement'.

The tea party position to "end the bailouts" for example is just silly. Bailouts are just big money welfare and isn't that what we want all Coloreds to strive for? What kind of racist would want to end big money welfare? What they need to do is start handing the bail outs directly to us coloreds! Of course, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People is the only responsible party that should be granted the right to disperse the funds.

And the ridiculous idea of "reduce[ing] the size and intrusiveness of government." What kind of massa would ever not want to control my life? As Coloreds we must have somebody care for us otherwise we would be on our own, have to think for ourselves and make decisions!

The racist tea parties also demand that the government "stop the out of control spending." Again, they directly target coloreds. That means we Coloreds would have to compete for jobs like everybody else and that is just not right.

Perhaps the most racist point of all in the tea parties is their demand that government "stop raising our taxes." That is outrageous! How will we coloreds ever get a wide screen TV in every room if non-coloreds get to keep what they earn? Totally racist! The tea party expects coloreds to be productive members of society?

Mr. Lincoln, you were the greatest racist ever. We had a great gig. Three squares, room and board, all our decisions made by the massa in the house. Please repeal the 13th and 14th Amendments and let us get back to where we belong.

Sincerely

Precious Ben Jealous, Tom's Nephew
NAACP Head Colored Person

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/2010/07/18/2010-07-18_tea_party_express_leader_mark_williams_expelled_over_colored_people_letter.html

The national Tea Party federation to their great credit has kicked Williams and the Tea Party Express out of the federation (since they won't fire him). What will Sarah have to say about this man and the major Tea Party group that he used to run that refuses to find any fault with his behavior here? A group she has worked with? Just so you know, while this letter is way over the top, it really nothing new for this racist donkey.

[Red Arrow]

Ed, I completely agree that the fringes, but especially the right wing fringe because

Nathan agrees more with the left than the right.

They both need to go.  I like Pelosi and Reid about as much as you like Inhofe and Coburn.

[nathanm]

They both need to go.  I like Pelosi and Reid about as much as you like Inhofe and Coburn.

I'll give you Pelosi (she is from San Francisco, after all), but Reid isn't very left wing, unless you have a very strange definition of it. The lefties in the Democratic Party all hate him. I do also, but because he's completely ineffective.

Sometimes I forget that being in Oklahoma, the center is skewed even farther rightward than it is in most of the rest of the country.

[rwarn17588]

Well, Sarah has been part of the Tea party Express. I wonder if she's going to change her mind about the NAACP resolution now?

This is a "joke" from Tea Party Express spokesman Mark Williams (and the Tea Party Express has refused to fire Williams)

Holy crap. That's the first time I've read the letter in full. The guy was trying satire, but that's just a big steaming pile of FAIL right there. That's the kind of junk you'd read in Deep South newspapers during the Jim Crow era.

I wouldn't let that guy walk my dog, much less let him run an insurgent political campaign.

[Conan71]

And so likely ends the power of the Republican Party, the fringe is now completely taking over and it remains to be seen if Tea Partiers can be elected in any numbers at all even in local general elections much less in state wide and national elections.

You know, that's what they were worried about with the infiltration of the Moral Majority back in the 1980's and 20 out of 28 years of White House Control followed along with a 12 year majority in the House and Senate.  Someone figured out, apparently pretty correctly, that Christians vote and that the social agenda of the Democrat Party was starting to depart from core Christian beliefs.

I've not paid close enough attention to the Tea Partiers other than to gather that it's a small government movement that wants less government intervention and control, less government waste, is tired of Washington giving huge hand-outs to special interests in exchange for power, and is against high deficit spending.  I really don't see what's so whacked out about that.  Why would anyone be for the government spending and needing an ever increasing flow of cash? 

But I think they've been mis-portrayed as a bunch of racist, anti-tax, radical separatists.  Some of that probably is far out fringe that's managed to catch the eye of the media but would typify maybe a percent or two of those involved in the movement.

[swake]

But I think they've been mis-portrayed as a bunch of racist, anti-tax, radical separatists.  Some of that probably is far out fringe that's managed to catch the eye of the media but would typify maybe a percent or two of those involved in the movement.

The Tea Party is a loose group whose unifying principal really is hatred of government in general and hatred of Obama in particular. Some of that hate is positively race based. Certainly a great deal, if not most of that hate is policy driven but the extreme kind of hate and irrational statements made by the leaders of the movement even if not racial based is harmful to the country and probably nearly unelectable in most states. Republicans under Reagan knew what they were for as much as they knew what they were against, this current group can't agree on anything more substantial than gross generalities like "smaller government and less taxes".

I think you need to relook at the Tea Party groups. Look at the letter I posted from one of the founders and leaders of one of, if not the main large Tea Party group, the one the Palin has made a bunch of her speaking engagements with. The Governor of Texas has advocated succession and then there's Michelle Bachmann, a real nut job who is now taking more formal leadership role, as said in the article above. Here is a nice rational quote from her "Take this into consideration. If we look at American history, between 1942 and 1947, the data that was collected by the Census Bureau was handed over to the FBI and other organizations at the request of President Roosevelt, and that's how the Japanese were rounded up and put into the internment camps. I'm not saying that that's what the Administration is planning to do, but I am saying that private personal information that was given to the Census Bureau in the 1940s was used against Americans to round them up, in a violation of their constitutional rights, and put the Japanese in internment camps.", that's stupid and meant to scare the sheep into thinking Obama is going to start rounding people up into camp. What about some of what Palin has said? How about her "The America I know and love is not one in which my parents or my baby with Down Syndrome will have to stand in front of Obama's 'death panel' so his bureaucrats can decide, based on a subjective judgment of their 'level of productivity in society,' whether they are worthy of health care. Such a system is downright evil"? Death panels, really?

This crap isn't coming from the fringe of the Tea Party groups, it's front and center.

[guido911]

Some of that hate is positively race based.

Swake channeling his inner NAACP membership.

Modified to add:  Look at the attacks on the tea party on this page (other than Williams)...Victoria Jackson, Michelle Bachmann, Sarah Palin. Sounds like gender based discrimination is on full display. Makes sense under you and others' thinking.

[swake]

Swake channeling his inner NAACP membership.

Modified to add:  Look at the attacks on the tea party on this page (other than Williams)...Victoria Jackson, Michelle Bachmann, Sarah Palin. Sounds like gender based discrimination is on full display. Makes sense under you and others' thinking.

I think if you check I also mention Mark Williams and the Governor of Texas (Rick Perry, not a woman)

But nice shift on the argument without addressing any material facts.

[Gaspar]

The danger in the Tea Party groups is not their motivation, that will be defined by their opponents.  The danger is that their lack of coherence only serves to fracture any movement toward a more "common sense" based government.

The goals to reduce spending, end corruption, and promote individual freedom over government control has become the common sentiment of the general public (both Democrat and Republican).  The current administrations loss of independent support has opened up a vacuum that the Tea Party movement is attempting to fill.  The problem is that the Tea Party has no defined leadership, and while they see this as a strength, it becomes a weakness because it allows them to be defined by their fringe and by their opponents both Republican and Democrat. 

Meanwhile the American Public is still seeking rescue from what has become a drastic lapse of judgment.  The Tea Party forces candidates to walk a narrow line between endorsement and betrayal.

The Tea Party may end up being the Democratic party's best tool.  But the Dems must tread lightly, lest they destroy the Tea Party too early in the game giving rise to a more organized conservative effort before the presidential elections of 2012.  On the other hand, conservative forces know this too, and I'm sure that multiple scenarios exist.

The Tea Party will force some decisions in the upcoming midterms.  It will not be pretty for both Democrats and Republicans, and how the major parties react will determine the Tea Party's roll in the next presidential election.  It certainly is a fascinating phenomena.