Thread: Allow me to clarify what the Tea Party Movement is really all about

And the nutjobs here call the TEA Party wingnuts! if you think huge government and across he board waste is good for america, then you must be of your rocker. Mainly, the people who reject the premise the TEA party presents are the entitlement suckers who think the fed is their mommy and daddy and should accompany them thru life, picking them up whenever they fall and skin a knee or elbow.

I'm quite sure that everyone already knows what the TEA party is about. The reason they mischaracterize it is intentional, not accidental.

Originally Posted by C-B-M

I'm quite sure that everyone already knows what the TEA party is about. The reason they mischaracterize it is intentional, not accidental.

It all about the way the liberal media packages and presents them. Anyone with eyes can look at photos of their rallies and come to the conclusion that the attendees come from all walks of life, age groups, economic standings, etc. The liberals hate them because the stand against big (entitlement creating) government.

Originally Posted by James Cessna

First, let me say I am not a "member" of the Tea Party.

I am a moderate and a centrist and therefore I do my best to stay away from any and all party affiliations.

However, I have several professional friends and colleagues who are members of the Tea Party. Here is a very good review of why they support this most noble cause.

It is surprising how many political commentators on radio and TV, in newspapers and magazines, talk show hosts and members of both major political parties have a very significant misunderstanding of what the Tea Party Movement actually represents. On their own, they make accusations and invalid assumptions, and then rant and rave to everyone believing, incorrectly, that their assumptions are, in fact, actual and correct.

WHAT THE TEA PARTY MOVEMENT IS NOT

* It is not an attack on Barack Obama, his religion or his early childhood. He just happened to be the President in power when the dam burst and our national economy tanked.

* It is not an attack against the Democratic Party.

* It is not a movement in support of the Republican Party.

WHAT IS THE DRIVING FORCE BEHIND THE TEA PARTY MOVEMENT?

* It is a protest against the way government is run; whether the Republicans are in power, or the Democrats are in power. It is a protest against government being run by either the extreme right or the extreme left members of the political spectrum.

* The members of the Tea Party Movement did not all come from one political party. The members are made up, ideally in equal parts, of Republicans, Democrats, Libertarians, Moderates and Independents.

WHAT THE MEMBERS OF THE TEA PARTY MOVEMENT ARE OPPOSED TO

* Against politicians whose main role in life is getting elected and forever re-elected.

* Against politicians ignoring the wishes of their constituents and voting instead per the instructions of their party leaders.

* Against politicians who vote for bills, without reading or understanding them.

* Against SWEETHEART deals with lobbyists, unions, big corporations, and major contributors.

* Against politicians who accept “favors”; meals, event tickets, travel, lodging, vacations, etc. from registered lobbyists.

* Against politicians who feel that it is beneath them to respond to their constituent’s requests, meetings, telephone calls, etc.

* Against mortgaging the financial future of our children, our grandchildren, and their children.

* Against closed door deals by the political power brokers.

* Against earmarks (congressional pork).

* Against the lack of transparency and clarity of proposed legislation.

* Against politicians who take expensive junkets, at taxpayer expense, for no apparent or justifiable reason.

* Against politicians who are paid $ 175,000 per year, plus an un taxable $93,000 petty cash fund, to only work 3 days a week when Congress is in session, but who seldom bother to make an appearance during any of these three days.

* Against political payoffs to politicians in order to “buy their vote".

* Against politicians who make speeches running down and apologizing for our country and our country's legal and congressionally-sanctioned foreign policies.

* Against politicians who have a large staff, paid for by tax payer funds, whose jobs are totally dependent upon satisfying the desires of the elected officials they work for, rather than their constituents.

* Against politicians who believe they know better than we do with regard to how we rear our children and manage our lives.

* Other important and similarly salient features.

WHAT THE MEMBERS OF THE TEA PARTY MOVEMENT ARE FOR

* Politicians who believe that our government should be a government "of the people, by the people and for the people".

* Politicians who are concerned with policies and laws that are best for our country, rather than what’s best for their political future.

* Politicians who believe and follow the principles laid down by The
Declaration of Independence, the Bill of Rights and the Constitution.

* Fiscal responsibility – Spending only the money that is available to Congress (PAYGO) and not constantly and forever borrowing against the future.

* Eliminating high cost “perks” that are only available to elected officials and their staffs.

* Establishing a special fund for FICA contributions and not transferring Social Security receipts into the General Fund, which Congress immediately spends.

* Elimination of earmarks – congressional pork.

* Transparency of all proposed legislation – require that the complete text of all proposed legislation be posted on the Internet for constituents to see and read for a minimum of 72 hours prior to allowing that legislation to be voted upon.

* Other important and similarly salient features; but you get the general idea!

I'd say most of this is pretty good, but you are forgetting two things the original Tea Party was against: The Federal Reserve/fiat currency and unconstitutional (undeclared) wars.

You are very correct, chassisman.

Republicans and Libertarians want to “lift” the human spirit. Liberals just want to tax the wealthy and give other people a free government handout! This policy only keeps these people beaten down and despondent because they know they are parasites and leeches who have produced nothing and contribute nothing at all to the rest of society.

We used to be a constitutional republic. Today, given the amount we spend on entitlement programs, we more or less resemble a government-owned and government-directed plantation estate!



Uncle Sam's Plantation 1939-2011.

Democrats have been running our inner-cities for the past 30 to 40 years, and blacks are still complaining about the same problems. More than $7 trillion dollars have been spent on poverty programs since Lyndon Johnson's War on Poverty​ with little, if any, impact on poverty. Diabolically, every election cycle, Democrats blame Republicans for the deplorable conditions in the inner-cities, then incite blacks to cast a protest vote against Republicans.

If people today would stay in school, get a good education and work hard every day, they too would become very successful. But too many people today would rather take the "easy" way out, and then they "moan and groan" and complain because other people, the "wealth creators", who have worked hard all their lives, have so much more than they do! These people have no one to blame for their misfortunes but themselves.

In order to break the Democrats' stranglehold on the black vote and free black Americans from the Democrat Party's economic plantation, we must shed the light of truth on the Democrats. We must demonstrate that the Democrat Party policies of socialism and dependency on government handouts offer the pathway to poverty, while Republican Party principles of hard work, personal responsibility, getting a good education and ownership of homes and small businesses offer the pathway to prosperity. -- Frances Rice, distinguished black author

You guys may be overthinking this a little bit.

The TEA Party, today, encompasses several specific ideologies and not all of them are compatible with the others but the single unifying idea is that government is there to insure the ability of the individual to preserve and protect his/her own interests and that such pursuits will not be infringed by the will of the masses. Beyond that the level of unity starts to deteriorate quite rapidly.

Originally Posted by James Cessna

First, let me say I am not a "member" of the Tea Party.

I am a moderate and a centrist and therefore I do my best to stay away from any and all party affiliations.

However, I have several professional friends and colleagues who are members of the Tea Party. Here is a very good review of why they support this most noble cause.

You're not a member, but you support them. That...seems a little contradictory, to not identify with an ideology but still support it.

It is surprising how many political commentators on radio and TV, in newspapers and magazines, talk show hosts and members of both major political parties have a very significant misunderstanding of what the Tea Party Movement actually represents. On their own, they make accusations and invalid assumptions, and then rant and rave to everyone believing, incorrectly, that their assumptions are, in fact, actual and correct.

Part of it is the movement does nothing to really distinguish itself. There are dozens of chapters and groups all squabbling about what they stand for. They have no coherent message and no real discernable platform. Talking to members usually ends in rants about government and taxes so it's not easy to really discern what the Tea Party actually stands for.

WHAT THE TEA PARTY MOVEMENT IS NOT

* It is not an attack on Barack Obama, his religion or his early childhood. He just happened to be the President in power when the dam burst and our national economy tanked.

* It is not an attack against the Democratic Party.

* It is not a movement in support of the Republican Party.

It may not be expressly those, but the teabaggers seem eager and happy to serve these functions.

WHAT IS THE DRIVING FORCE BEHIND THE TEA PARTY MOVEMENT?

* It is a protest against the way government is run; whether the Republicans are in power, or the Democrats are in power. It is a protest against government being run by either the extreme right or the extreme left members of the political spectrum.

Then why is the focus of almost all their ire the Democrats?

* The members of the Tea Party Movement did not all come from one political party. The members are made up, ideally in equal parts, of Republicans, Democrats, Libertarians, Moderates and Independents.

I have never once seen or even HEARD of a Democrat, Moderate, or Independent claiming the title.

WHAT THE MEMBERS OF THE TEA PARTY MOVEMENT ARE OPPOSED TO

* Against politicians whose main role in life is getting elected and forever re-elected.

That's a little illogical; a politician who gets re-elected does so because the voters think he should be re-elected which means they approve of what he's doing enough to keep giving him the job. So they're opposed to political figures whose main goal is do a good job by their constituents?

* Against politicians ignoring the wishes of their constituents and voting instead per the instructions of their party leaders.

Political parties are made up of constituents and their leaders are, generally, picked by party members. Additionally, if a person is unhappy about what a political figure is doing, they CAN vote for others. We dont live in a one-party system.

* Against politicians who vote for bills, without reading or understanding them.

I doubt this is the case very often. Politicians will often vote the way their constituents want them to vote and their constituents almost never read the bills.

* Against SWEETHEART deals with lobbyists, unions, big corporations, and major contributors.

* Against politicians who accept “favors”; meals, event tickets, travel, lodging, vacations, etc. from registered lobbyists.

That's how Capitalism works. Sorry.

* Against politicians who feel that it is beneath them to respond to their constituent’s requests, meetings, telephone calls, etc.

Would you want to entertain every phone call from everyone who felt they had an opinion (informed or otherwise) about your job? Many political figures have tens or hundreds of thousands of constituents. I really dont blame them for not wanting to field every single call from someone demanding action on the "Mexi-cans" or an invasion of Iran.

* Against mortgaging the financial future of our children, our grandchildren, and their children.

Aside from being a pretty vague position, that's not really realistic. You dont get anything serious in this country unless you go into debt for it. We are BUILT on debt. That seems like a knee-jerk "I want stuff but I dont want to have to pay for it" kind of attitude. Especially when most of the teabaggers are against higher taxes to pay for things to AVOID putting debt on "our children."

* Against closed door deals by the political power brokers.

Again, full disclosure is not realistic nor is it helpful. We already have incredible access to much of what our government does and demanding they xerox every napkin they use to sketch out ideas would be a monumental waste of energy because the same thing would happen; people would pick out one little detail, make it into a national disaster, and bitch endlessly about it until some knee-jerk legislation was put into place that did more harm than good.

* Against earmarks (congressional pork).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earmark_(politics)

* Against the lack of transparency and clarity of proposed legislation.

You CAN read the bill, what more do you want?

* Against politicians who take expensive junkets, at taxpayer expense, for no apparent or justifiable reason.

How often does this happen?

* Against politicians who are paid $ 175,000 per year, plus an un taxable $93,000 petty cash fund, to only work 3 days a week when Congress is in session, but who seldom bother to make an appearance during any of these three days.

What else do you want them to do?

* Against political payoffs to politicians in order to “buy their vote".

Do you have an example of this happening and going unpunished?

* Against politicians who make speeches running down and apologizing for our country and our country's legal and congressionally-sanctioned foreign policies.

Diplomacy has to be approached with some air of humility. Walking out on stage and saying "I'mma gonna fuck your country up, take your shit, and brag about on national TV" is not really a good approach to diplomatic policy.

* Against politicians who have a large staff, paid for by tax payer funds, whose jobs are totally dependent upon satisfying the desires of the elected officials they work for, rather than their constituents.

For example?

* Against politicians who believe they know better than we do with regard to how we rear our children and manage our lives.

I dont think this has ever really been the case, as much as people like to think it is.

* Other important and similarly salient features.

Such as?

WHAT THE MEMBERS OF THE TEA PARTY MOVEMENT ARE FOR

* Politicians who believe that our government should be a government "of the people, by the people and for the people".

That's a nice slogan, but the political reality is "the people" are really REALLY bad at governing.

* Politicians who are concerned with policies and laws that are best for our country, rather than what’s best for their political future.

What's popular isnt always right and what's right isnt always popular. What you are asking politicians to do is "do what's right regardless of how it might effect their jobs", yet that happens all the time and politicans end up getting booted by voters for it. IE; Rick Perry and the HPV vaccine, he obviously thought it was the right thing to do, yet now his opponents and voters are pissed at him for it.

* Politicians who believe and follow the principles laid down by The Declaration of Independence, the Bill of Rights and the Constitution.

Politics is a good bit more complicated than that.

* Fiscal responsibility – Spending only the money that is available to Congress (PAYGO) and not constantly and forever borrowing against the future.

Except that's how most of our economy works; debt is an integral part of our economic structure for individuals and groups.

* Eliminating high cost “perks” that are only available to elected officials and their staffs.

Such as?

* Elimination of earmarks – congressional pork.

Pork is bad...unless it helps you, then they're "earmarks".

* Transparency of all proposed legislation – require that the complete text of all proposed legislation be posted on the Internet for constituents to see and read for a minimum of 72 hours prior to allowing that legislation to be voted upon.

That is already in place. The 72 hour hold isnt, but proposed legislation is already posted online to see and read. Most people just dont.

* Other important and similarly salient features; but you get the general idea!

No, I really dont. A lot of the positions are contradictory.

The Tea Party is not much different then the other crooks in DC

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...d=opinionsbox1

http://www.politicsdaily.com/2010/12...billion-in-ea/

http://www.capitolhillblue.com/node/40931

And many many more. Just do a search.

If the media is so liberal, than how come they cover the Tea Party favorably, but aren't covering the Occupy Wall Street people and the Wisconsin people, and the Ohio people, and all the other disenfranchised people in America?

Why do four young unarmed women get corralled and pepper sprayed during a peaceful protest and environmentalists outside of the White House, but not Tea Party folks?

As a person who has lived both the American and the Canadian experience, it is clear that the media in America is not so liberal. It's just a myth perpetrated by the right. The mainstream media is owned by major corporations who have a vested interest in making sure that laws favor themselves and their fortunes, so it makes sense that the teabaggers are favored in the media with their "down with the gov't, less gov't regulation" movement while the organic grassroots movement swelling in America as I write this is abused by the cops and not covered by the mainstream media as more than just a sidebar story. Meanwhile, what's happening right now is a movement of people who actually want their institutions to work for them instead of against them.

You can build the highest gates you want to keep the masses down, to steal from them and then not return people's calls when they need loans again, and there's only so much that people will take.

The OP isn't clarifying the teepee movement at all. It's simply a defense of what he wishes it would be about to him.

It's not a real movement. It's the same old crowd of mostly religious-right people sprinkled with a bunch of Ron Paul types.

But they're not real. Example? Look at the tizzy they were in about the Ground Zero Mosque, and I'm not even sure anybody knows that it's been open for like a week now without protest, proving yet again that Republicans are the kings of advancing bullshit issues into the national spotlight.

Originally Posted by Hoplite

Then why is the focus of almost all their ire the Democrats?

I guess you missed the last elections where many GOP establishment were ousted in the primaries.

Originally Posted by Jason Marcel

If the media is so liberal, than how come they cover the Tea Party favorably, but aren't covering the Occupy Wall Street people and the Wisconsin people, and the Ohio people, and all the other disenfranchised people in America?

Aside from Fox, who doesn't always cover them favorably, what other broadcast station has covered them favorably?

Allow me to clarify what the Tea Party Movement is really all about

So who made you king of the tea party?

I am a tea party member. Frankly this is the only non-partisan group in the country because membership does in fact--include democrats--republicans and independents--who are very weary of this big spending out of control--regulation federal government. The main premise is to CUT the size of government while getting our financial house in order.

tea party health care bill.jpg