TEA PARTIES WITH A FRUIT CAKE

The other day Niko brought up the subject of Sarah Palin on one of his posts, and that reminded me that she had been involved recently in a new movement in America about which I knew little, so, as ever in these situations I turned to the expert, Danny 1st Earl of the Ozarks, whom I thank for this article:

ONE OF THE BIGGEST American political stories since 2008 has been the ongoing war for the heart and soul of the Republican Party. And the war is heating up, with the off-year Congressional elections coming in November. We are now in primary election season, when the voters determine who will be the standard bearers of the two parties. Some Republican incumbents will be facing conservative challengers in their primaries. No less a political figure than John McCain, the recent Presidential candidate, is facing a right wing Republican challenge to his bid for reelection to his Senate seat in Arizona.


The cast of characters in the Republican struggle are a colorful lot and among their number, perhaps the most colorful of all, Sarah Palin, darling of the right wing, and fresh from her gig as Governor of the Arctic tundra. She now sells books, collects huge fees for after dinner speeches, and is a contributor to Fox News, offering her keen intelligence and insight in the role of political commentator and analyst.


And into the fray comes the conservative “Tea Party movement,” opposing “big government,” federal budget deficits, tax increases, and Obama administration policies generally. They first came to wide national attention with protest meetings across the country on April 15, 2009, (the day when income tax returns are due.) These Tea Party protests were massively promoted by Fox News as a major political event, on a par with the second coming. Styling itself as a “grass roots” uprising, the Tea Party movement was in fact organized by very well funded conservative lobbying organizations, most notably “FreedomWorks,” an activist organization controlled by Dick Armey, former Republican House Majority Leader from Texas.


The Tea Party movement takes its name from the “Boston Tea Party” of 1773, when colonists boarded British ships in Boston Harbor and dumped cargoes of tea overboard, an iconic early event of the revolution. The Tea Party protests have certainly tapped into genuine American populist sentiments, and dissatisfaction toward Washington. But it’s also an example of how large, big money interests with self-serving agendas can manipulate relatively naïve people to serve their political ends. In any event, the label “Tea Party” has gained such considerable media currency that every right wing loon in America either self-identifies as a Tea Party protester, or is labeled as such by opponents. The term “Teabaggers” has been gleefully used by opponents to refer to the movement, and refers to a protest gesture of mailing a tea bag to the White House. (That name is now much hated by the protesters, since they discovered that it is also a salacious term describing an activity, the explanation of which would be far below the journalistic standards of Munguin’s Republic.)


There now seems to be some splits forming within the movement. We have the “Tea Party Patriots” (Dick Armey’s FreedomWorks group), but also “Tea Party Nation,” which held its inaugural national convention in Nashville, Tennessee, on February 4-6.

The convention met with immediate controversy over its high attendance fees, Sarah Palin’s $100,000 honorarium, and a for-profit financial structure with dubious intent. Several sponsors and speakers pulled out before the event, but sister Sarah delivered her address as scheduled. (The exact amount of her fee was not disclosed.) The New York Times reported that Sarah assailed Obama, urged the audience to support conservative challengers in the Republican primaries, and announced that “America is ready for another revolution.” She left the stage to chants of “Run Sarah Run!”


You will know that American politicians “run” rather than “stand” for political office. So yes, the Tea Party protesters were urging her to run for president. Only in America, God help us.



PS: Danny, Beneath the journalistic standards of Munguin's Republic....? Impossible!