Tea Parties Explained

Throughout the Spring of 2009, and especially on April 15^th, hundreds of thousands of Americans in thousands of towns and cities gathered in a grassroots effort to protest a wide variety of general grievances about the current and anticipated actions of US government and the political parties. However, those who get their news from their friends or from the mainstream media have probably been seriously misinformed about the Tea Party phenomenon. I can help clear things up because I attended two of them, talked with dozens of participants, watched hours of coverage about them, and I was already well informed about most of the grievances expressed at the Tea Parties.

I can assure you from my first hand experience that pretty much everything said about the Tea Parties by CNN, MSNBC, the New York times, Hollywood, and the Obama administration – is wrong. For example, I did not see or hear a single racist thought. I did not meet a single person who was pleased with the Republican party, and I only met one person who came because he was a Glenn Beck fan. I met no one calling for any violence. I met no one praising the war in Iraq, the war on terror, or the Patriot Act, and I met no one who liked George Bush.

The Tea Parties I attended were as informal, as local, and as grassroots as any event can possibly be. There was certainly no money or vast right wing conspiracy behind them.

I have a strong understanding of the Constitution, and I did not see or hear a single unconstitutional agenda; whereas, the critics of the Tea Parties including Congress and the Obama administration have a poor understanding of the Constitution and support a plethora of Constitutional violations.

The primary grievance was not about Obama, and although Obama’s divisive agenda has surely strengthened support for these Tea Parties, Obama himself was a minor subject. I saw about 100 signs, and maybe three of them mentioned Obama.

The primary grievance was not about taxes either.

The primary grievance was about government spending and the related topics of government bailouts, government debt, and government pork. Spending, bailouts, debt, and pork comprised the main grievance because our children will inherit massive debt, owe money to China, and have more inflation and a lower quality of life than they could have had. A few people also recognized that deficit spending is taxation without representation for today’s kids because they will have to pay back the debt when they grow up even though they could not vote when the debt was created.

Taxes were actually the second biggest grievance. Some opposed the current level of taxes. Some opposed any increases in taxes, and some wanted a simpler or more fair tax system.

After taxes, the third most common grievance was the demand for closer adherence to the Constitution, less corruption, more accountability, and more transparency in Washington. The most common concerns about current and anticipated violations of the Constitution were about religious freedom and the right to keep and bear arms.

Perhaps tied for third place were signs that summed up all grievances by opposing socialism, communism, or fascism because these tend to expand government, reduce freedom, reward failure, and punish success.

Why did putatively objective journalists and the putatively post partisan Obama administration so viscously belittle and slander such a noble grassroots effort by the American people? If I had voted for Obama or were a regular patron of CNN, MSNBC, the NYT, their disgusting betrayal of these noble Americans and these noble American values would be sufficient justification for me to renounce them permanently.

To be fair, there was one guy I met at a Tea Party who had some pretty harsh words for Obama and the government, but consider that the government had tried to extort him into spying on his neighbors, and then when he would not cooperate, they spent millions of dollars spying on him and attacking his family with lethal force. For example, his son and a friend were hunting on their property when two agents dressed like ninjas jumped out from behind a rock and shot their hunting dog. The friend instantly fired his rifle from the hip and killed one of them. The 15 year old son fled to the house, but was shot in the back by a third agent. Several weeks and several millions of dollars later, an agent shot his wife in the head while she was holding his 10 month old baby. Then that agent was promoted and was present at a similar government atrocity two years later in Waco Texas. The mainstream media covered this whole event at Ruby Ridge Idaho about as dishonestly as they have covered the Tea Parties. Therefore, I am surprised that this man (his name is Randy Weaver) was not more angry. Perhaps the reason for his calm was that these events happened back in 1992 under the first Bush administration. Reason Magazine published the best account of the whole story that I have seen to date.

I told a liberal coworker the story of Randy Weaver, and he said that he didn’t care because it sounds like Randy Weaver was a racist. I told a coworker from Finland the story of Randy Weaver, and he said that it was OK because it sounded like Randy Weaver was right wing.

So these compassionate leftists say we must punish those who waterboarded 3 terrorists and saved thousands of lives, but they say it is OK kill anyone who is a right winger, and these oh so noble leftists say it is torture to play loud music to deprive terrorists of sleep, but it was OK when the Clinton Administration did the same thing to the innocent right wing Americans at Waco Texas who had been framed by the BATF. Also, these same leftists who view the Constitution as nothing more than an obstacle to their big government fantasies, say that waterboarding terrorists is wrong – because it is unconstitutional!

I suppose it is true that the Tea Party goers were not as wealthy, as educated, as famous, or as powerful as their critics, and yet the Tea Party goers were more civilized, more mature, more honest, more peaceful, and better informed than their critics. In a nutshell, the Tea Party goers are just much better human beings than their critics.