Abso-effen-lutely.

Well said, and so true.

Of course, the real funny thing about this situation is that they have a Republican in the White House, they’re just too damn hardheaded to admit it.

Yup. After eight years of getting everything they could possibly want, the right-wing crazies are getting only most of what they could possibly want…and they’re getting it from a black man with the middle name “Hussein”…and that, of course, will just not do.

God help us if by some miracle we ever elect an actual liberal to the White House again. We’d be lucky to survive.

So much win in one post it’s hard to know where to start.

Frank Rich? Then you use the quote that includes “Don’t expect the extremism and violence in our politics to subside magically after Election Day” as a primer to your argument? More violence occurs at a typical Thanksgiving dinner than has been seen in this election cycle. Unless you count those roving bands of gangs with teabags hanging from their belts – stuffing them with rocks and pelting anyone who looks the least bit hipstery.

Tim McVeigh & Eric Rudolph? Notice how you only have a few names to cycle through before you exhaust your examples. How’s that Helter Skelter world you’re living in doing? Watch out for the Ides of March, too. BOOGA BOOGA BOOGA BOO! Are teh puppies here that lame they rally around the idea that someone somewhere at some point in time will kill someone? Boy, the Bushies did a number on you guys, that’s for sure.

Average of 50,000 murders occur in the U.S. every year. I think you should be eyeing grandma when she pulls out that carving knife more closely than you are white middle class people driving their fat asses in scooters to cheer on television actors.

Aw, it’s the black man’s fault. If I were President Obama I’d be really pissed at you for making this all about him being black. Probably the reason he is so disgusted by the progressive wing.

You’ve boiled him down to one thing. He’s black.

That’s all the history books are going to prominently mention. He’s black.

Black black black black BLACK.

No siree, he ain’t no Presidente, he’s the BLACK Presidente. How do I know? Cuz his progressive supporters keep reminding me of that. Sometimes, when I’m sitting next to Chris Matthews, listening to his speeches, I get to thinking he’s a white man

When I think to myself at those times how little I support his policies it reminds me. He’s BLACK.

You would not last one day in some of the neighborhoods or jobs I’ve worked. Last I heard, black people would rather just be considered people and not constantly reminded by their progressive intellectual friends how BLACK they still are. No matter how much more money they make. They just black to y’all.

Cheerio, pip pip, and all that rot.

MY anger would subside a little with a real economic recovery, especially if it’s due to government action as opposed to recovering in spite of inaction but then, I’m not a teabagger.

If you think that economic collapse doesn’t have political consequences then you haven’t studied history, say ca. the 1930s in the USA or Germany.

Cheerio, pip pip, and all that rot.

Cheerio, leave the door open when you leave. Place needs some air after that pile of horseshit.

Feed not the troll…

I don’t see any trolls.

I never leave. That’s why you lose elections.

Reading for comprehension wasn’t your favorite subject, I take it.

As the article pointed out, the problem isn’t his race, or his politics. It’s the D by his name.

The Tea Party crowd are not the ones who will defeat Democrats. Those Democrats will be primarily Blue Dogs and New Democrats who will be defeated by establishment Republicans with political experience at the local and state level. And the endorsement of the US Chamber of Commerce and Club for Growth. But for the moment, all of these folks are painting themselves in Tea Party colors in order to use the Tea Party folks who are not lifetime Republicans to make their margin.

The Tea Party is a media obsession without much base.

Oops, sorry. It was a reflex.

That’s all it is.

No, that’s not all it is. Two-thirds of the citizenry think the country is going in the wrong direction. By golly, some of them even post here. Approval of the Congress is at twenty percent (RCP). All these people don’t think or act the same way so stereotypes (as always) are dangerous.

IMO it’s exactly what BT says it is. The same old bunch from the 90′s. And if we live long enough to see another Democrat elected President, they’ll be back again. With a different look, and a different name, but the same old tired, sorry assed right wing assholes that just can’t stand the thought of living in a country not run by Republicans.

From the article I apparently couldn’t comprehend: “And of course, the fact that this president’s middle name is Hussein and he’s Muslim and black, well, that’s just a few extra scoops of nuts on the wingnut sundae.”

You ever notice how no one felt the need to remind everyone that Clinton or Bush were white when making their arguments?

If it were just rich angry people there would not be very many of them, since there aren’t that many rich people and not all of them are angry. The ones we see seem to be middle to lower-middle class with a sprinkling of the richer types (which is not to say that rich people are not behind the movement). I think one has to break out the analysis regionally. The core is the Bible Belt South and its Appalachian and Mountain West extensions. I would be surprised if the T-Party is significant in the suburbs, which is where most people live nowadays. My guess is that the demographic core is the lumpenproletariat, who are the most fearful of the outside world and the most exposed to economic downturns. They are also the class for whom the chances of upward economic and social mobility have dwindled down to the proverbial precious few.

If this is the case, the on-going Depression is going to intensify that movement. So I think Rich is basically correct.

Republican Teafarts need to look at themselves for whom they are.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S38VioxnBaI

I advise we panic.

I get your point, but I don’t think it misses BT’s point. His point was we would have a tea party even if the economy were good. Remember, their “name” stands for “Taxed Enough Already.”

That’s not a slogan about hard times. Now because we do have a bad ecomony, they’re finding it easier it draw in folks they might not ordinarily draw in, and that will make their numbers look larger. But at the core, they’re just the same old “I don’t want to pay any taxes” right wing core that’s been with us forever but over the last few decades has really figured out how to play the media.

Don’t give the “movement” more credit than it deserves. There’s some decent folks that may be caught up in it out of the economic crisis, but it is basically just the same anti-tax crowd that’s been around forever.

Yes, they’re just letting their hair down a bit more because the economy is bad.

But those numbers were the same or higher during Bush/Cheney and — surprise! — no right-wing “populist” Tea Party to be found.

You ever notice how no one felt the need to remind everyone that Clinton or Bush were white

Gee, maybe because to that point all there ever had been were white presidents so it was kinda of an assumed point doncha think?

Nice load of straw yer bringing tho.

It has a base – just not one that has issues that make sense. Their greatest “power” is their propensity to vote in numbers, like a herd of buffalo racing across a plateau, heading for a cliff.

These are the same kind folks who fueled the “Reagan Revolution” that has burned them, their children, and each and every one of us. But they don’t care, due to the depth of their hatred.

I worked under one such man. He screamed at his fellow employees. He picked political fights, which gave him an excuse to belittle others. One day he poked his head into my office and said, “Are you a LIB? You look like a lib to me. Are you a commie lib?” He learned to leave me alone. But not everyone has my years of experience rebutting people like him, thanks to being raised by a dad whose attitudes weren’t much different.

We had an employee from the former Soviet Union. The manager badmouthed him daily, insulting him for being a “Russssss-kie.” One day, being in a particularly foul mood, the manager lit into him mercilessly for hours because he couldn’t understand what he was saying through his accent. The employee was replying accurately, but despite my, and others’, intervention attempts, the manager kept it up all day, screaming in his face, accusing him of being stupid. That night, the young technician, a kind man to all, was stricken with a massive heart attack.

The young man never returned to work. The manager was promoted.

These are the people in the streets demanding their country back. They’re not necessarily poor. They believe “others” are stealing what they perceive as America – their jobs, their savings, their guns, their rights – even their sexuality is challenged. They hated Russians, they hated Vietnamese, they hate Iraqis and they hate you and me. We’re not supporting them, ergo we are the enemy, and so their hatred is free to flourish.

When one of us finally figures out how to counter these American cancers, we’ll have truly accomplished something for the betterment of our fellow man.

Yup. After eight years of getting everything they could possibly want, the right-wing crazies are getting only most of what they could possibly want…and they’re getting it from a black man with the middle name “Hussein”…and that, of course, will just not do.

That’s indeed what’s telling. Obama wants to raise taxes 3% on the top 1% and it’s ZOMG FASCISM!!!!

Very well said. thanks

nice video, did you make it?

These are the people in the streets demanding their country back.

Precisely. Well said. Thank you.

Ditto, that. And it’s getting views. Very nicely done.

I just pulled a door-hanger thingy off my front door, left there by the republican candidate. It had a handy republican voter guide in it, which looked like a sample ballot with all the republicans on it from Senate on down. Must remember to take it with me on November 2nd so I know who NOT to vote for.

More than that, it had the “cut taxes” as part of this asshole’s Tea Party-mantra advertising. I really, really, really, really want to know how cutting taxes does anything… they’ve been at it for what, almost thirty years now since St. Ronnie was elected and look where we are now, in the economic shitter. When does reality ever set in for these people (I know, they’re republicans/teahadists/whatever)?

Anyhow, Matt Taibbi has a great follow-up to his last piece on the TeaBaggers. Check it out.

Having a Democrat in the White House charges the right-wing battery. A Republican in the White House drains it, as we witnessed with the dispirited Republican base in ’06 and ’08.

Fox News might have gone under without two Clinton terms to drive up their marketshare.

The same thing works in reverse but to a lesser degree. Democratic constituents aren’t as easily herded. They were not foaming at the mouth about Bush 43 right out of the gate. True, people were pissed at his stealing the 2000 election but it was his smug ignorant blathering and war mongering that eventually made people crazy and drove voter turnout in the last two elections.

Wow.

That is so depressing. And sad.

The Teabaggers make up the RepubliKLAN wing of the party and got duped by the GOPranos wing of the party to go out and demonstrate and then vote against their own economic interests.

As for the RePURITAN wing of the party, they have not really shown up at the teabag events although they also get duped by the GOPranos wing to go to the polls and vote against their economic interests.

The real winners in the 2010? The GOPranos.

Affluent Tea Partiers is a MYTH. I keep seeing it repeated in the lefty blogosphere. The fact that bull crap about Tea Partiers can be posted in the lefty blogosphere and not get challenged doesn’t say much for the lefty readership – neither their sense of fairness, nor their critical thinking skills. In fact, this incessant Tea Party bashing led me write a diary, recently, called Call for investigation of Left HATEKeepers (and Right HATEKeepers, too)

I actually did the math on the data in the NY Time /CBS poll. If you compare Tea Baggers, and assume that they are all white, with the general population, minus an assumed 10% black contingent, you get about a $2-$3 per hour difference. The Tea Partiers tend to be older, also, which means they’re probably earning more due to that fact, alone.

I reported my calculations here and here. This was in a diary by David Sirota called All Roads Lead to White Privilege

I’ve even seen Krugman, a Nobel prize winning economist, recently refer to the Tea Partiers as “affluent”. Shame on him.

My advise to lefties and progressive who hate the Tea Partiers is essentially the same that it was a year ago, viz., if you must smear the Tea Partiers, at least spend at least as much time organizing, politically. Towards which end, it wouldn’t hurt to see if there are any valuable lessons that the Tea Partiers can teach you.

A current thread at OpenLeft dealt with this subject, in the comments. See Tea Party will gain influence within the GOP

It seems that any discussion of less than rosy outcomes at FDL, is strictly verboten.

No, I saw it posted on Huffington the other day and it really speaks to who they are. I have a sister who’s a born again and now a teabagger. She indoctrinated her family in Christian Right Home Schooling. Funny how when she needed a job she went back to teaching in a Public School and hates Obama even though she probably only has a job due to Stimulus money.

That certainly is true.

Amazingly, not one of Bush’s opponents smeared Colin Powell or Condi for their race, so there wasn’t so much of this sort of material to work with.

See doggid @ 18. Who wrote their signs? “Commies?”

Actually, the economy sucked in 1994 for the overwhelming majority of Americans, though the rich did just fine. It was a less extreme example of what is going on today.

The accurate description is that the teabagger scam is misdirecting rage that should be targeting the wealthy, corporate interests, and the politicians that are their servants.

Great read, thanks for the link. Matt gets it right, as usual. And his last line brought a big smile to my face.

Man, did they break the mold when they made these assholes.

Couldn’t of said it better myself, Matt.

Too bad your comment has absolutely nothing to do with the post. Here, let me help you — I’ve even bolded the key parts for you:

Anyone who thinks the Teabaggers’ unhinged “anger and bitterness” will subside in the face of an improving economy really needs to take a closer look at objective polling on the Teabaggers and review the 1990s.

The ’90s was a time of economic prosperity, but because there was a Democrat in the White House, the far-right was in full freakout mode. Back then, Clinton/Gore’s black helicopters were coming for their guns and right-wing “patriots” like Tim McVeigh and Eric Rudolph roamed the countryside.

But they weren’t called the “Tea Party.” They were the Angry White Men.

[...]

Polls have shown that Teabaggers are lily white and well off. They’re not the people getting kicked out of their houses by the banksters. They’re not unemployed. They’re not bearing the brunt of the Great Recession. They’re just doing what they do when Democrats are in charge. Obama’s death panels and FEMA camps have replaced Clinton’s black helicopters.

He’s a classic case of projectionism, isn’t he?

I haven’t seen a post that showed a rosy outcome in many months. There are some things in your longer comment that I agree with. I think this overheated atmosphere is very dangerous and could cause many problems down the road.

Point me out (give me the time stamp you see me there).

Seems like it leaves out a few million others as well.

There’s actually a very good reason for that.

I think it grew out of the anti-communist fervor of the cold war, in part, fed by other fears. Economics, the fear of losing possessions and lifestyle, the influx of immigrants from non-white nations, the rise of gay rights and the media’s tying change to Democrats (rightly or wrongly) all helped turn these already seething people against their neighbors, and now against science, progress, human rights – anything someone can brand as “liberal” (hence, “communist”), even the government of their own country.

Of course, the real funny thing about this situation is that they have a Republican in the White House, they’re just too damn hardheaded to admit it.

The MSM has done much to push the Teabagger narrative.

In today’s New York Times Magazine article “The Education of a President” (should be titled “A President Who Still Doesn’t Get It”), Peter Baker writes that

“the left thinks [Obama] did too little; the right too much.”

Laughable nonsense.

It would be far more accurate to say: “millions of Americans know he did too little; the right does nothing but spin his corporatist agenda into a nonexistent Socialist plot.”

Of course, according to Baker, Obama believes that he’s done most of what he promised and has only failed in the P.R. campaign to explain it to an ignorant electorate. From now on, Obama 2.0 won’t

be neglecting of marketing and P.R. and public opinion.

Talk about a President who just doesn’t get it.

I thought that was a standard ethos of the right wing?

Well, there are plenty of facts to support quite different outcomes than those discussed here. Any suggestion based in both current policies and historical record suggesting something far more grave is being censored.

Christopher Hitchens’s articles that you can read at Truthdig would be censored in this vaunted free speech zone. Why?

What is the good reason you speak off?

It is accurate to say

the right does nothing but spin his corporatist agenda into a nonexistent Socialist plot

.

That’s the method. Tie the “left” with “communists” through the direct causal chain:

leftist -> socialist -> communist -> gay

Projection is done unconciously, no?

The right wingnuts do what they do deliberately. That makes it simple lying, spinning bullhit.

Got cites for those stats? And how many of the people are people who (unlike the very vocal and rich minority Tea Party Republicans) wanted actual change in a progressive, non-corporate, non-Republican direction and are disappointed that they’re not getting it?

Laughable nonsense indeed.

The right wing knows the media portrays EVERY story as D said/R said, so even though they know he’s not in the least bit liberal, much less socialistic, by playing it that way it makes it appear as though he’s way to the left of them. When in actuality he’s governing almost to a T like W.

Nonsense indeed. My grandpappy taught me to call it bullshit.

Yes, Obama appears very disappointing in that he sold out to the health insurance corporations on the health care law and he sold out to the pharmaceutical companies in not getting rid of Medicare Part D and expanding the existing drug benefit in Medicare Part B to cover all patented and generic drugs.

The GOPranos believe in either doing nothing unless pressured then they come up with a corporate slush fund as Medicare Part D and unfortunately the Democrats do similarly.

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Increase-the-minimum-wage-to-10-an-hour/140711249308538

You’re still here, aren’t ya?

Well, yeah, bullshit is definitely a BIG part of the right wing ethos as well.

It’s worse than regular lying, because it takes the things of which you yourself are guilty and attributes them falsely to others.

Here’s an example: Remember the “Chinagate” non-scandal pushed by Republicans against Clinton and Gore? The FBI agent at the center of “uncovering” it, as designated by FBI Director Louis Freeh (a Republican judge who repaid Clinton’s bipartisan decency in picking him for FBI head by backstabbing Clinton 24/7), was a guy named James Smith.

James Smith’s girlfriend was a lady named Katrina Leung, who was not only a longtime fixture and fundraiser in the California Republican Party, but also a spy for the People’s Republic of China.

Everybody needs to see Grayson’s new ad about the GOPrano’s

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1010/43536.html

If anyone thinks we’ve had our economic collapse and are now coming out of it, they aren’t paying attention to the foreclosure fraud, the fallout, unintended consequences and unmitigated disaster of which will eclipse anything we’ve ever seen.

Nothing like it, no models to explain or predict it, huge collateral damage. And Team Obama is pedaling as fast as they can to get it beyond the midterms.

If anyone thinks we’ve had our economic collapse and are now coming out of it, they aren’t paying attention

Amen.

I’m reminded that the Nazis had their strongest base of support not among the blue collar industrial workers (who voted for socialists and communists), but the middle class. It’s when the middle class is threatened that politics turns extreme.

Even if many “angry white men” in the middle class aren’t hurting as much as other groups, they FEAR they may. That fear is perfectly real and justified in this economy. It’s not a racial issue, despite the original poster’s overtones.

The accurate description is that the teabagger scam is misdirecting rage that should be targeting the wealthy, corporate interests, and the politicians that are their servants.

A few questions

1) How would you redirect the teabagger rage to the “wealthy, corporate interests, and the politicians that are their servants”

2) If they acted, what would you want them to do?

3) How would the “wealthy, corporate interests, and the politicians that are their servants” respond to their actions?

4) Would their correctly placed rage help us?

5) If we can’t get them to act and direct their rage to our suggested targets, should we act and direct our rage at, “wealthy, corporate interests, and the politicians that are their servants”?

Congressional Job Approval 21.2% Approve

Direction of Country 63.5% Wrong Track

How many of the people are people who (unlike the very vocal and rich minority Tea Party Republicans) wanted actual change in a progressive, non-corporate, non-Republican direction and are disappointed that they’re not getting it?

As I wrote om my #14:

All these people don’t think or act the same way so stereotypes (as always) are dangerous.

Yep.

It would be far more accurate to say: “millions of Americans know he did too little; the right does nothing but spin his corporatist agenda into a nonexistent Socialist plot.”

Obama has said that the left has been too impatient, that he is not getting things done fast enough to suit us.

I abhor this “done too little” meme. The fact remains that he has done many wrong things. Many things a Republican would do.

Judicial appointments undone. Conservative appointments. Catfood Commission, Increased War Spending, Expanded wars, domestic surveillance, gutting of FISA and the apprehension and murder of American Citizens with no due process.

No Green Job Program. Tax Cuts. It ain’t the speed. It’s all the wrong things.

With the false dichotomy Obama posits, we’d be better off with slower rather than faster regarding these disasters Obama has wrought.

As best I can recall, the Baggers were raging against the Wall Street bailouts, while the left was totally Obama/ok with it.

I just read a story about this group of people. They also were fed a daly bit of propaganda about “The international Jewry”. This was followed by various laws that they had to follow to identify themselves (e.g. putting the name Israel before the male names on all passports of Jews)

Then the vandalism started. It was first directed at community centers near ground zero synagogues and Jewish businesses.
They also began passing laws not letting some groups work, like Jewish lawyers weren’t allowed to practice law.

The people who complained about the “International Jewry” often ended up taking over the businesses of Jews forced out of the country.

The political fallout from a D president presiding over the biggest economic fail since the Great Depression will be catastrophic.

Agree with the thrust of your diary. Because the Democrat, Barrack Obama, who also happens to be half African-American, won the presidential election in 2008, even if the economy were doing well, there would be an angry white men/Tea Party movement.

The polling results confirm much of what you say in your article. Since almost everybody (except for the very wealthy, the wealthy, and the very well-off), however, is unnerved, and frightened by what’s happening in the economy, some of what the Tea Party is about inevitably has to do with economic insecurity. The context in which this economic insecurity takes place, nonetheless, is the extreme right-wing ideological context that you lay out, and this polling confirms.

Some polling factoids about the Tea Party movement:

Tea Party activists, once on the fringe of the Republican mainstream, are fueling the party’s momentum in the midterm elections, a Bloomberg National poll shows.

Four of five Tea Party supporters who say they plan to vote in the November congressional elections will back Republicans, even though one-third describe themselves as independents. Eighty-five percent of these respondents say the economy will improve with Republicans in control of Congress.

—————————–

The members of this fiscally conservative movement take a darker view of the economy than most voters in the poll. Half say they have no confidence they will have sufficient funds to live on in retirement and more than half worry their children’s quality of life will be worse than their own.

“I am nervous for my grandson,” says poll respondent Cindy Young, 55, a dairy farmer in Wisconsin who describes herself as a Tea Party supporter. “He’s only two years old and I feel he has no chance in this world if it keeps on this way.”

Just because you wish it to be so doesn’t make it so. Again, the fantasies of the firedog crowd are just that..fantasies.
The Tea Party movement has made its central goals abundantly clear. Activists and the sizeable swath of voters who sympathize with them want to reduce the massivly ballooning national debt, cut runaway federal spending, keep taxes in check, reinvigorate the economy, and block the expansion of the Federal Government into citizens’ lives.
As Thomas Jefferson said: A wise and frugal government, which shall leave men free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned – this is the sum of good government.
I own that I am not a friend to a very energetic government. It is always oppressive.
I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them.
I consider the foundation of the Constitution as laid on this ground that “all powers NOT delegated to the United States, by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States.” To take a single step beyond the boundaries thus specifically drawn around the powers of Congress, is to take posession of a boundless field of power, not longer susceptible of any definition. The States can best govern our home concerns and the general government our foreign ones. I wish therefore, never to see all offices transferred to Washington, where,further withdrawn from the eyes of the people, they may more secretly be bought and sold at market.

Well, yeah, since most of those bailouts did occur while Bush was still president.

But I think if you go out and google FDL and TARP, you will find there were a lot of posts around that time and since pointing out the nonsense of the “Too Big To Fail” banks being given direct bail outs as well as back door bailouts for the conditions the banksters had caused for themselves and then receiving astronomical bonuses on top of it all

The Republicans – if they take over – won’t be able to fix the problem either. What will the baggers do then? Stay tuned, it could get interesting.

What actions did they take? Specifically at the wealthy, corporate interests?

Did they do anything that made the wealthy corporate interests fear them, take them seriously? Did the cost the wealthy corporate interests money? Did they get anyone fired? Arrested? Taken to jail? Did they scare any wealthy corporate interests enough for them to hire extra security and hide?

I was one of the few insisting that we must make that our cause to mobilize the left. Obama love was still very strong @ FDL.

Now, however, it’s not permitted to make any suggestions of likely outcomes that may involve uncomfortable scenarios. That will, of course, change in short order after Nov 2, but it points to the censors here limiting the breadth of discussion to more rosy scenarios.

I was quite specific, – where did I mention Corporate interests?

Agreed! I’ll reproduce my words, but highlight the other part:

It would be far more accurate to say: “millions of Americans know he did too little; the right does nothing but spin his corporatist agenda into a nonexistent Socialist plot.”

We’re in total agreement. Obama has not been the change we’ve been waiting for.

After 8 years of Bush, we could have and should have gotten what Candidate Obama promised to be, but isn’t.

In 2012, you mean?

I remember these people well. I lived in MI in the late 60s (Bircher Headquarters and KKK). On top of it I was an immigrant from Germany. So when the guys from the local VFW came to burn my house down I knew about the history of such things. Why did they want to burn me down? I flew the United Nations flag on July 4th.

I don’t agree. They know their enemy is the majority who want to preserve social security and medicare, and wanted public option. Read the Ron Paul board. Not working class at all. They are middle management types, from oil and coal industry, corporate farmers, and small business owners, that hire cheap illegals. There aren’t that many of them. http://www.dailypaul.com/node/81294

The political fallout from a D president presiding over the biggest economic fail since the Great Depression will be catastrophic.

It’ll be politically catastrophic for Democrats, even though Republicans were mostly responsible for it. All true. But so what? A great big plague on both their houses.

Book Salon up with Gregory Fried’s Because It Is Wrong: Torture, Privacy and Presidential Power in the Age of Terror hosted by Mary

Like it or not, and right or wrong (and it is WRONG), we are still living in the post 9/11, Patriot Act country. A country where anyone “left” is suspicious, to the point of harassing anti-war groups.

So, naturally, on any site that is well known for being a political site AND to the left of center, IMO they are only acting in their best self-interests to be EXTRA careful on what type of language gets through. It’s why violence is strictly verbotem, and it’s also likely why “what if” scenarios depicting “less than rosy outcomes” might run afoul. If someone thought we were posting a road map to a popular rebellion, even in a “what if” kind of way, FDL would likely disappear from the toobz tomorrow.

Or maybe I’m over-reacting.

Maybe, but I’m not convinced that will happen – yet.

Well, that’s one way to look at it.

So really, are we being asked to endure 8 years of Obama? What is the solution?

No kidding.

Every time I see these guys I think of a pissed off half wit Archie Bunker. These guys would eat their own shit if the billionaire Kochs told them to on Fox News. Bunch of puppets lead around by the two neurons they have to rub together.

Another way would be to say the Democrats deserve it. Congressional Democrats aren’t impotent, and ha majorities to do more if they wanted. I’m hard pressed to see a situation where a vast majority of Democrats in Congress passed a HUGE stimulus bill, popular with a large majority of Americans, and Obama vetoing it.

Besides, I still insiste on a technical note your original point was in error. IMO it’s NOT a Democratic President in there during the biggest economic fail since the GD. He may have a D after his name, and he may even talk a good D game, but his acts are all R.

Because these clowns — Barry’s supporters — insist they are “progressive,” the political fallout from abandoning low- and middle-income workers will be catastrophic for anyone who calls himself or herself “progressive.”

In 2010, since many of the state mechanisms that are in place, in the name of national security, are “1984″ mechanisms — you’re definitely not “over-reacting.”

What’s the point of engaging the trolls on Teabagger policy/theory. It’s all about the long green in Armey’s astroturfing.

ADD: Armey grew up in the center of rightwing politics in ND… the neo doesn’t fall far from the Birch.

It’s not a case of being taxed too much, it’s a case of not appearing to get anything from those taxes. The impact of the Tea Party could be minimized if most folks saw their taxes going to help average people, not big banks. It really is that simple.

Because these clowns — Barry’s supporters — insist they are “progressive,” the political fallout from abandoning low- and middle-income workers will be catastrophic for anyone who calls himself or herself “progressive.”

Unfortunately you’re absolutely correct. And that’s part of the evil genius of Obama’s plan to destroy the Democratic party and the liberal/progressive movement. Most evil MoFo I’ve ever seen, and I remember Nixon.

the crashing of the global economy — a direct result of the plutocratic “free market” [sic] orgy they helped usher in

who else helped usher it in? Maybe Democrat Bill Clinton, who repealed the Glass-Steagal Act and forced NAFTA through, beginning the cascade of outsourcing that has now moved from Mexico to China?

funny how you always try to pin such things on (R)’s, when it is a fully bi-partisan project.

Voting for Tweedle-Dee changes nothing, he is just as culpable as the Tweedle-Dumbs you like to pick on.

Not sure what you’re pointing out, the part about Republicans having had a huge role in the recession or the part about both parties deserving to be tossed out.

Yes, a key word of that passage is “helped.” And it’s accurate.

Are you suggesting the Teabaggers are not anti-regulation?

I don’t want another term of Obama, though I doubt the Democratic Party will primary him out in 2012. So the alternative to Obama will be ending up with a Republican president, i.e. more of the same (D) or more of the same (R).

Jane and Firedoglake had it right in 2006 when they supported Lamont. The focus in 2012 should be on getting progressives nominated to run as Democratic Party candidates for the House.

Not that simple, Blue Texan. There’s a core of tea partiers who are white and well off, yes. But I think most of the people who favor the TP in the polls aren’t part of that core, and they are affected by the economy.

Nice story and it rings true with me but that may be for another day. I don’t know if Frank Rich is right or not but I enjoyed his piece today. I just know there is a lot of hate out there and it seems worse today than I ever recognized it in the past – even though the haters of this world have always been around.

Usually, historically, “anger and bitterness” of this sort is the result of social anxiety. It is a reflection that not all is well in a society (most often something economic). You show me someone who isn’t scared, kept in the dark and fed shit by folks with a lot more power than they have, and I’ll show you someone who isn’t spewing “anger and bitterness.” Otherwise, are we to believe that these folks are just bad people motivated by evil?

(Also, the poll reflects the socioeconomic status of Tea Party sympathizers, not members. Should these be conflated?)

What did anyone in the middle, working or lower classes get in the last eight years that they could put their hands on?

You speak of tea partiers as though the Tea Party movement is grassroots. It isn’t.

“When one of us finally figures out how to counter these American cancers, we’ll have truly accomplished something for the betterment of our fellow man.”

Fear, according to Carl Rogers and other folks who have studies how people learn, is the essential factor keeping folks from being open to new ideas and empathy. Bob Altemeyer suggests that perhaps only non-violent resistance makes any political impression on right-wing authoritarians. And, we could always shut down the Two Minutes Hate that passes for news.

I provided objective polling. Do likewise, please.

Great post—totally agree–Paul Street has an article on his ZSpace page about the Tea Party too.

Thanks

Knowledge is power.

If governments control the news, propaganda passes for knowledge.
If corporations control the news, you get the same thing, but with a far sexier anchor.

I’m all for non-violent protest. It’d be nice to have the MSM cover it honestly. I can just imagine how Gandhi might be reported on these days.

Following the latest ravings of the suspected terrorist, countless numbers of the warlord’s followers disrupted train service throughout India today. The regional authorities noted they were bracing themselves in case the radical Hindu’s followers turned to violence. Her Magisty’s finest assured the public they would take whatever measures were necessary to restore civility, reiterating that nothing was off the table.

We’ll keep you informed about this dire situation as the evening progresses. In other news, is a Gandhi terror cell operating in YOUR neighborhood? Frightened citizens react! And, is sexy in in India? We’ll lift the veil on the REAL India thriving far beyond Gandhi’s clutches. We’ll be right back.

Continuation of my reply @ 70 where I basically agree that there would be a Tea Party with or without an economic crisis; a Tea Party with a reactionary right-wing ideology. But in the current crisis they are feeling economically insecure in the context of a reactionary right-wing ideology.

The Bloomberg poll results of Oct. 13-14 would not seem to bear out that Tea Party supporters are not feeling economic insecurity – to even a greater degree than other Americans

See Bloomberg poll chart on Tea Party supporters and all likely voters

More Tea Party supporters (than all likely voters) are not confident that they will have enough money for retirement.

More Tea Party supporters (than all likely voters) are not confident that they will not have to keep working beyond the age they want to retire.

More Tea Party supporters (than all likely voters) are not confident that Social Security and Medicare will pay them benefits equal to that of today’s seniors.

More Tea Party supporters (than all likely voters) are not confident that the children in their lives will have a better life than they have.

This needs to be borne out repeatedly. The T-Party is is far less the enemy of the american working class than is the Neo Liberal government, no matter which Party is in charge, where it comes to economic policies.

Not more, just better financed and with sympathetic media coverage. There were enough of these types to elect Reagan in a landslide, so it’s not as if they just appeared on the horizon. They are easily herded, and they vote.

Who says the media is not on the Tea Party team as well?

Wake Up! The corporate media is sympahetic to the Tea Party because they are all on the same team.

MSNBC continually highlights and presents the likes of Sarah Palin and Glenn Beck nightly on the so-called liberal shows of Rachel Maddow and Keoth Olbermann but negative attention is still attention.

Maddow and Olbermann do not have enough liberal/progressive/leftist voices on their shows and would rather put “reformed-repenttant” conservatives like Frank Schaeffer and Levi Johnston on their programs rather than bonafide liberals who have a much better grasp of the issues.

In my opinion, as bad as FOX News is, this so-called MSNBC which is supposedly a “liberal channel” never misses a chance to give the Tea Party and Palin free air time.

That’s right too.

Dick Armey was one of the first guests on the new CNN Program, Spitzer/Parker.

Richard Viguerie has also recently been on this new CNN Program, Spitzer/Parker.

It’s not too difficilt to figure out that the right wing, pro-corporate interests, and by extension, these Tea Party types get all the attention.

I wonder when the networks will invite real radicals like Paul Street, John Pilger, Glen Ford, Bruce Dixon, or Michael Parenti to discuss the present state of affairs?

Neo-liberal economics is conservative economics, that as we have seen in the present economic disaster, genuflects at the alter of the oligarchs; after the oligarchs are taken care of, neo-liberal economics pays lip service, as well as actually employing woefully inadequate reparative remedies to the victims of neo-liberal economics.

Conservative economics, employed by the Republicans, also genuflects at the alter of the oligarchs; after the oligarchs are taken care of, conservative economics lets the victims of conservative economics resort to their own devices to survive; let’s them resort to the law of the jungle, as victims of conservative economics.

Neoliberal economics (conservative economics) and conservative economics are both insidious and exploitative economics.

That’s because their task is to make damn certain that the people remain divided, even though the Dems are implementing all the wet dreams of the Rep’s.

The Baggers hate the Reps, we hate the Dems, – perhaps at some most basic economic level, ‘Baggers and us are far more closely aligned with the needs of the general public then is Obama and our Congress who clearly represent the Bankers and Multinational Corporations.

According to the CBS NYTimes poll, question #5, “What do you think is the most important problem facing the country today?” the highest ranking answers for Tea Party supporters were:

Economy 23%
Jobs 22%
Politicians/Govt 13%
Budget Deficit 11%
Other 10%
Health Care 4%
Defense 3%
Religious Values 3%

Compared to average Americans, they’re not really “well off”, on average (see my previous comment). But some people love to hate, and in order to hate a group, you need some sort of differentiating factor or factors that you can assign to the group, rightly or wrongly.

Believing crap about how well off they are, or how they’re not economically insecure, makes the hate easier, for those so inclined.

I saw a recent study that we have a record number of Americans who are living paycheck to paycheck. There’s no reason to suppose that most Tea Partiers are immune.

“Remember when the pathetic farce that was the stress test presumably prevented Europe’s collapse, and served as the inflection point preventing the EUR from hitting parity with the USD? Well, one of the banks that the “stress test” uncovered to be solvent was the recently insolvent Allied Irish Bank, which earlier this month needed a taxpayer injection of billions to presumably make sure that European creditors (and likely Goldman Sachs, very much like the case in Anglo Irish) never see even one dime lost. And today, an Irish Member of the European Parliament Alan Kelly said he intends to write to the EU Competition Commissioner to discover just how it is that one of Ireland’s top banks slipped through the stress test cracks only to require a bail out mere months later. It appears that slowly everyone in Europe is starting to turn against the trillions in German bank liabilities that stand to be impaired, and lead to a systemic collapse, unless local taxpayers dutifully reach into their back pocket and make sure fat bankers continue their worry-free existence.”

–zerohedge

The T’partiers are a simple bunch, just like the DKos crowd. They can be easily led to slaughter, and so they are, while vehemently believing themselves to be both well informed and righteous in their opinions.

excellent stuff metamars and southof!

Note the question is “facing the country” as opposed to “you personally.” Not sure there’s many people who wouldn’t put “economy” and “jobs” near the top. It’s objectively true.

That doesn’t make them all Teabaggers and that doesn’t mean Teabaggers are primarily motivated by economic insecurity.

And none of that changes the fact that even if the economy was booming, you’d still have a bunch of angry white Republican voters screaming about socialism, just like they did in the boom 1990s.

Tea party supporters come in all stripes: the very wealthy (bankrolling the Tea Party movement); the wealthy who are basically immune to the economics disaster, like the very wealthy; the upper middle class; the middle class and the working class, who are being battered by this economic crisis, as well as free-trade/neoliberal/conservative policies of the last thirty years; and of course the poor (including the long-term unemployed). From the middle class on down they’re all suffering, in differing degrees, from this “great recession.”

The Tea Party is comprised of all these classes. From the middle-class on down, they, on the one hand, are suffering as a result of the economic crisis (like other Americans); but these Tea Party supporters are also being manipulated by the very wealthy. In addition, they have the added burden of also being the victim of their own biases, prejudices, as well as ignorance.

They’re against the Fed, the bank bailouts, e.g. This, at the same time that, ideologically, they are opposed to regulations of the banks. They are a maze of contradictory impulses that right now are leading them down the road against their own economic self-interests. Whether they can ever get past their own blinders, against their ultra-conservative inclinations, isn’t very likely in the short-to-medium term. Beyond that, we’ll see.

Need to change the ‘title’ to Tea Party = Angry White Men = Racist

TP opponents have been saying the same things as this post over and over, and all that’s happened is that the TPs have grown in power. So, posts like this might make you feel better, but the evidence shows that playing the race card and not really understanding the TP isn’t effective.

You do want to be effective, right? Then, don’t keep doing the same thing expecting a different result.

A little research will show that I disagree with FDL on many issues. But, one common area is opposition to the tea parties. My opposition is more valid and could be much more effective, if I could get some help. So, instead of cheering posts that make you feel good but aren’t that effective, help me out.

The partiers lean libertarian, an ideology rejected by over 99% of Americans. And, despite that, about all other opponents can do is play the race card.

“The partiers lean libertarian, an ideology rejected by over 99% of Americans.

Does not ring true. There are far more libertarians and not all of them are of the American brand.

Are you opposing them because they are Libertarians? Please, explain.