I went to the local Tea Party meeting tonight. Maybe 150 people meeting in a conference room at the local puddle-jumper airport, and a calico cat greeted me at the front door. (No small airport is complete without a resident mouser.) My Gunwalker shirt was a huge hit, and I sat with a couple of my favorite library patrons. One of them lent me her "Agenda" DVD, and I'll be watching it Friday.
Not surprisingly, it was mostly a bunch of recycled Republicans, chasing the myth. After a bit of campaigning from a few Republicans, the guest speaker gave a presentation on Agenda 21. He was a good speaker and it was interesting. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TzEEgtOFFlM "Agenda 21 For Dummies"
Everything he said was true.
The thing is, that's all they do, tell the truth about what the eeeeevil Democrats are up to. And the eeevil Democrats tell the truth about what the eeeevil Republicans are doing. And they're all correct, because BOTH parties are eeeevil!!! Are we seeing a pattern yet? Why can't these people see more than an inch beyond their own noses? Do they really think that if every Democrat in congress suddenly dropped dead, the Republicans would solve this country's problems? The Republican party ditched the real conservatives decades ago; haven't they noticed? Do these Tea Partiers really think they're doing something different? They're making deals with the Republican party, just to get in (and accepting its limitations) they're taking funding from the likes of the Koch brothers (whose billions came from having congress in their pockets) and they're accepting the agenda dictated to them by FoxNews (THE Republican mouthpiece.) Dudes! Really?
The Tea Party will NEVER change a thing in this country if it aligns itself with ANY entity that has a vested interest in maintaining a massive corrupt government!
The preceding statement deserves a paragraph all to itself. If the Tea Party wants to succeed, it absolutely must be a completely independent third party. It has cut off its own balls and handed them to its oppressor. On a silver platter, no less. If it doesn't take them back, it will be just another passing fad, unfortunately at a time when this country might actually be ready for a third party.
I think there were a few independent thinkers in the house. If I attend any more meetings, I might just raise a little dust. Not normally my style, but what the hell - why not? (Menopause is a bitch; goodbye, estrogen, helloooo testosterone!)
Very interesting Suz. Thanks for the information and insight.
ReplyDeleteLove,
Lola
I can agree there are problems on both sides of the isle...and there are fringe cooks on the left and right, but the one thing I cannot abide and will never support is Socialism. I will go with any party that opposes big government, higher taxes, universal health care and the government doing everything for the individual. I will even support States Rights over Federal Government control.
ReplyDeleteRaise some dust chicklet... the two party system has reached it's limit. It's become a "let's be US versus THEM" and it's JUST. NOT. WORKING.
ReplyDeleteSo glad you went!!!! Thanks for sharing.
PS... our son's are fighting for those bast*rds. Somebody needs to be start paying attention!
Get involved. One person, one at a time, can make a difference.
ReplyDeleteCoffeepot, that's it exactly! That's why I'm so pissed at the Republican party. It claims to be anti-big-government, but it's not. Small government means less power, and that's off the table. Republican PEOPLE are anti-socialist, but the party is not. It's pure hypocrisy. Both parties will maintain their power as long as they can keep us focused on what the other guy is doing wrong. Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain!
ReplyDelete(PLEASE read in a calm mental voice. I am not shouting in any way. Well, maybe I am shouting "PLEASE")
ReplyDeleteOk, why the total backlash against socialism? Jesus was a socialist.
Is it because we think that the poor are gaming the system? I think the Koch Bros. have been gaming the system for a long time.
Great post, Suz, my sentiments almost exactly!
ReplyDelete"Koch Bros. have been gaming the system for a long time." Damn straight. And while many poor people are abusing the system, what they take is peanuts compared to the People Who Own The Parties.
ReplyDeleteI'm not yelling either, Ben. In fact I feel like crying. This is the legacy of Limbaugh, Hannity, O'Reilly and Beck. It makes me sick that I have to explain myself to you, of all people. You know my character, you've known my character for 25 years. Yes I was ditzy, careless and shallow when you knew me, but did you ever doubt that my heart was in the right place? Did you ever doubt my compassion?
I'm a true moderate, not a wishy-washy moderate. Supporting the concept of social welfare has never made me a socialist. Our Constitution may not literally outlaw socialism, but the two are essentially incompatible. Socialism works only in societies where the majority is willing to give up certain liberties for the "greater good." That's not the USA; we prefer to choose how we help the helpless, rather than trusting the government to do it properly. And with good reason. Liberal and conservative principles aside, look what the government has done to every social program it has started. It couldn't possibly be more inefficient or ineffective.
Both parties serve the PWOTP's first, and the rest of us get the leftovers. That's what I object to, and the people who agree with me, by and large, identify themselves with the Tea Party movement. Not with the "TP Republicans." I've found that there is a HUGE difference: INDEPENDENT TP'ers understand that the Republican party is 1/2 of what's wrong with Washington. But both parties and the PWOTP's don't want you to know that. They want you to believe that anyone who is not a Democrat is an illiterate survivalist anarchist, who thinks all the government should provide to anybody, is 40 acres and a mule. And they want you to believe that anyone who is not a Republican is a pinko hippie commie. And thanks to the press, which is owned by the same PWOTP's, most of us have fallen for it. They have polarized us and scared the hell out of us. Our primary political goal is now to demonize and defeat whichever group is trying to take our share of the pie. What they don't want us to notice is that we are fighting over crumbs. Most of the pie is already going to the power brokers, for them to share with their cronies. Like the Koch brothers. This nation can afford to feed the helpless, but not while it's feeding the billionaires. Don't think for a minute that the Democrats in Congress are against feeding the billionaires. They and the Republicans are equally corrupt, because they are owned by (mostly) the very same people.
And frankly, I disagree about Jesus being a socialist. He said God wants us, as moral individuals, to give our wealth to the poor, and moral individuals do, AFTER they pay their taxes. He never said that the government should make it compulsory. He wants us to CHOOSE to serve God, not to be coerced by the threat of imprisonment. In my mind, "Jesus as a socialist" cheapens morality and degrades the idea of service to God. (And I know for a fact that you don't want the United Stated to be ruled by religious doctrine.)
Go to http://www.afr.org/ and read the intro to the book, "The Conservative Revolution." This book explains why NEITHER party will ever be reformed enough to serve the people. In a post-Demopublican America (yes, I'm dreaming) there would be plenty of room for BALANCE between liberalism and conservatism. The people who are working toward this, are the people I'm looking for, and they keep calling themselves the Independent Tea Party.
In my quest toward a degree, I'd missed a history class and am taking it right now. Very enlightening... same sh*t, different day.
ReplyDeleteCare to comment on the unions "glomming on" to the Rage in Washington protest? Typical big business/government agency/ big anything - they wait til the "grassroots organization forms" then they jump on and take it over for themselves. SIGH...
Exactly, Meadowlark. That's why the Republicans grabbed ahold of the Tea Party - so they could control it.
ReplyDeleteSuz, I never doubt your sincerity! I just hear "socialism" tossed around as something horrible. When I think of Jesus and socialism, I think of the Acts church and "They held all things in common. They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need." I take that to mean that we use the tools at hand to do what needs to be done. Very possibly my definition of socialism is skewed.
ReplyDeleteBen, I just answered you on FB; it just took forever! I now you don't doubt me, and I hope you know I love you. I'm going back to FB now, it's almost bedtime...
ReplyDelete