Smashing the Left’s Stereotypes about Tea Partiers
I had the privilege of interviewing three interesting individuals among the 500 or more who attended the Tea Party Express III rally Monday afternoon in St. Charles, Mo. One is a student at nearby Lindenwood University. Another is a small business owner from Belleville, Ill. The third is a black ambassador of conservatism from Deltona, Fla. Together, they smash the left’s stereotypes about who attends tea parties.
College Student
Despite a 30-minute deluge of rain prior to the rally, a college student with dreadlocks named Josh Ciskowski was determined to stand up for conservatism and constitutional values.
A history major at nearby Lindenwood University, he displayed and articulated a thorough understanding of what’s wrong with this country when government officials supplant the ideas of the Founding Fathers with their own misguided, big government ideology.
“It’s movements like this that reassure us that the government is not going to take away our freedoms that were guaranteed to us through the Bill of Rights, the Constitution, what America was founded on,” he said.
Most adamantly, he said, “We are not supposed to have our freedoms taken away by the people we elect.”
To watch the interview, click here.
Small Business Owner
Many people on the left like to paint business owners as greedy. Sandy Richter owns Sandy’s Back Porch, a small garden center and gift shop in Belleville, Ill., and she doesn’t fit that description. She shared her story with me prior to the event’s kickoff.
During her first five years in business, she said, she paid out around $400,000 in wages to her 10-12 part-time workers. Conversely, she’s taken in only $7,000 — or 20 cents an hour — for herself during the same period. Understandably, she’s concerned about the future.
“My concern with the current administration is that they have a tax-and-spend philosophy,” she said, “and, as a small business owner, you have to take a major risk in your life, you work for many, many hours for no pay until your business is actually profitable.
“At that point in time, when you do make a profit, I’m concerned that our tax rate with this new health care issue will grow to be 50 or 60 cents on every dollar that you have made,” she explained. “Why would you hire people to run a business to make money just so you can give the administration 60 cents on the dollar?
“And it may not happen tomorrow and it may not happen two years from now, but this health care reform — that is what it is going to do to this country.
“I believe this is the land of opportunity,” she said. “If you want to do anything bad enough, you can do it here. It’s not a land of entitlements.”
To watch the interview, click here.
WELL WE JUST HAVE TO KEEP HAMMARING AT THE CLOWN’S IN THE M.S.M. TO LET THEM KNOW THAT WE TEA PARTYER’S WO’NT STAND FOR HAVING ARE LIBERTY’S TAKEN AWAY, FROM US. WELL WEATHER ITS THE DEATH PANEL’S OR THE FORCED ABORSION FUNDDING, WE ARE LIKE BON JOVI WHEN WE SAY ‘WHERE NOT GONNA TAKE IT!’
That would be Twisted Sister, not Bon Jovi – BJ’s guitarist Richie Sambora is the smart (conservative) one of that group, anyhow.
WELL THATS WIERD I DID’NT KNOW THAT D. SCHNEIDER WAS IN BON JOVI
You are right, Richie is the smart one. Not sure about conservative. He was right there with Jon helping to campaign for our President Obama. Thank you for giving him such a compliment.
The Left’s stereotype of Tea Partier’s horrible grammar and spelling is quite evident in this post.
While it’s nice to see some folks forced to admit their their errors, let’s remember that the only people they really deceived were themselves. Most of the rest of America find the TEA party more congenial than the Mr. Obama.
And here’s another proud ‘traitor’ to the Left-wing cause: a Tea Party patriot who happens to be a lesbian.
As a non-Orthodox Jewish conservative (and we vote Democrat in the same percentage as gays), I hear ya….
This hybrid-driving pro-choice Wiccan patriot welcomes you.
as does this pot smoking atheist who is as far right as they come
“I Am Spartacus!”
There’s room for all freedom loving people in the TEA Party movement. We don’t have to agree on everything to agree on limited government and fiscal responsibility.
The legacy media’s potrayal of the TEA party movement is so disconected from reality that it renders suspect the rest of their “reporting”. If they can’t accurately describe the events at a peaceful protest, how can we expect them to have veracity regarding other news? The answer is, we can’t.
This is one of the reasons that the traditional liberal press is in such deep financial trouble. Intelligent people can see the bias, see the alternative sources, and are thus armed to turn them off or stop subscribing.It makes me laugh that CNN, MSNBC, NBC, ABC, CBS, the NYT and Boston Globe, along with many others, can’t fathom this. I look forward to their bankruptcy and replacement by more viable, comprehending outlets.
“This is one of the reasons that the traditional liberal press is in such deep financial trouble.”
I think it became obvious several years ago that devotion to the Marxist faith far outweighs financial concerns for these propagandists. In fact, rather than correct themselves and move rightward, they have doubled down and moved ever farther to the left, until their reporting is now as disconnected from reality as that of Pravda and Izvestia during the days of the USSR.
The “journalists” of the SRM are not motivated by money. They are motivated by their Marxist faith. George Soros and the Obama Junta will support them if they go bankrupt. They are there to try and crush Jews/Israel, capitalism, and Christianity.
Economic pressure will work, but only to bankrupt them, not to correct the error of their ways.
I work in the public sector (school teacher) and vehemently support the tea parties. Doing so could eventually affect my job; don’t care. Being right is much more important than being employed (my husband is also in a union).
There is no point in trying to refute the radical leftists in the State-Run Media. They are religious fanatics, every bit as much as the Jihadists that they love so much. The SRM religion is Marxism, not Islam, but the goal is similar — the eradication of Jews, capitalism, and Christianity (in that order, for both groups).
You cannot refute these people. They are fanatics. Beyond reason. You have to defeat them. Crush them. Drive them out of business. Just this morning, I was listening to Glen Beck (yes, I am a listener of his) talking about how advisers of the President are constantly trying to get advertisers to boycott him. (He may be conspiracy-minded, but I believe that Glen is correct about the presence of these “conspiracies” – what the left would merely call a “concerted effort against racism”).
These people have to be beaten. The NY Times and CNN in particular are vulnerable — go after THEIR advertisers — tell them that if you advertise on these left-wing outlets that denigrate good Americans — they will be boycotted. And while the leftist SRM will denounce such conservative boycotts as censorship, these rantings must be ignored and you must perservere in them.
The major corporations know that there are more good “middle Americans” than there are left-wing elitists, and that if we organize to the same degree as the left, they have to fear us more than they fear the leftist SRM.
As a strong social conservative Tea Partier, I have just one thing to say to ‘lesbian conservative’: welcome aboard!
It is high time that we all put aside petty differences and stand up for our Constitution and those things that have made this country great. One of those things is the ‘can-do’ attitude that says that when patriotic Americans collectively decide that we (not our government) are going to get something done, by jove, we’re going to get it done.
Thanks, Tom and Rick, for your kind words. And I agree, Rick–we all have to stick together here; there is so much at stake.
And to Eric, Frank, and Achillea: heck, it looks like we’re giving newer and truer meaning to the word ‘diversity’!
Native American and a Tea Party Conservative. If there is any ethnic group in the US that understands the failure of socialized reformation it is the Native.
I have no idea what the left’s stereotype is. Don’t watch the news.
My own impression is that tea partiers are the right wing equivalent of the lefty types who want to get rid of the electoral college; the entire concept of “elected representative” who votes according to his/her conscience seems to elude them.
The premise of having representatives is that the representative is privy to a lot of speciality information that Joe Sixpack is not privy to. That’s not because Joe there is stupid. It’s because Joe is busy holding down a job and supporting a family. The representative is there to understand the issues and do what s/he thinks is best for Joe.
Tea Partiers would have you believe that the representatives are there solely to be puppets of Joe and other loud Joes.
Democracy is two wolves and a sheep voting on what’s for dinner.
All Tea Partiers are doing is trying to enforce this distorted version of democracy (the tyranny of the majority.)
That any number of people can cross racial, ethnic and social divides to proudly proclaim their abject stupidity ought to not be surprising, but yet here you all are, patting yourselves on the backs.
You all are the biggest bunch of inarticulate (can’t write or spell a coherent sentence) racist nitwit stereotypical uneducated right-wing looney tunes one could imagine. Emigrate to Madagascar! Please!
To #3 (and friends) I am a conservative Christian( gasp!) and I say” Welcome!”If we don’t stick together and fight this evil in the White House, we will have nothing left to fight for.Tea Partiers transcend personal convictions and preferences and fight for the Doctrinal issues of freedom, safety and security.
The premise of having representatives is that the representative is privy to a lot of speciality information that Joe Sixpack is not privy to.
No, privy-ness is not the “premise” of representative government. It’s just the bull-puckey propaganda that you, apparently, have sprinkled with a little salt and swallowed for dinner.
There is an information gap that’s crippling the federal government, to be sure. But it’s not what the Congress is “privy to” and the voters aren’t. It’s what Congress doesn’t know and can never know, and yet keeps insisting it does know, in the form of legislation coming in torrents out of the Capitol like water over Niagara Falls.
I would say this even if every single member of Congress were Solon reincarnate. *Nobody* can know enough about the day-to-day decisions, circumstances, influences and motives of 300 million people to pass legislation that burrows into every nook and cranny of those people’s lives. Circumstances change from day to day, hour to hour even. Individual liberty, not regulation from above, is what allows the individual to make the decision that is in his or her best interest. We have long passed the point where the federal government protects individual liberty and fosters individual responsibility. It is now just a suffocating jungle of obtuse legalese. “Three felonies a day.”
No, not even the very best and brightest and most honorable Americans could sit in Washington and legislate well, to the degree that Congress is currently legislating.
But when a sitting member of the Congress publicly professes his concern that putting additional U.S. troops on Guam is going to cause the island to tip over and capsize … and when another member of Congress says, on camera, that he doesn’t worry about the Constitution … and yet another says, “All this talk about rules, we make ‘em up as we go along” … and yet another says, “If you don’t tie [Congress'] hands, we will keep stealing” …. continuing to believe that Congress is some body of august, upstanding, conscience-voting benevolent wise people, and that all those “privy” goings-on are for anyone’s benefit but the dirty Triangle Trade of lobbyist-client-Congress insider dealing, is the very height of blinkered benightedness.
#12 bogie wheel — No, privy-ness is not the “premise” of representative government.
Joe Sixpack has neither the time nor the training to have an informed opinion on NASA policy objectives, just for one dirt simple example. Neither do you. Yet this is the sort of thing we expect the representative to be able to cast an informed vote on.
I suppose the day I see tea partying for NASA objectives I’ll probably take a closer look, because at that point someone’s making an argument regarding representation that’s worth listening to.
Present day tea parties aren’t REALLY about representation; they’re about trying to bully representatives by a small yet absurdly vocal and hyperpartisan interest group about whatever seems to blow their skirts up this month.
Put down the crack pipe before you hurt yourself permanently amigo. Tea party is the essence of democracy, populism (that is not a dirty word) and Americanism. It is the Declaration and Constitution breathed into vivid life. This is why every stripe of American is in it, at home and abroad.
The Democrats had Wallace and the GOP has the TParty…I say its all good for politics and the entertainment factor brings in interest from an otherwise boring public so what is wrong with that?
Now what did I do with my flag shirt and matching socks?
NASA Policy objectives? Please. Most Congressmen couldn’t even tell you a thing about NASA policy objectives with the exception of a few on some sub-committee. We’ve got Representatives and Senators voting on bills longer than War and Peace who don’t have the slightest clue as to what is in them and readily admit that they haven’t read the bill.
The only thing they should be “privy to” that Joe Sixpack should have access to are matters of national security, and honestly many of them probably couldn’t obtain a TS clearance if it was part of a normal job requirement. Sadly our CIC probably couldn’t get a Secret level clearance with his past associations, let alone a TSCI. Now I’m not saying that Joe Sixpack will know everything, but they should have access to it (as long as the information does not compromise NS) if they want to find out. Most Congress Critters are lawyers anyway, not Aerospace Engineers so they aren’t exactly swimming in their area of expertise when it comes to NASA.
Hey Poor Citizen,
In the 60′s Wallace was an unrepentent segregationist and demonstrably racist.
The TEA party movement stands for the principals of limited government, lower taxes, liberty and the founders interpretaion of the Constitution. The movement is 79% white, 6% black, and 15% other which matches fairly closely US demographics. You need to get your facts straight. Your feeble attempt to tie the movement to a racist agenda is unsupported by fact.
Did you determine that demographic % breakdown yourself or from another source. If you came up with that, what were your methods? Photo scans? Mailing lists (e.g. using ZIP codes and ethnic first names)? Genuinely interested.
urbanleftbehind,
Those numbers were released within the last 10 days and I took note of the actual numerology, although I didn’t retain the source. It was mainstream polling data from a legacy media outlet, which made it credible to me because it ran counter to their editorial bias.
The progressives attempt to lable TEA partiers as racist and non mainstream is going to come back to haunt them in November. These are highly motivated people who have a firm understanding of our history and constitutional federalism. Many of them are from the most likely voting block, the senior population. I seriously doubt that the voting block that elected Obama and completed the progressive sweep in 08 is going to be similarly motivated in 10.
The Democrats are 7 months away from ruing the day some smart mouth decided to offend 10′s of millions of people by lableing them “tea baggers”. We ain’t getting mad, we’ll be getting even.