Day #1: People, places or things…what are you thankful for?
Things I am thankful for : My Family~ Laurie, Lynell, Sheri and their Families who are my Families :D My Friends and my Tribe ~ What Blessing all of you are and you know who you are you sly minxes
My Critturs~ What unconditional love looks like
The Scenery~ I live in a Progressive State which hasn't succumbed -so far- to Theocratic or Oligarchic pandering, nor has entirely bowed to H$U$ prohibition.
Cool stuff like a roof that doesn't leak, and a pellet stove that warms the place up. Down blankets. Down pillows with Salvation Army stain pillow cases. Chest freezers full of chicken for the Kidz
Sleepy Time tea with honey Song Dogs and the Howlelujah Choir
Depending on where you look, which resource you investigate, how far
back you go, and how invested you are in the ideology, the Tea Party can either
be viewed as the ultimate guide to Citizen Grassroots Organizing, or the
epitome of Corporate shilling. There
seem to be three major facets; the roots and the cause, what it could have
been, and what it has become; and none of them are black and white. As are many
things in life, It’s Complicated.
against President Obama’s Mortgage
Relief Plan as the “spark of
the tea party movement.”
This 2009
Founding date is also cited by the Tea Party Patriots http://www.teapartypatriots.org/get-started/ who claim that “there is one Tea
Party movement. Several organizations use the phrase “Tea Party” in their name.
Tea Party Patriots is the largest grassroots organization and strives to be the
best service provider for local groups. The strength of the tea party movement
is the grassroots leaders, activists and organizations – Tea Party Patriots is
dedicated to lifting up and strengthening the tea party movement at the
grassroots level.” This inception date is also used by The Tea Party.net http://www.theteaparty.net/a division of Stop This Insanity,
Inc.
Further,
people who were actively involved in the Tea Party movement credit Glenn Beck
as the originator of the “Modern Tea Party” with his “We Surround Them”
broadcast https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aKKUfmFL3Cs (VIDEO)
And then there is the Ron Paul connection. Ron Paul was elected as the
first Chairman of the CSE in 1984. According to Ron Paul, the Tea Party began
in 2007 http://www.bizpacreview.com/2013/08/26/ron-paul-takes-credit-for-tea-party-says-gop-took-over-82222 at one of his
Presidential Campaigns aboard a shrimp boat in Galveston, Texas, on Dec. 16, 2007. http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2011/may/13/tea-party-godfather-ron-paul-running-president/?page=all Mr. Paul goes on to say that the Tea Party
was taken over by the GOP and thus, its’ message diluted; “What happened after that was that a
lot of people came onboard – including Republicans – who watered down some of
the beliefs, and certainly changed the opinion of some on foreign policy so
that the original Tea Party movement was taken over by the Republican Party,
which I think was part of the problem.”
So we have
inception dates of 2002 by the CSE; 2004 by the Tea Party.org; 2007 by Ron
Paul; and several dates in 2009, including The Tea Party Patriots on Feb 19th via Santelli’s
Chicago Mercantile speech, and March 13th via
Glenn Beck’s show on that date. I discovered a timeline here archived on the Way Back Machine: http://web.archive.org/web/20131029052509/http://www.teaparty-platform.com/Tea_Party_Movement_P9MG.html which was quite informative.
Originally,
from its’ self-proclaimed Populist http://www.ushistory.org/us/41d.asp roots, the Tea party was anti Big
Business, and anti elitist but since its’ acceptance of funding and control by
the Koch Brothers’ CSE, http://crooksandliars.com/karoli/koch-industries-denies-funding-freedomworks
Freedom Works organization http://www.freedomworks.org/
and other Dark Money organizations, that grand design has undergone a
significant re-imaging. Citizens for a Sound Economy (CSE) was splintered into
two Organizations in 2004: FreedomWorks http://www.freedomworks.org/ as the Political organization and Americans for Prosperity.
(AFP) http://americansforprosperity.org/ as the Think Tank Foundation. After all, Big Business has Big Money, and
Free Market Capitalism and its’ funding is the bottom line on all things
Political, even –and perhaps especially- grassroots anti-taxation groups.
Consider the platform Rick Santelli used for his “average Americans” in his
2009 Mercantile Rant : Ultra-wealthy Wall Street investors who will be
“marshalling derivative securities” in opposition to any assistance for those
people who were fleeced by the same Wall Street Vulture Capitalists Santelli
works for. So is this a Populist Movement? Or is this an Elitist Movement?
As you can see, there seems to be no firm inception
date, no specific trigger to light the flames of revolution, and the Tea Party
seems to have been protesting against both Republican and Democratic programs
equally. At this point, the Tea Party seems to embody Libertarian views. But
wait! Does that hold true?
The Cause ~ The Recession and the Affects of
Vulture Capitalism
So now we
have seen how varied the inception dates for the Tea Party Movement are, and
some of the social and political influences which have shaped it. Let’s explore
the role of money and speculative real estate.
Understanding
the role which mortgage lenders and speculative financiers played in the Real
Estate Bubble implosion of 2008 is important. It’s easy to say that unqualified
potential home owners were at fault for buying a home they could not afford and
expecting others to pick up the slack they could not carry. Your
next-door-neighbor’s new mortgage which he used to buy a new car and add a new
addition to his house while you struggled to keep your checkbook balanced puts
an easy face to the blame. But the pressures which predatory lenders, brokerage
firms, and mortgage companies heaped upon our less-fortunate yet still hopeful
neighbors should not be glossed over.
My friend
Dianne worked as a courier during this time, from 2003 to 2013.
“Well I wish my memory was sharper. I don't remember the name of the mortgage
company, nor the year, exactly. I did not see them, I overheard a conversation
as I walked down a corridor towards their cubicles. It was a conversation
between a young female and male. She said she was “thinking about their
bonuses, and she wanted hers delivered in $1, in a dump truck, to fill up a
swimming pool.. Then she would just swim in it”. When I walked in they seemed
aware I might have heard and were a bit embarrassed. Like they knew their greed
was obvious, and somehow wrong. Clearly the only goal of these people was
profit for them.
Many times we would pick up packets, I am assuming they included home equity
loan papers, for signature. We were to get a signed receipt of delivery. But
the funny thing is many times people would not answer the door, even though
they were clearly home. Would not answer the door and accept the paperwork. I
can only assume they had been high pressured on the phone, but thought better
of getting involved. So when we showed up they didn't answer the door. I don't
know what we were delivering exactly, they were sealed envelopes.”
~personal
correspondence from Dianne Woni Lea, Aug 2014
I, myself,
have had some personal experience with this Housing Bubble, predatory lenders,
and the ramifications of not knowing the correct questions to ask. I was very
fortunate. I sold my house in San Diego in 2004, just after the peak of
California Real Estate boom, but before the crash. My Grandmother had just
died, and she was savvy about property and real estate, so when she died, I did
not have her sage council available. I had to flail about the brambles of
financing barefoot. I sold my home, and paid in cash for a new home in a new
State. Then; perhaps foolishly, but in hindsight, perhaps not; I took out a
small loan in order to build yards for my dogs.
The first
lender I approached informed me that the lowest amount of a loan was $80,000.oo
and that they could not approve the $30,000.oo loan I was inquiring about. The
second lender was Countrywide Home Loans, a non-Better Business Bureau approved
lender. http://www.bbb.org/washington-dc-eastern-pa/business-reviews/financial-services/countrywide-home-loans-inc-in-fairfax-va-1034243
They did approve me for a $50,000.oo mortgage loan. Bank of America and its Merrill Lynch and Countrywide Financial units
sold billions of dollars of mortgage securities backed by toxic loans and misrepresented
the risks to investors. Of
course, I didn’t know this at the time. Last month, Bank of America paid off
$16.7 billion dollars in penalties in order to cease State and Federal probes
in Countrywide’s involvement in the 2008 financial Crisis http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-08-21/bofa-agrees-to-pay-16-65-billion-to-end-u-s-mortgage-probes.html Countrywide tried to pressure me
into an adjustable rate loan, calling three to four times weekly and on every
visit to the lender for signatory signings, there was a huge push to try to
talk me into this option. But because I just didn’t understand all the
ramifications and have always been resistant to pressuring, I refused, and went
with a fixed rate. Then, in 2008, Countrywide tripled my mortgage payments with
no warning, and no reasoning. They claimed that I had refused to keep my Home
Owner’s Insurance up-to-date, which was not true. Again, fortunately for me, I
qualified for President Obama’s refinancing option, and I was able to save my
home. I also qualified for President Bush’s NeighborWorks counseling program
during this time. That program; while possibly helpful to some; was a huge
waste of funding as well as a source of stress and heartache for me. Because I
wasn’t upside down on my loan, my “counseling” included this advice: “Sell your
home, get rid of your pets; they are too costly; and live in your old broken
down Motor Home. You can use the money you get from the sale of your home to
fix the coach. We can help you with selecting an agent.” Shortly after I changed Mortgage companies,
Countrywide was caught up in President Obama’s finance sweep of 2008.
So was this
Mortgage Bail Out Plan to which many have attributed the rise of the Tea Party
a terrible socialist plot designed to redistribute the wealth of America? Or
was it a bi-partisan small step to control out-of-control Vulture Capitalists
during a time of great financial crisis? Was the Tea Party a self-fertilizing
grass roots Protest sprung full grown from the foreheads of concerned
Americans? Or a meticulously designed Astroturfed political lobbying
organization crafted by wealthy industrialists bent on plutocracy?
When I first
embarked on research for this article, I knew it would be lengthy, I knew it
would be complicated, and I thought it would be rather simple to explain once
everything was laid down chronologically. How naïve. The more I dug, the more
those dragon’s teeth produced warriors designed to obfuscate, complicate, and
defy my efforts at simplifying.
What
It Could Have Been~ the Tea party as seen by real citizens. What they did
right, and how they missed the boat
We have
explored some of the basic issues of the Mortgage roots which are claimed to
have been the trigger for the Tea Party in current understanding. What about
the citizens who were involved in this 2009 inception? What drove them?
The Tea
Party has been described by many as a grassroots movement to discuss effective
ways to lower taxes and address the deficit. Regular citizens concerned about
their tax increases and concerned that they were bearing the brunt of fiscal
responsibility for others’ unsustainable desires to own property gathering
together to discuss what could be done to begin to affect the change they
believed was needful. This facet of
the Tea Party was an assembly of like-minded neighbors meeting in their living
rooms, and in the coffee shops nearby.
Engaged citizens looking for a way to not lose their homes and dreams,
looking for a way to make our Government once again work for US, looking for a
way to affect chance, gathered and discussed and engaged in the Political
process. I think if the Tea Party had focused on this inclusive bipartisan
platform rather than turning their attentions to highly partisan
socio-religious issues, as well as championing Corporate “Rights” over Citizen
Rights, that this movement could have been a force for positive forward advancement
rather than the hugely divisive morass we see today.
” In the spring of 2008, I started hearing about Glenn
Beck’s “We Surround Them” media event, and I found a group here in Miami that
was meeting to watch his live show and discuss politics with like-minded
individuals. After that showing, I was hooked on the 9 Principles and 12 Values
of Glenn’s 9-12 Project, which, collectively, were “designed to bring us all
back to the place we were on September 12, 2001. The day after America was
attacked we were not obsessed with Red States, Blue States or political
parties. We were united as Americans, standing together to protect the values
and principles of the greatest nation ever created” (Glenn Beck, 2008). I
created the “we-surround-them-miami” Yahoo e-group and began attending meetings
of what was then an informal Tea Party. I participated in the Tax Day protest
at the main post office here in Miami, waiving a sign that read “CHANGE: That’s
All We’ll Have Left in Our Wallets” on one side and “America’s Cup Runneth
EMPTY” on the other.
~personal
correspondence from Jody Haynes’ essay: “The Lesser of Two Evils- Personal Political Introspection of an
Average American Citizen
(AUTHOR CORRECTION: Glenn Beck’s “We Surround Them” broadcast
was on Friday, March 13th, 2009, and uploaded to Glenn Beck’s
webpage on Wednesday, Apr 1st, 2009 at 9:26 PM PDT) http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/We_Surround_Them
Even tho
there are many parts from these interviews that I disagree with personally, if
the Tea Party had stuck to this Populist theme; inclusivity, bipartisanship,
and a willingness to work together across party lines to address what we all
know are weaknesses in our Political system; I wonder what gains we might have
achieved? Can you imagine? I remember the feeling across the County after 9/11,
that we were all Americans. That we were all in this together. That if we
pulled together in a bipartisan manner, there was nothing we could not
overcome. I was a card-carrying Democrat when 9/11 happened. I did not support
or Vote for GW Bush. However, on 9/12, President George W. Bush was MY
PRESIDENT. He was our AMERICAN President, not the REPUBLICAN President.
So this
facet of the Tea Party could have been so empowering for our Citizenry. It
could not, however, stay the course. The grassroots Tea Party ideology was
swallowed up by something darker. Something greedier in nature, and more
Machiavelian. http://www.emachiavelli.com/Machiavelli%20on%20power.htm
Something distinctly un-democratic and in some areas, un-Constitutional.
I began to discover a dichotomy in the Tea Party, an imbalance between Elitism
versus Populism, between what we are being told about the intent, and what
issues about which we are purposefully being kept in the dark.
American
Populism is defined by its’ antipathy to Big Business and Big Government. And
while the Tea Party claims it is a Populist movement, they have repeatedly
sided with corporate interests over private interests in policy stances against
Big Government, rather than a balance –however precariously we may achieve that
balance- between Big Business and the Big Government designed to counter the
undue influence of said Big Business. I found a fascinating video from the
UCBerkeley Goldman School of Public Policy’s Center on Civility and Democratic
Engagement https://gspp.berkeley.edu/events/webcasts/populism-and-the-tea-party-in-american-politics (VIDEO)
which references a 2011 poll
taken by the American National Elections Studies http://www.electionstudies.org/ . During this video, Henry
E. Brady indicates that roughly 18% of the cross section of respondents
identified as Tea Party Supporters. (Poll data referenced in the “2010-2012
EVALUATIONS OF GOVERNMENT AND SOCIETY STUDY” http://www.electionstudies.org/studypages/2010_2012EGSS/2010_2012EGSS.htm Also according to that poll, 70% of
Tea Party supporters were registered as Republicans. And over 60% of these
respondents stated that they viewed Wall Street unfavorably. So, considering
the strong corporate influence and funding of the Tea Party Movement, can the
label “Populist” still apply?
What
it could have been: An Interview
Kim is a Professor of English at a Florida College of some
repute. She’s an erudite, non-partisan, highly intelligent person whom I have
known since the late 90’s. She is not an
easily swayed minion, leashed to an ideology which she has not examined; she,
like her husband Jody, is a professional, used to scrutinizing and
disassembling fact from fiction. She sat down with me to discuss her
involvement in the 2009 face of the Tea Party Movement:
Kat
Wolfdancer
I would like to ask you to tell me about your experiences of
the Tea party. I’m writing an article about them, and frankly, I want it to be
FAIR AND BALANCED and you are the ONLY person I know who has a real life experience
with the grass roots beginnings uncolored by rhetoric.
Kim Miles
As for the grassroots tea party movement I was involved in,
it was comprised of democrats, republicans and independents who had some
conservative leanings (fiscal, not so much social) and were concerned about
government expenditures and government control. In other words, they had some
libertarian viewpoints to some extent, being concerned about how big the
government was growing, increased taxes (something that concerns us all), wasted
moneys (pork), unsustainable programs and the number of people on government
assistance vs those paying into the government to assist the other half (again,
unsustainable), etc. anything else?
Kim Miles
Oh, the average age of those involved were 35-70, with most
being mid 40s to mid 50s. Not a lot of young people. That was about the only
consistent demographic. Equal numbers of males and females in ours. Cross
section of dems, GOP and independents. Another consolidating factor is that we
were all concerned about skyrocketing government expenditures regardless of who
was doing it. That it was being done was the issue and that we couldn't
continue in that vein was the concern. The one objection to Obama was his idea
of "spreading the wealth." Everyone found that concept offensive in
that the implication is that half the working population (in large part, the
middle class) would be taking on the burden of those not working and on
government assistance. It's not that we object to those in need. It's that (1)
there are so many scamming the system and getting a handout when they don't
need it (we all know of people who have bilked the system and have gotten away
with it) and (2) the continued increase of those on government assistance is
unsustainable. I'm squarely middle class (below $100K with a combined income)
and my taxes are exorbitant. If my husband and I filed independently or
divorced and filed single, we would both likely qualify for government
assistance of some sort (I know I definitely would). Being married and having
no children or home mortgage deductions (house is paid off) actually hurts me
when it comes to taxes. I would be better off single and with kids as far as
our current government is concerned. It's set up in such a way that it encourages
dependence upon the government as opposed to independence from it. And as long
as that continues, we will have people sitting in line with a hand out desired
rather than trying to better their lots in life. And that appeared to be one of
the biggest bones of contention with those in our grassroots tea party circle.
Kat
Wolfdancer
I really want to explore what the Tea Party -before big money
got involved, and before the media/special interests did their spin of events -
STARTED OUT AS .. Because surely they did NOT start out as this
corporate-driven profiteering vulture capitalistic pseudo religious amoeba that
it is today ...
When you have time, describe one of the first meetings for
me.. Take me there .. Make me a believer of where the Tea party started.. I'm
already halfway there because of the inclusiveness and the fiscal issues.
Kim Miles
Nope. It had libertarian ideals for the most part. Smaller
government. More for the people ideals and less government.
Kat
Wolfdancer
Today's Tea Party isn’t at all like that ... Did you guys
meet in various living rooms? What were some of the topics discussed? How did
you advertise the idea? How did you connect? It sounds like what it started out
as -the idealism - was utterly bastardized for private corporate profit
How did that happen? When did it happen? Were you still
active when it happened? What did you think about that? How can such a GRAND
and inclusive idea get so brutally high jacked?
Kim Miles
We met to watch one of Glenn Becks "we surround
them" episodes. I know liberals have a skewed version of Beck but he hit
on much of what many of us were feeling at the time. He didn't pull punches
between Bush or Obama. He wasn't for one party or another. He spoke to some of
the concerns that people not fixated on parties had--a growing government, a
growing debt, and a growing dependency on government. We met at a hotel lobby
to watch the event. Networked with people of like minds. Put aside party
demographics in our concerns for America and being American. We staged protests
that were peaceful in solidarity of a smaller government and less expenditures.
This was about 2008-9, I think.
As for how things can get hijacked or twisted....anything
can. Look at our two leading parties for a perfect example. Both are so far up
their own party line that they have lost touch with being American first and
foremost.
Kat
Wolfdancer
I've actually watched SOME of Beck's shows.. and a couple of
times I have walked away with a feeling of respect for him, and sometimes not
.. Still, I think when we put party aside is when we -as Americans- wind up
doing great things.
Kim Miles
Yep. I agree.
Kat
Wolfdancer
How did you feel when the Koch Brothers started pumping so
much money into the Party and pushed it into religious moral -ism ? (I don’t
know of a better term for that .. It seems to me that the whole "we must
govern through the Bible" push that prominent Tea Party political members
are advocating ... the push to theocracy What do we call that??)
Kim Miles
I didn't know about it till later. The Tea party itself was a
loose party with no one group leading or outing rules into place that governed
tea party operations, per se. I think the Koch brothers were one tiny faction
that gained so much notoriety because of a liberal media wanting to discredit
the tea party as a whole. They became the tea party. But they were not the tea
party nor were they the grassroots movement. They simply capitalized on it and
on the media attention.
It's like saying that any radical faction of the dems or GOP
are representative of their respective parties. It's not true, but it makes for
a better media spin.
Kat
Wolfdancer
I forgot to ask you what year you STARTED getting involved
with the Tea party? I know you said when you went to the G. Beck gathering that
was in 08-09 ish but was that when you first started getting involved?
Kim Miles
Yes. It was at the beginning, before the tea party actually
had the name "tea party." I'm not sure when the official term
"tea party" was coined but it was after that gathering.
Kat
Wolfdancer
So the Glenn Beck gathering was your introduction to the
movement?
Kim Miles
Yep. I went to the wiki page on the tea party and some of
what it has on it is actually correct. What its agenda is...
The interesting thing is the debate on its origins. Wiki
attributes it to Ron Paul. I guess about the only way you can do that is by
looking at it historically and in hindsight. Ron Paul was one who was
disenchanted with the way things were going. But so were many Americans. Most
of us, in fact. I think he got thrown into the "origins" simply
because he is a figurehead. The movement began later. Glenn Beck appealed to
many with his condemnation of the way things were being run in Washington, with
the divide between the parties, with the party line usurping what was best for
America, with the growing debt, with the growing government, etc.
Kim Miles
Wiki also claims that some referred to it as a grassroots
political movement while others referred to it as astroturf. This is true.
However, it WAS a grassroots movement--an uncoordinated movement of the people
in objection to the government. The astroturfing and "teabagging"
terms were first promoted by media in a disparaging attempt to downplay and
disparage people's angst and were then promoted and repeated by politicians who
desired the same (e.g., Nancy Pelosi). When the movement kept gaining ground
both by Dems and GOP, the teabagging and astroturf comments stopped. It was not
a fake movement created by corporate America as people tried claiming in an
effort to diminish it. It was a sound movement that gained popularity with many
of the masses--one that was slanted and skewed by most media outlets to
diminish its validity.
Kat
Wolfdancer
hmmm according to US History (dot org) It was Rick Santelli's
Chicago Mercantile’s rant which was the "name sake" not Ron Paul.
Ron's libertarian views most certainly helped SHAPE the party, but according to
the research I've been doing, he wasn't the "father of the party"
And I agree, originally it WAS a grassroots movement. I do
not believe it is now, tho. It's been highjacked by Corporate interests ..
which seems SO ironic to me ..
Kim Miles
So this guy Rick S is supposed to have started the tea
party???
Kat
Wolfdancer
No he seems to have coined the current phrase.
The Party itself seems to have been natural grassroots
extension of the Populist Movement.
But I still have a long way to go to
make sense of the "Wikis" vastly dichotomous opinions on just what
where when ...
Kim Miles
Hmmm. I don't know whether he was the first to coin the
phrase. All I can say is that much of the media hopped on the "tea
party" name because of the original one. Kinda like every political
scandal now has "gate" in it. LOL
Kat
Wolfdancer
yeah interesting that. Shaking my head.
This is going to be a difficult
article for me to write QUITE!! a challenge because to do it RIGHT, it is
challenging me to re-examine everything I THOUGHT I knew!! ah the lessons which come to us, eh ??
laughing at myself.
Kim Miles
BTW, Rick S is dead on at what people were so disenchanted
about. You can't spend your way into prosperity. It just sticks in the craw of
any rational person that spending what you don't have will yield more. I
understand the theory behind the economics but do not understand the practical
application of it. LOL
BTW, one of the things that I thought was so great about
Obama at first was that he was hiring professors. But that very thing is also
what had me becoming very concerned.
As one who has been in academia for more than three decades
now, I know what professors are like. Most have theoretical
application/understanding but have little practical application/understanding.
The more PhDs he hired, the more concerned I became. Some theoretical info is
good but it has to be tempered with practical, hands-on application to work.
IMO, he hired too many people, too quickly who had little hands-on, practical
application and had mostly theoretical ideas. That is scary for any business
and government is big, ginormous business.
Kat
Wolfdancer
That's a great point ... Theory is all well and good, but you
DO have to have some time-in-title with .. well, "real life"
practical application.
~Personal
correspondence from Kim Miles Aug 2014
What
the Tea Party has become The Corporate Connection
As you can see, the Tea Party is a convoluted hybrid of strange
bedfellows, dichotomous definitions, idealism, ideologues, and righteous
revolution which seem to be manipulated since its’ inception by special
interests. Let us now explore what the current Party’s political platform is,
the politicians which champion its’ current causes, and the financial backers.
Currently,
in many areas, the Tea Party has more in common with the Patriot movement http://www.splcenter.org/get-informed/intelligence-files/ideology/patriot-movement than
anything vaguely resembling an inclusive, American ideology. It is a long fall
from where it began – if we could actually pinpoint where it began- to where
the Party is now. What the Tea Party has presented itself as publicly, and what
my research has uncovered, are two vastly different realities. Rather than a true
grassroots citizen-led campaign, the Tea Party has been subverted into a
Corporate Astroturfing http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Astroturf scheme. Thanks to
this long-term plan of misinformation, deceit and manipulation, understanding
what the Tea Party is –and subsequently what it no longer is- is a snarled
confusing muddy mess, and the deeper I dig, the more Hydra heads I uncover. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/eric-zuesse/final-proof-the-tea-party_b_4136722.html
Moreover, according
to yet more records recently released by Source Watch, http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Citizens_for_a_Sound_Economy
CSE was the major funding for these efforts, and share dominant figures
from the 1987’s Tobacco industry with the modern day Tea Party. “Nonprofit
organizations associated with the Tea Party have longstanding ties to tobacco
companies, and continue to advocate on behalf of the tobacco industry's
anti-tax, anti-regulation agenda.” From the study by Amanda Fallin, Rachel Grana, Stanton A
Glantz for the Center for Tobacco Control Research and Education
called “To quarterback behind the scenes, third-party efforts’: the tobacco
industry and the Tea Party” http://tobaccocontrol.bmj.com/content/early/2013/02/07/tobaccocontrol-2012-050815.full which also states; "If you look at CSE, AFP and Freedom Works, you will see a number
of the same key players, strategies and messages going back to the 1980s. The
records indicate that the Tea Party has been shaped by the tobacco industry,
and is not a spontaneous grassroots movement at all.” http://www.ucsf.edu/news/2013/02/13507/study-tea-party-organizations-have-ties-tobacco-industry-dating-back-1980s
“The
anti-government fervor infusing the 2010 elections represents a political
triumph for the Kochs. By giving money to “educate,” fund, and organize Tea
Party protesters, they have helped turn their private agenda into a mass
movement. Bruce Bartlett, a conservative economist and a historian, who once
worked at the National Center for Policy Analysis, a Dallas-based think tank
that the Kochs fund, said, “The problem with the whole libertarian movement is
that it’s been all chiefs and no Indians. There haven’t been any actual people,
like voters, who give a crap about it. So the problem for the Kochs has been
trying to create a movement.” With the emergence of the Tea Party, he said,
“everyone suddenly sees that for the first time there are Indians out
there—people who can provide real ideological power.” The Kochs, he said, are
“trying to shape and control and channel the populist uprising into their own
policies.”
Mayer also interviewed David
Axelrod, President Obama’s senior adviser, who said, “What they don’t say is
that, in part, this is a grassroots citizens’ movement brought to you by a
bunch of oil billionaires.”
Also telling is the depth of the Koch Brothers’ donations. Again from this
article:
“Only the
Kochs know precisely how much they have spent on politics. Public tax records
show that between 1998 and 2008 the Charles G. Koch Charitable Foundation spent
more than forty-eight million dollars. The Claude R. Lambe Charitable
Foundation, which is controlled by Charles Koch and his wife, along with two
company employees and an accountant, spent more than twenty-eight million. The
David H. Koch Charitable Foundation spent more than a hundred and twenty
million. Meanwhile, since 1998 Koch Industries has spent more than fifty
million dollars on lobbying. Separately, the company’s political-action
committee, KochPAC, has donated some eight million dollars to political
campaigns, more than eighty per cent of it to Republicans. So far in 2010, Koch
Industries leads all other energy companies in political contributions, as it
has since 2006. In addition, during the past dozen years the Kochs and other
family members have personally spent more than two million dollars on political
contributions. In the second quarter of 2010, David Koch was the biggest
individual contributor to the Republican Governors Association, with a
million-dollar donation. Other gifts by the Kochs may be untraceable; federal
tax law permits anonymous personal donations to politically active nonprofit
groups.”
Who knows how much of that
private lobbyist money has been funneled into shaping American Politics and
politicians? Only the Koch Brothers themselves. Who knows exactly how much went
into funding, training and supporting the campaigns of Tea Party members?
Again, only the Koch Brothers and their tax lawyers know for sure. But what is
clear is that the Tea Party has been funded and continues to be supported by
severely deep pockets with personal financial interests in the outcome of our
America political system. And the American people continue to be kept in the
dark about the depth and breadth of that influence.
“And while more than half of registered voters (54%) said that corporations make too much money, Tea Party supporters were inclined to see corporations as making a fair and reasonable amount of profit. Indeed, Tea Party supporters took this position by a 2-1 margin (62% fair profit vs. 30% too much profit).”
The Tea Party Nation enthusiastically supported the Citizens United decision, allowing unlimited campaign financing from Corporations.
“The Citizens United decision? It saved the First Amendment. It saved freedom of speech and freedom of the press in the United States.”
Frankly, I believe the Citizens United issue has been abused, and I would
rather that more focus would be placed on citizen input and less on corporate
influence; especially if those corporate interests and influence affect their
own personal and economic investments. (Can you say “Conflict of Interest”?)
However, having briefly studied this issue, I can’t –quite- agree with any
restrictions on 1st Amendment rights. My biggest issue is that I am not quite sure how Corporations have Constitutional Rights. Nevertheless, it is a bit of a
sticky wicket. There is no doubt that the backlash from the McCain-Feingold
Bill –or Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 as it is formally named -http://www.fec.gov/press/bkgnd/bcra_overview.shtml has affected
unreported and less accountable outside group money which has made the voices
of the Tea Party supporters much stronger, less transparent and more strident.
So it begs
the question; how can information such as this be weighed against an originally
stated purpose of Anti-Big Business, and an anti-Elitist platform?
The
Tea Party defines itself and its’ platforms
Even its’ own definitions seem to be antithetical. All claim to be “The
Tea Party”, but, for example, the Tea Party.org has considerable and open foci
on social issues, such as open involvement with the Oathkeepers, http://teapartyorg.ning.com/group/oathkeepers , America as a
Christian Nation, Citizens United, Anti-Gay Rights, Women’s Health issues and
Voter’s Rights; while the Tea Party Patriots http://www.teapartypatriots.org/category/actions/calls-to-action/claim
they do not address social issues. “As Tea Party Patriots focuses on the three
core values of Fiscal Responsibility, Constitutionally Limited Government, and
Free Markets, we do not take a position on social issues. As an
organization, we are neither opposed to, or in favor of, issues surrounding
these questions, and will not expend our resources on them.“ Yet, upon examination of their Calls to
Action section, there is quite a bit of social elements being addressed, such
as immigration, the Hobby Lobby ruling, Citizens United, and Constitutional
Amendment repeals.
“What unites the tea party movement is the same set of core principles that brought America together at its founding, that kindled the American Dream in the hearts of those who struggled to build our nation, and made the United States of America the greatest, most successful country in world history. [sic] Very simply, three guiding principles give rise to the freedom necessary to pursue and live the American Dream: 1) Constitutionally limited Government or your personal freedom and your Rights2) Free Market Economics or Economic Freedom to Grow Jobs and Your Opportunities3) Fiscal Responsibility or very simply, a Debt Free Future For You and Generations To Come.”
“any issue which challenges the
security, sovereignty, or domestic tranquility of our beloved nation, the
United States of America.” By those who [sic] “possess a strong belief in the
foundational Judeo-Christian values embedded in our great founding documents.” According to
THIS sect of the Tea Party, “You will be upholding
the grand principles set forth in the U.S. Constitution and Bill of Rights.”
[sic] by supporting these: 15 Non-negotiable Core Beliefs 1. Illegal aliens are
here illegally.
2. Pro-domestic employment is indispensable.
3. A strong military is essential.
4. Special interests must be eliminated.
5. Gun ownership is sacred.
6. Government must be downsized.
7. The national budget must be balanced.
8. Deficit spending must end.
9. Bailout and stimulus plans are illegal.
10. Reducing personal income taxes is a must.
11. Reducing business income taxes is mandatory.
12. Political offices must be available to average citizens.
13. Intrusive government must be stopped.
14. English as our core language is required.
15. Traditional family values are encouraged.
From the site:
“Stripping your freedom is not a pipe dream but a reality! Fema Camps are
already built and waiting for you!
They’ve been practicing for Martial Law and the great round-up of
citizens in the 300-acre fake city Obama had built in Virginia. Do NOT dismiss
this under any circumstance. It is serious.Here’s what they are going to do:Grab our guns and leave us defenseless! Grant amnesty to tens of millions more illegal aliens to kill
your vote! Extinguish free-speech, crush it anywhere it exists! Intern
unlimited numbers of US citizens without cause! Brand conservatives and the Tea Party as terrorists! Teach our children that sexual perversion is normal! Strip your wealth by taxing you to death and give it to the
world to consume! Make all private homes government housing! Outlaw certain foods and gasoline-powered vehicles! Bypass then reduce and eliminate Congress! Make states accountable to the UN! Reduce our military by 90%! Remove our borders! –
And then there is the Tea Party Nation, a Conservative Social Networking Group, http://www.teapartynation.com/ who states:
“Tea Party Nation is a user-driven group of like-minded people who desire our God-given individual freedoms written out by the Founding Fathers. We believe in Limited Government, Free Speech, the 2nd Amendment, our Military, Secure Borders and our Country.”
“The Founding
Fathers originally said, they put certain restrictions on who gets the right to
vote. It wasn't you were just a citizen and you got to vote. Some of the
restrictions, you know, you obviously would not think about today. But one of
those was you had to be a property owner. And that makes a lot of sense,
because if you're a property owner you actually have a vested stake in the
community. If you're not a property owner, you know, I'm sorry but property
owners have a little bit more of a vested interest in the community than
non-property owners.”
And yet another head, The Tea
Party.net http://www.theteaparty.net/ a division of Stop This Insanity,
Inc., an interesting PAC which has been raising money voraciously but spending
only a portion of what it raises. http://www.opensecrets.org/pacs/lookup2.php?strID=C00478024&cycle=2010 Stop This Insanity Inc was founded
in early 2010 as a political action committee in Arizona by Todd Cefaratti and
Ron Dove, who then became the Treasurer and Human Resources manager,
respectively. The PAC was terminated in November of that same year in the midst
of losing a lawsuit with the Federal Election Commission http://www.fec.gov/law/litigation/StopthisInsanity.shtmlThey claim that the Tea
Party.net was created in 2009, however, the “Stop” PAC , of which the Tea Party.net is a project, was not registered until 2010, and its’ DBA "The Tea
Party," was not registered until December 20, 2012, according to the
Arizona Secretary of State Charitable Organizations System. They are still
actively soliciting donations.
The Tea Party.net also developed
quite a bad reputation with other Tea Party groups after raising money
($469,000 between January and October 2010), and then not helping to fund
either rallies nor candidates. Instead, a significant portion of the funds
collected in that 2010 year, $189,759, went to online marketing.
These folks claim their aim is to
raise funds to support:
“The Tea
Party Movement is a grassroots movement of millions of like-minded Americans
from all backgrounds and political parties. Tea Party members share similar
core principles supporting the United States Constitution as the Founders
intended, such as:
Limited federal government
Individual freedoms
Personal responsibility
Free markets
Returning political power to the
states and the people
As a movement, the Tea Party is not a
political party nor is it looking to form a third political party any time
soon. The Tea Party Movement is, instead, about reforming all political parties
and government so that the core principles of our Founding Fathers become, once
again, the foundation upon which America stands.” http://www.theteaparty.net/about-the-tea-party/
At the Tea
Party Caucus for the 113th Congress Chief strategist and Executive
Director of The Tea Party.net Niger Innis told Breitbart News in April 2013
that the Tea Party was evolving the movement to the next level, where it can
infiltrate the halls of Congress and change Washington from the inside.
“We realize it is not enough to just critique Washington,”
Innis said. “We need to be in Washington to impact Washington. It’s not enough
to throw stones at the beltway from the outside. We have to [have] players
inside the beltway and that’s what we’re doing.” Also from that interview; One
person inside the room said the members determined that “they can’t abandon the
Republican Party because it would mean total political irrelevance for the
foreseeable future. So they stamped out the idea of a third party, going
rogue.”
Therefore, that
person said, the plan is that the Tea Party members will fight internally to
make the GOP more conservative, forcing it to the right to make it better and
stronger.
Now, all
taken in all, it seems mendacious to state on one hand that the Tea Party
stands for small government in matters capitalistic, yet supports government
interference in matters of social behavior. The role of Conservative Christians
should not be overlooked in the makings of this social and political
phenomenon. Mark Rozell, a public policy professor at George Mason University
who has written extensively about the religious right, commented there have
been repeated battles between social and fiscal conservatives in the 1990s and
beyond.
"Now the word 'conservative'
is accepted to mean generally small government in the economic sphere but an
activist government on social issues," he said.
“The analysis shows that most people who agree with the
religious right also support the Tea Party. But support for the Tea Party is
not synonymous with support for the religious right.”
Another Poll by the Public
Religion Research Institute claims:
“There is a large constituency overlap
between the Tea Party and white evangelical Protestants. Nearly half (47
percent) of Americans who identify with the Tea Party movement also identify as
a part of the religious right or Christian conservative movement. [PRRI,
November 2010]. Fully three-quarters (75 percent) of those who identify
with the Tea Party movement describe themselves as “a Christian conservative.”
[PRRI, August 2011]”
So while Tea Party members are
overwhelmingly self-identified as Conservative Christians, only about half of
Conservative Christians are inclined to identify as Tea Party members. Again,
this wide variance makes it difficult to get a clear understanding of just what
the Tea Party aims to achieve.
What platforms does the Tea Party espouse? What do they stand for? Which one
speaks for the Politicians who self-identify as Tea party members? Who speaks
for the People? And finally, what about everybody else?
The
Tea Party Politicians and Platforms
Now let us explore the Politicians who
either self-identify as Tea party members, or who are supported by, or who
support the Tea Party. A
few of the more prominent politicians who identify as Tea Party members include
Sen. Ted Cruz of TX, Gov. Scott Walker of WIS, Rep. Michele Bachmann of MINN,
Rep. Louie Gohmert of TX, and Sen. Rand Paul of KY.
In the House:
The Tea Party Caucus in the US House of Representatives
What all of these politicians share in common
are:
All are in support of a
Federal ban on abortions.
Support of significant
tax breaks for Corporations ala Reaganomics’ “Trickle Down” economic plan.
Opposition of Civil
Rights for Gay Americans
Voted against the
Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) –that is, those who COULD Vote on this issue,
Gov. Scott Walker is not included in this.
Supports the
privatization of our Public School system ie: Charter Schools
Disagrees with the
science of Climate change and opposes all efforts at curtailing environmental
degradation and regulation of corporate polluters.
Supports drilling on
public lands and leasing those lands to corporations for private gain.
Supports unregulated Free
Trade. Believes that the market must be allowed to self-regulate.
Opposes any regulations
on gun ownership, including a Federal Background Check. Believes the 2nd
Amendment “protects” and trumps all others.
Supports significant MediCare cuts
Opposes the ACA and have voted to repeal, modify, or defund it in all 54
congressional votes. (This does not include Gov. Scott Walker who was not able
to Vote in these congressional Votes, but did refuse to accept any of the
MediCaid monies from the ACA)
Opposes contraceptives on the basis of them being “abortifacients”; a notable
and confusing exception being Sen Rand Paul’s publicly stated support of birth
control and the Plan B contraception, and his introduction of the Sanctity of
Life Bill – or “Personhood Bill” S. 583. (more here: http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/03/rand-paul-aborts-his-own-pro-life-views-live-on-cnn/
In researching this article, I have learned a great deal
about my fellow citizens. Some of this is hard to swallow: I find it difficult
to believe there are so many uneducated people who have no desire to do their
own research and make up their own minds, but more than willing to have some
talking head fill up their hearts with hate and discontent and divisiveness and
conspiracy theories. Not ALL supporters –especially the ones at the “2009 beginning”
of this movement- are uneducated. In fact, that beginning of this movement has
a common thread: distaste for the non-transparency and rampant abuse of our
Governmental system of checks and balances. And can we blame them? Some of the
actions of our Government have not been transparent, rather, they have been covert
behind closed doors and backroom deals. And some of the technology which we now
find invaluable has made this even more apparent and difficult. We now can get
our news unfiltered –and consequently un-edited and un-Vetted- within minutes
of its occurrence. The Media at large seems more prone towards sensationalism,
subjective spin and the “Making of the Next Big Scandal” than it is researching
and reporting in as objective a manner as possible. (But that is another article) Our Government suffers from
the biggest lack of approval and trust ever in the History of the US. (13% at
the start of 2014) http://www.gallup.com/poll/166838/congress-job-approval-starts-2014.aspx after the shellacking Ted Cruz & the Tea
Party suffered from the enforced Government Shut-Down of Oct 2013 ) http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/government-shutdown-a-consumer-guide/acf1e006-2a25-11e3-b139-029811dbb57f_topic.html
However, historically, Americans do not like being manipulated. And is
certainly not my place to make up your mind for you, or attempt to sway your
decision making. I just wanted to try to discover what this beast is,
challenging my own concepts, and perhaps clarifying some of the finer points of
the history of the Tea Party. Although I obviously have my own opinions, and I
am sure they are fairly clear within this article, nevertheless, I truly have
Faith in the integrity of the American people. Now it is up to us, your Basic
Generic American, to decide where our Country goes from here. Will we decide to
embrace our Founding Fathers’ inclusionary and visionary ideals? Will we decide
to burst out of the bonds of polarization and choose to encourage new ideals,
new visions, new innovations, even if it cramps our comfort zone? Or will we
isolate ourselves from our fellow Americans and support divisiveness, unchecked
greed, partisan Politics, the status quo, and control via fear? Will we learn
to think for ourselves and examine for comprehension what the media gives us?
Will we decide to demand accountability and transparency in our Government, in
our Corporations, and in our Media at all levels? Only our Votes hold the key.
Have you registered to Vote yet? http://registertovote.org/index.html See you
at the Polls !
