Opinions/Editorials
See other Opinions/Editorials Articles
Title: The "Tea Party" Is Not Revolting
Source:
[None]
URL Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/rober ... arty-is-not-revo_b_817995.html
Published: Feb 3, 2011
Author: Robert J. Elisberg
Post Date: 2011-02-03 15:11:23 by Skip Intro
Keywords: None
Views: 3896
Comments: 5
Just in case anyone from the "Tea Party" is watching the news from Egypt, this is what an actual revolution looks like. A quarter-million people randomly taking to the streets. No one dressed up in funny costumes and hats. No tea bags worn. Visceral, guttural, raw human outrage against one man's 29-year dictatorship while living under "emergency law" for 43 years. No voters upset that they lost an election two years earlier. Nobody angry that the government is trying to force national health care on them. Not one poster of Adolf Hitler. No professional lobbying organization putting together Official Protest Parties. BYOB. No national TV network rallying its viewers with directions on where to meet and directions on how to get there. Students and young people converging totally of their own accord, even as Internet accounts are turned off, even as phone service is turned off. Middle-class, middle-aged people eventually joining in. Ultimately making it a national cause. That's a revolution. And watching it unfold lays bare the "Tea Party" for what it is and always has been. Frightened, middle-class, middle-aged people upset that they have to pay taxes, angry that they can't have life the way they alone want it, and disturbed that a Black man was elected president. The spectacle of some reasonably-comfortable woman with tears filling her eyes, weeping mournfully that "I want my country back" looks even more utterly ludicrous while watching the nation of Egypt actually fighting to literally get their country back. The display of some grown-up man in cruise wear sashaying about being a proud terrorist because he's willing to yell at his congressman over taxes looks buffoonish when seeing a mass of humanity in Cairo scrabbling in wrenching desperation to be given dignity, democracy, freedom. Seeing torn people agonizingly putting their very lives on the line, getting beaten, crawling over one another to overthrow their nation after 43 years of "emergency law" and after 29 years of a one-man dictatorship makes it belly-achingly laughable to watch a coffee klatch in lawn chairs waving misspelled signs, screaming at their government for trying to give them all health care, and declaring themselves part of an actual "revolution" -- a "Tea Party Revolution!" As global television is today demonstrating to the world in stark reality, the "Tea Party" is to revolution what a debutante cotillion is to the Vietnam War. What Bozo is to Shakespearean drama. What we see daily in Egypt, that's a revolution. What we saw in America last November, that's democracy. Democracy in all its glory. "Throwing the bums" out isn't a revolution. It's what voters do. It happens. In fact, it happens a whole lot in elections whenever unemployment is high. Billion dollar corporations paying to organize people so they'll complain about taxes also isn't a revolution. It's what billion dollar corporations do. They only pray they'll find customers gullible enough to not realize they're being used as pawns. But then, that's why God created marketing departments, to come up with a cute, endearing "Tea Party" brand name ("New! Improved! From the Makers of the John Birch Society!") and bamboozle otherwise mature people into dressing up. And flim-flam them into seriously believing that they're not only part of something, they're part of a "Revolution!" All that's missing is the requirement to send in 10 box tops and getting a free decoder ring. "The Tea Party Revolution." Taking back our country. Turn on your TV. That's a revolution. That's taking back your country. After seeing a real revolution in their living rooms, no doubt there will be some who'll start to back off a bit from looking too clownish, and now claim that, no, of course, it's not a "real" revolution, that it's just a metaphor. Sort of like football players claiming that they're "warriors." Or Sarah Palin claiming that "Lock and Reload" is just about a surveyor's mark. Just a metaphor. I look forward to the "Tea Party" corporations trying to convince their pawns that what they're part of is a metaphor. If supporters of the "Tea Party" corporations want to voice their displeasure at high taxes; want try to get rid of the Department of Education, National Public Radio, environmental protection, Social Security, Medicare, and national health care; and rail against every single word from the President of the United States solely because he's simply too different from them -- Godspeed. That's their right in America. It's the very soul of the nation. Indeed, while the creepiest among us call for Second Amendment Solutions, that's the noble First Amendment Solution. But at least now, today, we and everyone all over the world can see on our TVs what a real revolution is. And it isn't the "Tea Party." Pinkies up.
Post Comment Private Reply Ignore Thread
Top • Page Up • Full Thread • Page Down • Bottom/Latest
#1. To: Skip Intro (#0)
It is most ironic that the liberals/socialists are the ones who always bring up race... But then again, liberals and socialists ARE racists, so I'm not surprised. Anyway, the quality of this article amply demonstrates why HuffPo is a wannabe news site... and why they continue to fail.
"There will be no more money when the U.S. dollar has no value, until that time we can keep printing more." -- go65, LF's answer to Ben Bernanke -- We always like cool X-rays, right? My response to this a-hole: Thanks for posting this. It's very instructive. Tea Partiers generally have productive jobs. Most also have families. They are not going throw Molotov Cocktails at their opponents. Tea Partiers don't seek to overturn history. They seek to restore it. Insofar as your comment about "posters of Adolph Hitler" is concerned, it demonstrates what a vile little cretin you really are. The Tea Party has no relationship to that nonsense. Unfortunately, the only thing you have is your desire to smear your opponents with lies. I feel sorry for you. Tea Partiers don't seek to overturn history. They seek to restore it. In light of what real revolution looks like, the Tea partiers look like the dupes everyone else knew they were. In fact on Freerepublic I laughed at the confused comments by posters about this very subject - they are pro Mubarak and they can't understand why Obama did not fold over the Tea Party protests.
"Keep Your Goddamn Government Hands Off My Medicare!" - Various Tea Party signs.
Another Know-nothing comment from you. What a surprise. Freerepublic is neo-con central. No Tea Partiers are allowed. Tea Partiers get booted quickly. I lasted one day before they kicked me out. That was 10 years ago, long before there was any such thing as a Tea Party.
I lasted one day before they kicked me out. That was 10 years ago, long before there was any such thing as a Tea Party. tea party = dupes & wussies.
"Keep Your Goddamn Government Hands Off My Medicare!" - Various Tea Party signs.
Frightened, middle-class, middle-aged people upset that they have to pay taxes, angry that they can't have life the way they alone want it, and disturbed that a Black man was elected president.
Here's one of our own American Socialist,
"godwinson," resident socialist goober.
#2. To: Skip Intro (#0)
(Edited)
It's been 45 minutes that Huffington Post has yet to "approve" the post. What a surprise.
Socialism is a philosophy of failure, the creed of ignorance, and the gospel of envy, its inherent virtue is the equal sharing of misery. -- Winston Churchill
#3. To: jwpegler, Skip Intro (#2)
Tea Partiers generally have productive jobs. Most also have families. They are not going throw Molotov Cocktails at their opponents.
#4. To: Godwinson (#3)
(Edited)
Freerepublic
"Everything that can be invented has been invented."-- Charles Duell, Commissioner of US Patent Office, 1899
#5. To: jwpegler (#4)
(Edited)
Freerepublic is neo-con central. No Tea Partiers are allowed. Tea Partiers get booted quickly.
Top • Page Up • Full Thread • Page Down • Bottom/Latest
[Home] [Headlines] [Latest Articles] [Latest Comments] [Post] [Mail] [Sign-in] [Setup] [Help] [Register]