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Title: Studies Shed Light On The People Behind The Tea Party
Source:
The Star-Ledger
URL Source: http://blog.nj.com/njv_john_farmer/ ... es_shed_light_on_the_peop.html
Published: Aug 28, 2011
Author: John Farmer
Post Date: 2011-08-28 13:07:55 by Brian S
Keywords: None
Views: 30578
Comments: 59
Just who are the people of the tea party, the big “new thing” in American politics — or at least in the Republican Party? Lots of claims are made for them. They’re newcomers to electoral politics, some say. Conservatives to be sure, but independents, too, spread pretty evenly throughout the country, largely devoid of racial animus, and broadly representative of a large portion of the whole population. That’s the stereotype. But a vastly different description emerges in a pair of studies, one by two academic political scientists and a second by a CBS/New York Times poll, both based on extensive interviews with tea partiers. “Early on, tea partiers were often described as nonpartisan political neophytes,” write political scientists David E. Campbell and Robert D. Putnam. “Actually, tea party supporters today were highly partisan Republicans long before the tea party was born. In fact, past Republican affiliation is the single strongest predictor of tea party support today.” The tea party cohort is overwhelmingly white, male and older — on that, the stereotype is on the mark — but it “had a low regard for immigrants and blacks long before Barack Obama was president,” Campbell and Putnam report. Or, as the CBS/Times poll found when tea partiers were asked what specifically they didn’t like about Obama, “the top answer was that they just don’t like him.” From the standpoint of future politics and the 2012 presidential race, the most significant finding from the studies may involve the geographical distribution of the tea party loyalists. If the CBS/Times study has it right, the tea party participation is principally a Southern phenomenon. More than a third “hail from the South, far more than any other region,” it found, and that has important implications for the GOP next year and perhaps beyond. It’s no secret the modern Republican Party has moved dramatically to the right. Less clear, however, is how much the GOP already is a Dixie-dominated party. A Kentuckian, Mitch McConnell, is the party’s Senate leader, but must occasionally defer to the ultra-conservative Sen. Jim DeMint of South Carolina, who commands its Senate tea party contingent. In the House, Ohioan John Boehner may be the Speaker, but the power behind his shaky throne is Rep. Eric Cantor of Virginia, a tea party favorite who regularly overruled Boehner during deficit negotiations with President Obama. It may be a sign of what’s ahead for the GOP that the ultra-right Texas Gov. Rick Perry, another Southerner preferred by tea partiers, has just displaced Mitt Romney as the favored candidate of Republicans. Perry went overnight from virtually unknown to a double-digit poll lead over the mostly moderate Romney. The Texas governor benefits from another preoccupation of the tea party crowd — its preference, like his, for a politics rooted in religion. Tea party leaders may parade under the banner of smaller government, but the rank and file, Campbell and Putnam stress, “are more concerned about putting God in government,” something most Americans say they oppose. While it’s clear the tea party has a chokehold on the GOP at the moment, that’s no guarantee it will hold true through the 2012 election. There is, for example, a stark contradiction in the whole tea party experience. Even as the country increasingly seems to favor smaller government — a tea party priority — it also has soured on the movement itself. Over the past year, opposition to the tea party and its no-compromise contribution to the political paralysis in Washington has more than doubled, according to the Campbell-Putnam study, exceeding even the disapproval level of those other bottom-feeders, the Democratic and Republican parties. Whatever its long-term liabilities, the tea party has been an electoral God-send for the GOP, the muscle behind its 2010 victories. But Campbell and Putnam see an ominous similarity to the 1960s anti-Vietnam War movement and the damage it did to Democratic election fortunes. Like the anti-war movement, the tea party has brought energy and passion to politics — but also a stridency and tendency to extremism that’s eventually a turn-off for voters, especially the independents and moderates vital to victory. “By embracing the tea party,” Campbell and Putnam warn, “Republicans risk repeating history.” We’ll see.
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Begin Trace Mode for Comment # 37.
#1. To: Brian S (#0)
What is it about the South anyway?
What is it about the South? The cultural richness of the South along with the South's pride are what really angers the North. The North no longer has an identity. What in this day and age can anyone say is great about the North? There is no real legacy that the North brings to the table. The only thing the North can do today is continue to talk down on the South. As if we, the people from the South even cared. What is it about the South? The South is the thorn in this governments side. The South continues to face, head on, issues that are important to our families and their future. God, family, home, property, States Rights, small government. It's about having the courage to stand by your convictions, even when the odds seem against you, and ignorance abounds. You, and other trash like you, talk down about the Tea Parties, but who are they, do you even know who the hell these people are you trash, do you know where they come from? They are Southerners, yes, but they are also Northerners, Westerners, and Easteners who have put their past hates aside and joined with one another against an overpoweing, greedy, corrupt and evil government. Southerners have always known what it is the feds were truley after and considering they never had the oportunities of a good education back then, like most have today, just how STUPID does that make you look? As long as you have nothing precious left to hold on to, nothing left to be proud of, nothing left to fight for, to die for, you will never understand the heart and courage of a real Southerner! JMHO!
You make a passionate defense of your beloved South, but let us not forget it is that same passionate Southern heart that accepted and defended slavery, Jim Crow, and segregation. It is a peculiar mindset that claims to love freedom unto death while so cruelly robbing others of that same freedom. IMHO, the same mentality that fostered historical slavery in the South is at the core of the South's persistent problems - a sort of communal cognitive dissonance.
Sez the idiot that loves to lick the boots of her federal masters who insist on telling us how to live ever single moment of our lives,or face federal prison. IMHO, the same mentality that fostered historical slavery in the South is at the core of the South's persistent problems - a sort of communal cognitive dissonance. You may have opinions,but it would also be helpful to have a mind to form an opinion.
Yet youse cheer the defense of a people so spiritually and intelectually corrupt as to rob others, literally, of life and freedom while claiming they have a God given right to do so.
Before you start suffering from nosebleed from being up on your high horse, you might want to consider this world famous picture taken in the 70s in that bastion of Kennedy Statism - Boston, MA. And no, I'm not from the South. I just hate stereotypes.
The working class Irish are, and always have been, the main enemy of the black man...
That may be true - it just underscored that racial prejudice isn't just limited to the South. Who knows - it may even exist in the land of Lucysmom - aka California.
Who knows - it may even exist in the land of Lucysmom - aka California. It does. They hate white people who don't feel guilty for being white.
There are no replies to Comment # 37. End Trace Mode for Comment # 37.
Top • Page Up • Full Thread • Page Down • Bottom/LatestFrom the standpoint of future politics and the 2012 presidential race, the most significant finding from the studies may involve the geographical distribution of the tea party loyalists. If the CBS/Times study has it right, the tea party participation is principally a Southern phenomenon. More than a third “hail from the South, far more than any other region,” it found, and that has important implications for the GOP next year and perhaps beyond.
#11. To: lucysmom (#1)
"What is it about the South anyway?"
#12. To: Murron (#11)
As long as you have nothing precious left to hold on to, nothing left to be proud of, nothing left to fight for, to die for, you will never understand the heart and courage of a real Southerner! JMHO!
#15. To: lucysmom (#12)
It is a peculiar mindset that claims to love freedom unto death while so cruelly robbing others of that same freedom.
#16. To: sneakypete (#15)
Sez the idiot that loves to lick the boots of her federal masters who insist on telling us how to live ever single moment of our lives,or face federal prison.
#22. To: lucysmom, sneakypete (#16)
Yet youse cheer the defense of a people so spiritually and intelectually corrupt as to rob others, literally, of life and freedom while claiming they have a God given right to do so.
#23. To: Get Outta Dodge! (#22)
#24. To: war, Luscysmom (#23)
#37. To: Get Outta Dodge! (#24)
That may be true - it just underscored that racial prejudice isn't just limited to the South.
Replies to Comment # 37.
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