Saturday, April 17, 2010

First hand look at the Tea Party supporters

Classically Liberal has a most interesting post about attending a Tea Party rally and what he found there. For one thing, a great deal of anti-immigrant sentiment;

One woman was lecturing a camera about "my country is like my house." She thought that silly analogy valid."And I have the right to say who comes into my house." I couldn't stand it any more and from where I was seat yelled to her: "It's my house too." Not being too bright she smiled, pointed at me and yelled, "EXACTLY!" To that I replied: "And I don't care who comes in." She was not thrilled with that reply.

7 comments:

Berry said...

That commenter sounds just like the pontificating libertarians that are damaging the brand here as well.
Apparently the subtle distinction between legal and illegal immigrants is too subtle to draw for this fellow, albeit that this may be a case of ideologically induced blindness.

James said...

Bez....that comme4ntator knows more about real Libertarianism than anyone in this country....I know from personal experiance.

He is well aware of the issues around immagration.Go and actually read what he wrote...if you are able to grasp the points he makes...

He has the bulk of the tea partiers down to a tee.....bigoted God bothering small minded lovers of big government...which is a shame as the potential for spreading Libertarian ideas is graet.

Blair said...

It's a shame to see that otherwise intelligent people are buying the bullshit left wing talking points that the Tea Partiers are "racist".

I don't think wanting to stop illegal immigration is racist, or wrong, or a bad thing to protest about. The right to live and work in America is valuable. You can debate what the rules should be, but I don't think you can debate that people should not break them. Many of the illegals are involved in other criminal activity - that's why they are illegals. They have to be stopped. Nothing wrong with wanting to do that.

I suspect this guy saw what he wanted to see, and is another small tent libertarian for whom nobody is quite good enough. My impression of the Tea Partiers is that they are just ordinary people, many of whom have never gotten politically involved before, and they are sick of the big government spending of both Obama, AND Bush before him. Most of them, contrary to the post, are not Bush lovers.

Note also that there has been widespread leftist infiltration of tea party gatherings and people with racist, misspelt signs showing up. The "racist" taunt is a beatup and a smear.

The Tea Party is the best thing to happen to American politics for a long time. They are directly affecting Republican primary races for congress. "Moderates" who would win in any other year are losing to smaller government candidates. At the very worst they are useful idiots who are making a real difference and will ensure the congress elected this coming November will be vastly superior to previous years.

Lindsay Mitchell said...

On the same day as I put up this post the LA Times ran an opinion piece based on polling analysis which wasn't dissimilar in its findings;

"They aren't, however, implacable foes of "big government" or even of taxes. More than half (52%) told the pollsters they think their own "income taxes this year are fair," just 10% less than all American adults. Moreover, a majority told follow-up interviewers that, though they wanted "smaller government," they didn't want cuts in our largest social programs, Social Security and Medicare."

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commentary/la-oe-rutten17-2010apr17,0,7797810.column

Anonymous said...

Blair asserts the writer saw what he wanted to see. In reality the same writer previously defended the Tea Party from such accusations and had a change of heart when he saw it up front and personal.

Nor did the writer say it was the entire Tea Party movement, he said his observations were based to one, large tea party event. Others have confirmed similar things at other such rallies. But the writer could not make statements for the whole, just for the one part.

So a previous supporter of the tea party movement had second thoughts based on actual observations. That doesn't sound like someone finding what they wanted to find.

Anonymous said...

Most of Classically Liberals blog posts are hackneyed anti-Christian bigotry.

This incessant preoccupation with Christians above all else is why libertarianism in general has been such an abject failure . . meanwhile the juggernaut of global socialism continues its insidious, pernicious onward march.

James said...

Most of Classically Liberals blog posts are hackneyed anti-Christian bigotry."

Actually they are mainly against forcemongering,big government busybodyness....that this often appears in the US inits Christian form isn't CL's fault.Some Christians need to have a good hard look at themselves and their attitudes to the use of force and State power against others before they try and play the "boo hoo poor vilified us" card.