Day: 4/15/2009

Some Tea Party Tidbits You May Have Missed

Posted by on April 15, 2009 at 4:43 pm. 8 Comments :

The Tea Baggers must be proud of their little parties. Even though attendance has fallen far short of their expectations, they were able to get their message out thanks to their media sponsor, Fox News. Media Matters has compiled a nice little montage of videos from various Tea Vee sources:

But there was so much more. For instance, Joe the (fake) Plumber had this to say at a Michigan TP:

“Let me give you another extremist view, ‘In God We Trust.’ Say that too loud in some parts of America and you will be shot. It’s terrible.”

Joey the P didn’t bother to specify what part of the country that would be. I can’t think of any place where militant atheists are knocking off folks who quote from currency. However, I can think of whole regions (I’m looking at you southerners) where fanatical gun enthusiasts revel in making violent threats directed at liberals, minorities, or anyone they view as different. Amongst those southerners is Texas governor Rick Perry, whose tea party address sounded more like a call for a new Confederacy:

“We’ve got a great union. There’s absolutely no reason to dissolve it. But if Washington continues to thumb their nose at the American people, you know, who knows what might come out of that.”

If Texas wants out of America, I say let them go – and take the rest of the south with them. I’m sure they’ll be very happy in their theocratic utopia, railing against imagined threats of Socialism – or worse, as Cody Willard from Fox Business News demonstrates by urging us to fight the Fascism that’s permeating the country:

Glenn Beck’s Acute Paranoia Revue took to the road to host the Alamo’s tea fest. The entire hour featured musical accompaniment from the Motor City Jackass, Ted Nugent, who famously taunted Hillary Clinton, Diane Feinstein, Barbara Boxer, and Barack Obama to “suck on” the end of his assault rifle.

Neil Cavuto attended a lame rally in Sacramento, CA, where he interviewed a girl who appeared to be about nine years old. He tried valiantly to put words in her mouth to the effect that she was there as a committed protester, not because her parents made her be there. But she defiantly refused and, at the end of the segment, she shouted at him that she was really there because she got to cut school. Nice try, Neil.

Cavuto and Beck devoted two full hours of live programming to the Tea Bagging. That’s a huge chunk of broadcast real estate. And it isn’t over. Bill O’Reilly, Sean Hannity, and Greta Van Susteren have yet to air. Hannity and Van Susteren previously announced that their programs would be live with the TPers.

I’m sure there are going to be an untold bounty of both comical and disturbing episodes erupting in the hours and days to come. But these were a few that I didn’t want to let get away. Fox News will begin spinning the days events into a fantastical misrepresentation of reality this evening. At least the truth about Fox’s role as the PR agency for the Republican Party (and the Tea Party) is becoming better understood by more people. Even House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has summoned the courage to honestly portray today’s events:

“[W]e call call it astroturf, it’s not really a grassroots movement. It’s astroturf by some of the wealthiest people in America to keep the focus on tax cuts for the rich instead of for the great middle class.”

That’s it in a wingnut shell.

Fox News: Get Ready To Tea Party

Posted by on April 15, 2009 at 1:24 am. 4 Comments :

The astroturf-roots charades that Fox News has been reporting as “Tea Parties” are almost here. Tomorrow is the big day and Fox has been ramping up their promotions. It has been well documented that these shams were conceived and executed by major players in the Republican Party and affiliated partisan advocacy groups like FreedomWorks. But now Keith Olbermann has put together a brilliant montage that shows just how hard Fox has been working to make these events successful.

The giddy elation these people project is reminiscent of a six year old being told that tomorrow the family is going to Disneyland. This has to be the high point of the year for these pathetic souls. The anticipation with which they are dripping seems to fill them with ecstasy. They apparently have gotten over their fear that ACORN’s Soros-backed community organizers are lurking in the shadows waiting to pounce just as their festivities get under way.

The White House is reacting to the day of revolting right-wingers in a particularly appropriate way:

QUESTION: Thanks, Robert. Tomorrow is tax day and a number of conservative groups are organizing these so called “tea parties” across the country; there are going to be grassroots uprising revolts against the administration’s policies so far. Is the President aware that these are going on and do you have any reaction to this?

ROBERT GIBBS: I don’t know if the President is aware of the events. I think the President will use tomorrow as a day to have an event here at the White House to signal the important steps in the economic recovery and reinvestment plan that cut taxes for 95 percent of working families in America, just as the President proposed doing; cuts in taxes and tax credits for the creation of clean energy jobs.

We’ll use tomorrow to highlight individual and instances in families that have seen their taxes cut and I think America can be — Americans will see more money in their pockets as a direct result of the Making Work Pay tax cut that the President both campaigned on and passed through Congress.

First of all, the reporter who asked the question needs to be schooled on what constitutes a “grassroots uprising revolt.” When the organizing principals are political insiders like Dick Armey and Ari Fleischer, and the PR is run by Fox News, it is beyond absurd to describe it as grassroots. More to the point, though, it’s nice to see that President Obama is not devoting much attention to this. The Tea Baggers can throw their pity party in the vast wasteland of their imaginations.

For those of you contemplating joining in on the Tea Bagging, I have this word of advice: Be careful out there. The crazy is extra thick.

Update: President Obama: For too long, we’ve seen taxes used as a wedge to scare people into supporting policies that actually increased the burden on working people instead of helping them live their dreams. That has to change, and that’s the work that we’ve begun.