[The Madcap]

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/poli...le_letter.html

Sorry fellas. Going to be hard for anybody to take you seriously after that.

[Sunde91]

What credibility was there? And credibility to what/whom? They have been called "Tea Baggers" and Racists by the establishment from the get go, and you're talking about credibility..

Absolutely nothing has changed.

[golfrulz]

this is a well intentioned yet misguided group of angry americans that is starting to splinter. mainstream reps are realizing the negatives are outweighing the positives i.e. whacky sharron angle.

[neila]

People miss the point concerning the Tea Bag movement. The real point is that there is a huge section of the population of this country that believes America is and has been going in the wrong direction for quite some time now. Most of these people have never attended a "Tea Bag party". The vast majority of this group are not racist or haters of anything. What we are is concerned for the well being of America, our future, and the future of our children. Whatever "path" America is on at this point is not the one that made this country great and I believe unsustainable. The Tea Bag movement is, perhaps, a more extreme representation of this larger group. As such, at times, they do not reflect our views at all times on all subjects, just as the brothers Jesse Jackson, and Al Sharpton do not reflect the views of all Black Americans.
For the liberal establishment to continue to try and marginalize the "Tea Baggers" while ignoring the rest of us, only shows that their only goal is to further their on brand of extremism.

[nasaki]

This bigots political career is over before it really started...there really is a God!

This man should have BIGOT tattooed on his forehead.I don't understand what makes people take this.attitude. Unfortunately there are a lot of political people that seem to feel that way. That's why they work so hard to take advantage of good,solid workers and short change them every chance they get. This same type are prominent in the Tea Party groups who claim they are not racists as they carry their very RACIST signs around the parks.How can you claim no racism when you paint our presidents face white? When you show him sitting in a coffin? And there are SO MANY more. You people are sick! In my very long life,I have never seen any to equal you for low class,.uneducated, jackasses!

[The Madcap]

What credibility was there? And credibility to what/whom? They have been called "Tea Baggers" and Racists by the establishment from the get go, and you're talking about credibility..

Absolutely nothing has changed.

Perhaps you are unaware that there are a great number of Americans out there who actually draw conclusions based on their own personal experiences rather than what the prattling yahoos on the television or crackpot news-paper journalists tell them.

Of course the "establishment" has been calling these people racists from the get go- their beliefs are an incredible threat to the power of the "establishment." Marginalizing your enemy in the press is as old as the press itself.

I think plenty will change because of this. The change being that all the positive momentum gained by this un-organized grass roots movement is going to break back because many who have joined their ranks actually aren't racists. And now they will be afraid that the folks they have aligned themselves actually are the racists the "establishment" has been saying they are.

Take global warming:

The science behind global warming was common knowledge to many long before Al Gore and "An Inconvenient Truth." The movement to deal with rising temperature changes had already began. Then Al Gore got involved, and the climate-gate controversy came out, and the good science that founded this concern, and the movement it spawned, became corrupted as an evironmental issue morphed into a political one.

10 years ago I could have a discussion with someone about global warming and it was informative, now it's degenerated into a bunch of political BS.

The global warming movement lost it's steam, not because the initial science is a load of BS, but because so many of its most ardent supporters turned out to be over-eager exaggerating zealots, and took the sound science and manipulated it for their political aims. Or to make money.

Slowly, the real scientists that had been a part of the group effort to figure out if the earth's temperature was truly rising and what to do about it, they lost interest, and faded into the background. They didn't want to be a part of Al Gore's dog and pony show. Nor did they want to condone the group-think, self-interested bias of the IPCC.

You always notice the bad apples, right?

I've had numerous interactions with folks who descibe themselves as "Tea Party" supporters, but none of them were these 'racists' that supposedly dominate the group. And for those who draw their conclusions in life based on their own discoveries, and not over-hyped idiocy, the Tea Party was not a movement of racists, but simple hard-working Americans who came together in the united expression that they were no longer getting enough bang for their buck by sending it to Washington. Now the media et al would have told me differently, but then I don't make conclusions based on one or two incidents. This recent event changes my mind. The fact that one of the "leaders" of this movement could come out and write something so backasswards is going to lead to a lot of people that were warming up to the movement turning a cold shoulder. No one wants to be associated with racism. Except for Klansmen and Black Panthers I guess.

Anyway, point is, a few bad apples at the top don't mean the whole bushel is ruined. BUT, some people are too lazy to dig to the bottom and will simply pass on to the next crate. That's what happened with global warming. And that's what may happen with the Tea Party's. Just because the liberal establishment thought these guys are kooky racists doesn't mean everyone did. The fact that you fail to grasp this makes me wonder if you're the type who believes everything he reads.

[Emily_Haines]

Tea baggers are a bunch of God and constitution freaks that think the country should be run as it was 200 years ago when 99.99% of America was white. They try their best to say they are not racist but we saw a glimmer of what they a really like deep down this week. If one of these kooks gets elected may not be a bad idea to invest in gas chambers.

[brooks85]

Tea baggers are a bunch of God and constitution freaks that think the country should be run as it was 200 years ago when 99.99% of America was white. They try their best to say they are not racist but we saw a glimmer of what they a really like deep down this week. If one of these kooks gets elected may not be a bad idea to invest in gas chambers.

so you saw a glimpse of how a group of people are by looking at one person in that group?

That sounds like stereotyping to me, and the majority of that group is white, so you must be a racist against white people.

[muldoon]

What credibility was there? And credibility to what/whom? They have been called "Tea Baggers" and Racists by the establishment from the get go, and you're talking about credibility..

Absolutely nothing has changed.

For starters, it's the TEA party folks who first used the term "tea baggers".

Secondly, tell me when you have seen as many racist sign and as many racist inferences as you have at tea party rallies? People carrying little stuffed monkeys, the signs depicting Obama as an Afican witch doctor, the constant reference to the president as Barack HOO-SAYEN Obama.

Not all tea partiers are racists, but their tolerance of racism borders on embracing it.

[Waterstpub87]

I don't see how this lowers their credibility. They kicked someone out for saying something racist. There are racists in every organization. The NAACP told them to kick the racists out. They found out one of their own wrote something racist, and they kicked him out. Disagree with their ideas, methods, and message, but at least give them credit for doing something right.

[The Madcap]

I don't see how this lowers their credibility. They kicked someone out for saying something racist. There are racists in every organization. The NAACP told them to kick the racists out. They found out one of their own wrote something racist, and they kicked him out. Disagree with their ideas, methods, and message, but at least give them credit for doing something right.

I actually don't disagree with the message. Philosophically speaking anyway. I'm a "live and let live" type of dude.

And I do think they did the right thing by kicking this guy out. And had this been some random small pup straggler I don't think it'd be a big deal. Say some whacko showed up at a rally hoisting some confederate flag placard with some message about the south rising again or something and how blacks are inferior to whites and should be enslaved, if that were to happen, and it was a person of no influence and he gets the boot, no harm no foul. But to have a guy in a leadership role come out with the asinine statements this guy did, it calls into question the whole movement. And they aren't going to go down easy. Just ask Solzhenitsyn.

While I agree every organization has racists, you won't find that many so blatantly stupid about it as this guy was. Not to mention the fact that because of its role as a grass roots organization, and the passion it has stirred, and the public's already growing accusations of racism, the Tea Party must hold itself to a higher standard and not allow itself to be found anywhere near a mere appearance of impropriety. And while this is a double standard and completely bogus, that's just the way it is. If the Tea Party wants to succeed as an established voice in the American political system, it must find itself beyond reproach, or at least as close as possible, because the potential success of this group stands to dismantle the very foundation of the liberal progressive movement in this country.

I was a bigger fan of the Tea Party back when it was more of just a state of mind than an actual organized political group. But in contemporary politics you've got to mobilize or you get trampled under foot by the big boys with all their money. No matter how good an idea might be, it will always fail to be disseminated to the masses if you're making sales pitches one on one to customers and your competitors have billboards, bullhorns, and air-time.

[Waterstpub87]

It was meant as more of a "you can disagree with their message, methods, ideas" sort of statement. It wasn't specific. But if you agree with it being a good decision to kick someone who is a public racist out, then how could it lower your view of their creditability. If they performed an action that you agree with, would it not make you look more favorable on their organization?

The tea party being a loosely affiliated organization lacking a central command structure which recently received a groundswell of support from the American people does not really has the ability to look deeply into the thoughts of everyone who becomes a leader. They are not elected, nor appointed. There is no pathway to becoming a leader in that organization. This guy was chosen to work on the tea party express, if I read the article correctly. It would be hard to for them to completely get his thoughts on everything. He made a statement that many people find offensive, including the leaders of the tea party movement, which they kicked him out for. I feel that it makes the tea party look more professional and organized to police their own members when they say things that are beyond the pale. Racism is an ugly thing and by standing against it, the tea party is attempting to show that the racist rumors are unfounded.

[curious]

Tea baggers are a bunch of God and constitution freaks that think the country should be run as it was 200 years ago when 99.99% of America was white. They try their best to say they are not racist but we saw a glimmer of what they a really like deep down this week. If one of these kooks gets elected may not be a bad idea to invest in gas chambers.

Sorry, Emily, that nut job doesn't speak for us. There are several groups claiming to speak for the tea party movement, they don't. No one speaks for us because we are all individuals who come together to air our grievances against the federal government.

Now, you suggest using gas chambers, are you a NAZI? Are you a racist?

I see you are trotting out the 99.99% whitey stat again in relation to the tea party. Funny how you didn't respond at all to my correcting your stat the other day when you said that 99.99% of the tea party "members" (we don't have membership rolls, so we don't have members) are white, and I posted the study from USA Today showing you that that figure is total fabrication. You never responded to that. Hmm, wonder why.

Now you say that 200 years ago America was 99.99% white? In 1810 the population of the United States was 7.3 million including 1.2 million slaves. So, are you saying that the 1.2 million slaves were white?

I have attended several tea parties in my state of Mississippi and the attendees were a reflection of the makeup of the population in the area. Mostly families, equal number of men and women, lots of children, lots of young people, roughly 30% minority. I didn't see any "freaks".

The sentiment at the tea parties is that we expect from our elected officials honesty, sound financial policies, an end to deficit spending, an end to usurious taxation, and America first trade and foreign policies. And we expect them to listen to us and not shove policies that we don't support down our throats. Those that ignore us do so at their peril because they won't be elected to so much as dog catcher ever again.

And yes, we want en end to un-constitutional actions on the part of the federal government.

It is obvious that you have never been to a tea party and you don't know what you are talking about.

[curious]

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/poli...le_letter.html

Sorry fellas. Going to be hard for anybody to take you seriously after that.

Sorry crackhead, this nut job doesn't speak for the tea party movement, no one speaks for us. There are several organizations that slapped the words "tea party" on their name and now they are fighting with each other over who is the "real" leader of the tea party movement. Well, we don't have any leaders. Since you think that you know nothing about what the tea party movement is or what its supporters think or how they see themselves.

Oh, and the nut job was told to stay away from tea parties.

The left wing nut job media has no idea what the tea parties are all about. Their constant attempt to find "leaders" of the tea party movement to discredit shows that.

[curious]

For starters, it's the TEA party folks who first used the term "tea baggers".

Secondly, tell me when you have seen as many racist sign and as many racist inferences as you have at tea party rallies? People carrying little stuffed monkeys, the signs depicting Obama as an Afican witch doctor, the constant reference to the president as Barack HOO-SAYEN Obama.

Not all tea partiers are racists, but their tolerance of racism borders on embracing it.

I have actually been to tea parties and I haven't seen a single racist sign.

Tell me this, when the left wing nut jobs were doing their parodies of President Bush for 8 years and using insulting caricatures of him, and calling him Dubya, were they being racist?

[curious]

This bigots political career is over before it really started...there really is a God!

This man should have BIGOT tattooed on his forehead.I don't understand what makes people take this.attitude. Unfortunately there are a lot of political people that seem to feel that way. That's why they work so hard to take advantage of good,solid workers and short change them every chance they get. This same type are prominent in the Tea Party groups who claim they are not racists as they carry their very RACIST signs around the parks.How can you claim no racism when you paint our presidents face white? When you show him sitting in a coffin? And there are SO MANY more. You people are sick! In my very long life,I have never seen any to equal you for low class,.uneducated, jackasses!

I have been to many tea parties and I have not seen a single racist sign. The left wing nut job media CLAIMS that our rallies are flooded with racist signs but they have not produced a single one. Please post a link to a video or a photo showing a racist sign in a tea party.

Were you as upset at the constant insults that the left wing nut jobs used against President Bush? Using caricatures that made the President look retarded, calling him Dubya, calling him Little Hitler, and all the other horrible things that were done. Were you upset over that? Did you call the left wing nut jobs racists?

[curious]

this is a well intentioned yet misguided group of angry americans that is starting to splinter. mainstream reps are realizing the negatives are outweighing the positives i.e. whacky sharron angle.

We cannot splinter because we are not an organized group. You obviously don't know much about what we are all about.

How are we misguided? We want an end to deficit spending, usurious taxes, policies being made behind closed doors with money interests sitting at the table, and openness and honesty in our government. How is any of that "misguided"?

[The fiddler]

Sorry, Emily, that nut job doesn't speak for us. There are several groups claiming to speak for the tea party movement, they don't. No one speaks for us because we are all individuals who come together to air our grievances against the federal government.

Now, you suggest using gas chambers, are you a NAZI? Are you a racist?

I see you are trotting out the 99.99% whitey stat again in relation to the tea party. Funny how you didn't respond at all to my correcting your stat the other day when you said that 99.99% of the tea party "members" (we don't have membership rolls, so we don't have members) are white, and I posted the study from USA Today showing you that that figure is total fabrication. You never responded to that. Hmm, wonder why.

Now you say that 200 years ago America was 99.99% white? In 1810 the population of the United States was 7.3 million including 1.2 million slaves. So, are you saying that the 1.2 million slaves were white?

I have attended several tea parties in my state of Mississippi and the attendees were a reflection of the makeup of the population in the area. Mostly families, equal number of men and women, lots of children, lots of young people, roughly 30% minority. I didn't see any "freaks".

The sentiment at the tea parties is that we expect from our elected officials honesty, sound financial policies, an end to deficit spending, an end to usurious taxation, and America first trade and foreign policies. And we expect them to listen to us and not shove policies that we don't support down our throats. Those that ignore us do so at their peril because they won't be elected to so much as dog catcher ever again.

And yes, we want en end to un-constitutional actions on the part of the federal government.

It is obvious that you have never been to a tea party and you don't know what you are talking about.

Now this...is a well done post. especially the part on correcting bogus numbers. Nothing chaps my ass more than people throwing shit numbers on anything political.

The original tea partiers were staunch fiscal hawks and anti interventionalists as it relates to nation building and expansive empire. Any group, political or otherwise, will have a small percentage of racists. To label the tea party people racist, is pure bullshit...mainly from black racists from the fringe left.

[golfrulz]

yup ...be proud of this lol;

[muldoon]

I have actually been to tea parties and I haven't seen a single racist sign.

Tell me this, when the left wing nut jobs were doing their parodies of President Bush for 8 years and using insulting caricatures of him, and calling him Dubya, were they being racist?

Bad taste when people compared Bush to Hitler (I recall seeing Bushitler signs), but I'm not sure how you draw the correlation between caricatures of him and calling him by a nondescript nickname (Dubya) would make them racists.

[The Madcap]

It was meant as more of a "you can disagree with their message, methods, ideas" sort of statement. It wasn't specific. But if you agree with it being a good decision to kick someone who is a public racist out, then how could it lower your view of their creditability. If they performed an action that you agree with, would it not make you look more favorable on their organization?

The tea party being a loosely affiliated organization lacking a central command structure which recently received a groundswell of support from the American people does not really has the ability to look deeply into the thoughts of everyone who becomes a leader. They are not elected, nor appointed. There is no pathway to becoming a leader in that organization. This guy was chosen to work on the tea party express, if I read the article correctly. It would be hard to for them to completely get his thoughts on everything. He made a statement that many people find offensive, including the leaders of the tea party movement, which they kicked him out for. I feel that it makes the tea party look more professional and organized to police their own members when they say things that are beyond the pale. Racism is an ugly thing and by standing against it, the tea party is attempting to show that the racist rumors are unfounded.

Most everything you say makes sense. But then, that's the problem-you assume that the people influential in politics, or those that care to be informed about it, are sane/rational/sensible people-and it's been my experience they rarely ever are.

Most are just ignorant. And I won't blame them for that. The scope of the political machine has grown so expansive it's close to impossible to be aptly informed about everything. And for the few who are actually well enough informed to make sound judgments, well they pretty much have to stop carrying about everything else decent in life to keep up, and this turns them into pent-up obnoxious assholes.

While I understand your point that "it would be hard for them to completely get his thoughts on everything," there's an old saying: "Birds of a feather flock together." And I think people on the fence about what to think with the Tea Party, especially independents and Democrats, are now going to be much more hesitant to opening their minds and hearing the message.

For me personally, the Tea Party doesn't lose much credibility, except that I'd like to think they'd be a bit sharper in determining who is allowed to make statements representing their mantle. I do, however, think this will hurt their credibility with the general public. And at the end of the day, that's what matters. What I believe individually about their integrity, or their supporters, is hardly relevant. One man's opinion is never enough to do any damage.

(Well.... unless he's positioned himself as the shepherd to our lost herd of sheep, and the sheep welcome him with their bleats because they'd rather be called home by a master than have the freedom and responsibility to fend off the wolves for themselves. You think they'll wake up in time to realize they're being saved now just to eventually be led off to the slaughter?)

Like I wrote in a previous post, I think this type of thing derails their momentum, prevents the movement from really sweeping the nation. It could grow a bit more, but in the end I don't see it winning anyone over that isn't already predisposed to agree with their sentiments, and as a result, it won't get much bigger than Ron Paul's "Revolution" in the '08 primary.

[curious]

Bad taste when people compared Bush to Hitler (I recall seeing Bushitler signs), but I'm not sure how you draw the correlation between caricatures of him and calling him by a nondescript nickname (Dubya) would make them racists.

how does it make others racist to caricature Obama as The Joker? Which is one of the talking points that the Obama crowd uses to prove that all the tea partiers are racist. That caricature has nothing to do with race, it has to do with intellect, but of course everyone knows that.

[curious]

To be perfectly honest...when they were making up a name someone should of called the sanity check on the "Teabagger" label. I mean..if you can look at yourself in the mirror and say "I'm a proud Teabagger" and not laugh...more power to you.

I have been to many tea parties and no one that I know ever gave it any thought what name to label ourselves with. We show up, express our opinions. If you have to call me somthing, call me an American.

The teabagger thing came from some people mailing teabags to their elected officials. Of course, everyone with half a brain knows that.

[BWest]

The tea party agenda is about as novel as a group of citizens calling for strict laws against child molestation. Nobody likes paying taxes or feels that special interests should dictate policy. But I have to say, nobody likes open and honest government. Thats where 99% of Americans break from the tea party. Real genius at work. I have to hand it to them, they tried to "reinvent" the republican party but they just could not tamp down those extremists that have taken a hard right into the cornfield. Moderate republicans are an endangered species. Arlen Specter, a moderate all his political career, has had to switch parties because the RNC will not back him as a republican in the next election. The problem-breaks from rank when he votes what he believes as opposed to what the party line is. Turns out that was almost all the time in the last 4 years of the Bush presidency. Instead of holding him up as a centrist voice in the party that is dominated by blowhards like Rush, they dumped on him only confirming what everyone has known for 6 years. Republicans in the Senate are hardcore, out of touch intolerants.

[BWest]

In the 90's we had Ross Perot telling people to mail 2x4's to their congressman. This decade it's tea bags. I could not stop laughing when I first heard about the tea bags. Morons trying to capitilize on a 200 year old concept that is about as connected as earth and the moon. Well, the tea ballbag movement is headed the way of the bowel movement-straight down the sh*tter. Thanks for the laughs.

[muldoon]

how does it make others racist to caricature Obama as The Joker? Which is one of the talking points that the Obama crowd uses to prove that all the tea partiers are racist. That caricature has nothing to do with race, it has to do with intellect, but of course everyone knows that.

Really? I'd say it's signs like these (this one was posted near the entrance to a rally) that give that woodsy racist flavor dude.



Yup...no racism here sir...move along

[Data]

muldoon, are you black and ashamed of the witch doctor? Why?

No matter what race you are, are you implying that the witch doctor is an inferior human being? You must be a racist then.

[curious]

Muldoon,
So depicting Obama wearing the traditional garb of his ancestry is racist? You'll have to explain that one to me. Hussein is both a Muslim and claims to be an African. So, depicting him wearing a traditional Muslim head covering is racist how? Hussein himself wore such head coverings when he was on the Obama Kisses the Asses of Muslims tour. Are you saying that Muslims are somehow inferior?

Hussein claims to be an African and proud of his heritage. Of course, Africa is a big continent and has at least a dozen different "races", so I'm not sure what heritage he is talking about. But, he claims to be a Kenyan, so I guess that is the heritage he is talking about. So, maybe he is Bantu? Or, perhaps he is Nilotic (Kalenjin, Luo, Ateker, Dinka, Nuer, Shilluk and the Maa-speaking peoples)? Hussein is being showin in the traditional garb of a Bantu healthcare practitioner, so are you saying that the Bantu are somehow racially inferior?

I just don't get how those pictures are racist.

My ancestors are Gaelic, if you depicted me wearing traditional Gaelic clothing I would not be offended, I would be honored.

So, I'm confused as to why depicting Hussein wearing the clothing of the civilizations that Hussein claims to be his is racist?

[jram68]

What credibility was there? And credibility to what/whom? They have been called "Tea Baggers" and Racists by the establishment from the get go, and you're talking about credibility..

Absolutely nothing has changed.

"by the establishment" ? Are you smoking the crack pipe again dude?

[BWest]

Muldoon,
So depicting Obama wearing the traditional garb of his ancestry is racist? You'll have to explain that one to me. Hussein is both a Muslim and claims to be an African. So, depicting him wearing a traditional Muslim head covering is racist how? Hussein himself wore such head coverings when he was on the Obama Kisses the Asses of Muslims tour. Are you saying that Muslims are somehow inferior?

Hussein claims to be an African and proud of his heritage. Of course, Africa is a big continent and has at least a dozen different "races", so I'm not sure what heritage he is talking about. But, he claims to be a Kenyan, so I guess that is the heritage he is talking about. So, maybe he is Bantu? Or, perhaps he is Nilotic (Kalenjin, Luo, Ateker, Dinka, Nuer, Shilluk and the Maa-speaking peoples)? Hussein is being showin in the traditional garb of a Bantu healthcare practitioner, so are you saying that the Bantu are somehow racially inferior?

I just don't get how those pictures are racist.

My ancestors are Gaelic, if you depicted me wearing traditional Gaelic clothing I would not be offended, I would be honored.

So, I'm confused as to why depicting Hussein wearing the clothing of the civilizations that Hussein claims to be his is racist?

Curious George, You seem to be confused by almost everything. But most of all, you confuse everbody with all the questions about being confused yourself. I know this is confusing, but I'm sure it makes sense in your confused mind.

[dollarbill]

What happpened to the KKK..........