A RI Yankee's Tea Party

Obviously, I am an unabashedly liberal conservative in the strict-constructionist camp of non-revisionist history, geography and baseball hagiography. Certain things mystify me; others just bewilder me. Really, I just do not understand. As Elvis Costello sings, “I used to be disgusted, now I’m just amused.”

Well-off, educated, employed, older mainly European-Americans (so-called white folks) are the vast majority of Tea Party members and call themselves “Patriots.” The “system” has worked for them: they are well off, educated and employed or retired! They want to take “their” country back… from themselves? If the Tea Partiers that I see on TV or those who watch Fox (not really the) News, or Glenn Beck or Sean Hannity, were aboriginal native Amerindians I would say “Go For It!” No, the Tea Party members are the actual Caucasian winners; so they want what? A bigger, better victory? A Marcus Garvey solution? A return to ante-bellum times?

The governors of Virginia (Bob McDonald) and Mississippi (Haley Barbour) are celebrating the memories of Confederate veterans. Virginia and Mississippi are part of the southern USA, an area that currently claims to be more American and patriotic than the east coast, west coast or the (Yankee) north. The Civil War (or The War Between the States, in the southern idiom) was not about slavery or rebellion against the greater United States, it was about “states rights.” In a narrow way I agree: a state’s right to allow slavery within its borders. Slavery is/was wrong, therefore the Confederacy was wrong to insist upon slavery as a state’s right and was wrong to rebel against the federal government. The Civil War was a treasonous, terrorist act against the United States. Treasonous, terrorist acts against the United States are sometimes punished with execution (see Eddie Slovik, Sacco & Vanzetti, and Timothy McVeigh, amongst others). The treasonous Confederate rebels were compassionately pardoned (for the most part) and went on to found such stalwart American patriotic institutions as the Ku Klux Klan, the spiritual antecedent to many of today’s militias. They believe that the second amendment is gospel but want to repeal the fourteenth amendment. They believe that the founding fathers were perfect, a group that thought that slaves were worth only 3/5 of a human being for representation purposes, but not human for moral purposes. WTF, indeed.

Many of these American Patriots that are members of the Tea Party believe that Barack Obama is a Muslim. It should make no difference what folly a person believes in, so long as that person is performing their duties. Many of the same folks believe that Obama was born in Kenya and is, thus, not an American citizen. Many of the same folks equate Obama with Adolph Hitler, while calling Obama a Marxist. (OK, they are not that well educated, confusing a Marxist and/or a Nazi with a centrist Democrat. If you listen to Hannity and Beck religiously enough, anything is possible.) This as they shout out to Obama to “keep the government hands off my Medicare!” Many of these folks are screaming about their taxes, without realizing that they are paying less in taxes than they did under their fiscal god Ronald Reagan and his illegitimate acolyte George W. Bush. Hey, Ayn Rand used Medicare and collected social security.

The common thread here, to me, seems to be racism; similar to the racism that dominated baseball and caused the game to be restricted between the careers of Moses Fleetwood Walker and Jackie Robinson. How could a black man play baseball with a white man? How could a black person be president over white people?

And now, Sarah Palin has a WTF moment (she said it, not me) and gets it all wrong about sputnik; Michelle Bachman just gets it all wrong and misinterprets her own chart. I rather like this Tea Party stuff. Reminds me of the Know Nothing Party of the mid-1800’s.

Damn, that rant felt good!

But Wait, There's More!!!!!

Got to love George Will (sometimes): he described Sarah Palin as Sancho Panza to John McCain’s Don Quixote. That translates to an illiterate sword bearer and sidekick to an addled old man. Sounds good to me!

Flash: This is mental illness awareness week, and Cindy McCain has stated (in Marie Claire magazine) that enlisted men are more susceptible to post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) than “trained” officers such as John McCain. My fellow prisoners, indeed. Classism? Elitism? Or just stupidity? Oh, McCain also voted against better body armor for soldiers – twice. Indeed. Just how long will the McCain’s noses get?

In case you haven’t read the comments section of this blog, one erstwhile correspondent took me task for not stating that McCain voted against troop support in Iraq because that version of the bill contained a timetable for withdrawal from Iraq. True. However, when Obama voted against another version of the troop support bill, Obama was voting against the lack of a timetable for withdrawal from Iraq. So, they both voted against funding for the troops.

Got to love Sarah Silverman for commenting on NBC being trashed in tomorrow’s (10/10/08) New York Post: “Whatever happened to the liberal Jew media?”

Will the Bradley Effect raise its ugly racist head when we whites get into the voting booth?

After watching a McCain rally in WI today, I am wondering why those angry voters are blaming the media for McCain’s ineptitude? Are they blaming the media for reporting the news? If the media had accurately reported the Bush Crime Family’s actions in 2000 and 2004, the Supreme Court would not have had to appoint W president. What is very scary is that these crazies also are yelling for Obama to be killed, and that the McCain wing of the Bush Crime Family has refused to acknowledge this.

Sarah Palin has addressed the Alaska Independence Party on more than one occasion. This group is a secessionist organization whose founder (Joe Vogler) was virulently anti-American. Vogler once stated that he “…had no use for America” and he had the support of Iran in his anti-America work. Todd Palin is a former member of that group. Palin told the Party to “Keep up the good work….” She has also been supported in her campaigns by members of this Party. Why is Obama's "association" with Bill Ayers a cause celebre but this is not in the news? Why haven’t the media made an issue of this? I say that Palin has consorted with terrorist organizations and needs to be brought to task. If you doubt my reportage, please see www.palinspin.com or www.salon.com for more details.

As the World Turns (Or, As My Head Spins)

As Prime Minister Putin of Russia invades Alaska's air space (or is it the space between Sarah Palin's ears?), John McCain is flying around the country (Country First, after all) aiding the airline industry's bottom line and single-handedly pulling the economy out of recession. No wait, he's trying to solve the current banking crisis (even though he's not on the Senate committee working on Czar Hank Paulson's takeover of the economy). Or is he just trying to avoid debating Barack Obama and emulating Sarah Palin's verbal ineptitude? By all accounts, McCain brought nothing of substance to the financial crisis discussion and was nearly incoherent in what he did say. He should have stayed in New York and appeared on Late Night With David Letterman.

If it weren't for the inherent racism of "we the people", Obama would be mega-points ahead in the polls. I am deliberately playing the race card here. So many white folks (I am one in case you consider it relevant) just cannot shake the fear that minorities are out to destroy polite society (is this what Fox Business News anchor Neil Cavuto really meant?). Remember that Thomas Jefferson - the god-king of the anti-government crowd - wrote that "...all men are created equal." Does this mean that those who hang on Jefferson's every word as slavishly as they hang on biblical verses believe that all non-whites are not human?

Sarah Palin's favorite (apparently) preacher chases witches out of whatever town he is in. Why hasn't Fox News made an issue of this? Is she really more of a disaster than Dan Quayle and W? Combined?

Merde!

Sarah Palin for VP??

I have held off long enough on this matter so as to allow my initial ire to cool. Governor Sarah Palin (R-AK) was nominated by the GOP for one reason only: to appeal to the Christian-right, anti-choice, anti-gay, pro-second amendment, anti-tax, anti-education, pro-Iraq War, be afraid of foreigners, Republican base. If she dragged in some disaffected Hillary Clinton supporters from the Democrats, that would be a bonus.

Several women that I recently spoke with were intrigued with Palin, because she is a woman, a mother (as were they), outspoken, affable, and a wisecracker. All good things to them (and me, incidentally). That the GOP nominated her is admirable, but incredibly cynical. These women will not vote for her. Let's look at the facts.

As mayor of Wisilla, AK, Palin was a strong advocate of accumulating as much "pork" for her city as could be had, hiring a PR firm to work for the city. On the surface, that is not a bad thing, but it is hardly the record of a government reformer who is against earmarks now that she is a VP candidate. Indeed, she was a strong advocate for the infamous Gravina "Bridge to Nowhere" when the bridge was an earmarked project for Alaska. The earmark was dropped from the federal budget, but the money remained. Palin's administration spent most of the money on other projects before she "killed" the already terminally ill project. Of course, the $500 million bridge had only a reported $50 million left on the table. Nice flip-flopping, exaggerating, and, yes, lying!

Palin's speech at the GOP convention contained an anti-tax message, but she advocated a raise in sales tax for a sports complex while a public servant in Wasilla. Then there is the issue of the local librarian whom she (Palin) asked if she (the librarian) would ban books if Palin asked her to. No way, said the librarian. No job said then Mayor Palin. She is anti-choice, anti-gay, anti-sex education in schools (ditto), pro-creationism. While she brags about fighting against Big Oil to get more money for Alaska citizens, she advocates drilling anywhere and everywhere. (Her husband works for BP Oil; more work for him in the future if ANWR is opened?)

How about the public works director who would not fire Palin’s ex-brother-in-law (despite intense lobbying for his firing by Palin’s staff and family)? He was canned.

She also takes credit for a new pipeline that is to be built in Alaska. Okay, but the pipeline is a project developed by a previous administration and will not be started until 2018. But she did sign the paperwork!

I have no problem with her support of the second amendment, the so-called Right to Bear Arms. That she thinks that it is okay to hunt wolves from helicopters does seem strange to me. (If she gets to be the actual VP, I’ll want to have access to guns to protect myself when she comes looking for pointy-headed liberals such as me!) Based upon her record as a city councilor, mayor and governor, however, she does not seem to have much use for the rest of the Constitution or that it should apply to all citizens.

Somehow, I do not think that Senator Clinton’s supporters will vote for McCain because of Sarah Palin. Palin is a hypocrite, an extreme social conservative, who is an anti-gay, anti-choice, pro capital punishment, anti-education opportunist who will advocate whatever position will get her elected!