That's right. The Wasilla Patriots Tea Party that just got national attention for being the model of what this cwhoreporate-backed, mostly white, very, very evangelical and anti-multi-cultural amorphous blob of mostly under-educated, overweight low information voters actually represents, has put a big trailer onto government property for several days to promote their party's party.Why didn't they put the trailer on private property? Because the event will be held on public property.
Why don't they hold the event on somebody's private property or at one of numerous local, privately-owned venues that could use some money if they charged a modest fee? Beats the hell out of me.
I'm hoping to be there, asking a few questions.
Meanwhile, here's my favorite tea party cartoon of the week (hat tip - KeninNY):
36 comments:
Yup, brilliant as usual...
I've lived out here for 10+ years now and I get the vibe.
They need to think a little further than the public park and roadways where they protest the livelihoods of their neighbors.
If they don't know how Wasilla has been developed (and by who) they need to find some unmaintained dirt "freedom" road to protest on. Better yet, they should do it in their CHURCH parking lots instead.
Dummies.
"they should do it in their CHURCH parking lots instead...."
Many of their church parking lots are knee-deep in mud this time in April.
Once again Mr. Munger you resort to name calling and hate speech. I don’t see why when you disagree with someone’s opinion you ridicule them in such a harsh immature manner. You poke fun at the teapariers and say that they are uneducated, so I am assuming that you are. Now as an individual who wants to come across as highly educated, you seem to be unable to show it based on your lack of creative criticism. I am also wondering what someone being overweight has to do with their political opinion.? As someone who thinks that you do put allot of time and research into your blog (thank you), I do not see the reason that you make people read through all of the rubbish to find the real point of your opinion. It is the hurtful words themselves, more than the difference in opinion that is bringing this country down. This attitude towards our fellow Americans is making it impossible to compromise. You have to be the change you want to see in the world.
Thank you for caring.
Government property????
The government owns property???
How did the government come to own it.
I happen to know that Phil lives on land previously used as a normal seasonal dwelling place by the local Indian tribes. And in this area, that wasn't too long ago. But now Phil owns it I guess. At least he bought it from someone that said they owned and so on back to the Federal government that "bought" it from Russia...NOT.
Why don't they just find a place in Wasilla owned by a local business person and have their event there? They could charge a small fee, donate 50% to a local charity and create some cognitive non-dissonance, instead of tramping all over the Newcomb Park lawn during breakup. You could still see some of the indentations they made from last year's tea party at the park in July.
I guess Ivy and Beehive Jessica have nothing better to do than hang out and troll Phil's blog. Don't you have some overpriced "consulting to do? Clerical work? Bad hairdos? Babysitting? Makin' mashed potatoes to put next to the wolf casserole? Harrassing other liberal sites on the tubes?
See Mr. Munger, that last comment was just as affective, and I do agree with you. I like that last line.
I wish womanwithsardinecan could learn to stray away from the insults as well.
Thank you for caring.
To anonymous at 6:27: I think Phil is simply calling it like he sees it and them. Have you not seen the pictures and videos of the tea partiers or heard them? Just saying.
Anonymous @ 6:27
This is why half way attractive and douchable Republi-hotties get so popular with the crowd. If every person who protested had their body mass calibrated, they'd be a reason not to have public healthcare. Are you suggesting that Eddie Burke is fit? What is the education level of most of them? Counter with facts; Phil is a grown-up and will allow yu to post them on his blog and if he is incorrect, he will admit it. He is a Progressive, but isn't happy with the President on some issues and he states it. Phil does his best to be accurate.
Assume nothing-- Phil is educated. (Read his blog. Your statements prove you a person who JUST got here and haven't read even the last two weeks of his blog entries.) If you meet him, you will probably like him. Just be armed with the facts because he will cut you down like deli meat and you won't realize it until later.
You're a brave man, Phil Munger. Be careful out there.
Blue_in_AK
That public park and its associated parking lot were paid for with taxpayer monies, some borough, some city, some state and some federal highway.
It seems to get a great deal of use as it was a nice improvement when it was installed. It's certainly much safer now to be a pedestrian or dipstick tax protester there.
It was installed by Union Tradesmen making LIVEABLE WAGES providing a high quality product for public consumption. It was paid for with public dollars which purchased a PUBLIC GOOD.
The dummies that stand out there in the MIDDLE OF THE WORKDAY protesting by proxy - someone else's profession - are disgraceful and hypocritical.
It's the younger crowd that does that work. You know, the ones that don't qualify for Medicare and probably won't ever see a dime of the Social Security taxes they pay in with the wages they earned building that PUBLIC PARK.
Again, dummies.
So... maybe I'm missing something here, but why is it such a crime for them to be using public property? Being that public property is, in fact, public?
Heather,
Nobody has said it is a crime for them to use government property for their "patriotic" event. They do rail against the immense costs of government, though, while they seek to divide people along some really retro lines in a political and civic sense. Incessantly, to say the least.
The Coffee Party of Wasilla, OTOH, is holding all their events at locally owned businesses where people attending the events pay for food and drinks while they discuss how to get people to agree on things.
Once agin, I am not saying that the author does not have valid points. I justg don't see the point of slandering smeone on a personal level. I also want everyone not to forget the way the opposition behaved when Bush or Clinton was in office. There needs to be some cind of cavility brought back to the table. We can not move forward untill we can b ring the other side to the table, and they will never come like this.
Thank you for caring.
I would like to apologize for the errors in the above post. I tried to post using my phone and the buttons are way too small, and the touch screen is too sensitive. Never again.
Correction:
Once again, I am not saying that the author does not have valid points, or that I don’t agree with him. I just don't see the point of slandering someone on a personal level. I also want everyone not to forget the way the opposition behaved when President Bush or Clinton was in office. There needs to be some kind of civility brought back into the discussion. We can not move forward until we can bring the other side to the table, and they will never come like this. We need not forget that even though we might not agree with someone’s opinion, they are still our neighbors and fellow Americans. At the end of the day we will accomplish more by working together, not tearing each other apart.
Thank you for caring.
Matthew -
Where is the slander? Which of Phil's comments is not true?
Might you be confusing "criticism" with "slander"?
Love that Tea Party flag! So very true...
I suppose that the minutemen at Lexington should have rallied at a private residence or perhaps at their church instead of on the village green when they protested the government so as to avoid cognitive dissidence? :)
I mean, let's face it. Whether it was Williams Jenning Bryan railing against the cross of gold, Vietnam protesters, or today's Tea Partiers, the "village green" has been a popular place to hold gatherings. It holds a unique place in American culture (likely inherited from the Brits) and I don't see that changing anytime soon. It isn't a left vs. right thing.
Additionally, according to CNN -- no bastion of right-wingnuttery, there, I think -- the Tea Partiers tend to be "tend to be male, rural, upscale, and overwhelmingly conservative... Nearly three-quarters of Tea Party activists attended college, compared to 54 percent of all Americans..." They also tend to be wealthier (i.e. they are probably in the 50% of Americans that pay income tax, not in the 50% that don't).
Now, I'd also point out that the CNN poll was based on a limited sample size, but still... This isn't the Washington Times, WSJ, or the dreaded Fox News here.
SOURCE: http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/02/17/tea.party.poll/index.html
I'd be interested to see what the demographics of the local Alaska activists are, and if they are also more educated and have higher earnings than the average Alaskan. Doesn't fit the knuckle-dragging neanderthal meme as well though, I'm afraid.
Cheers,
Chris
Chris,
The minutemen weren't upset about taxes by their local or colonial governments. They were mostly upset about a number of issues regarding the British government and its representatives in the colonies, most notably the garrisoning of British troops from outside the continent in some peoples' homes.
The original tea party protested government support of what was then one of if not the largest corporation in the world - the East India Company.
Do you understand that? The original tea party was a protest against corporate power. The current tea party is mostly propped up by behind-the-scenes corporate supporters, and one in-your-face corporate supporter - Rupert Murdoch, with the powers of Newscorp. Don't you find it ironic that the biggest cheerleader for the tea party is a British subject worth billions, leading his multimillionaire mouthpieces like Glenn Beck?
They gathered at Lexington as representatives of their local government - as a militia formed to protect the colonists from border threats.
I don't care what you think of me. I'm fed up with coming to a progressive site like Phil's and finding trolls constantly in the comments. The reality is that any video you see (pick one, any one!)of tea party protests shows an overwhelmingly white, obese, aging crowd carrying misspelled, over the top nasty signs, many of which are racist. That's the reality. And the other reality is that right wing trolls spend their days trolling progressive sites and leaving rude or off-topic comments by the hundreds. Any liberal/progressive shows up at a conservative site and just poses a simple question, they get deleted and banned. Phil is much nicer than I am, but he seems tired of pussyfooting and has been calling it like he sees it. HIS land has nothing to do with this post. He is right on about the hypocrisy of the tea party movement, as well as their general makeup. You trolls are willfully obtuse and your reasonableness is fake.
I see how you could find it to be cognitively dissonant, Phil. But to be frank, the opening paragraph left me with the gut feeling of "disagree no matter what the point is" which is not a good way to convince others. I think you might have made your point much better without such stereotyping, as witnessed by the fact that I wasn't able to say for certain what the point was just from reading the post.
And for some of the other comments on the blog, yes I have seen photos. I am also well aware of how the media is going to take the picture that sells, not the picture that doesn't show anything out of the ordinary. Nor am I being a troll by pointing out ways in which Phil might better make his point, regardless of whether or not I agree or disagree with said point. And, for the record, I do know Phil and have nothing but respect for him.
heather,
love your food blog!
Phil I hope you turn the info about anon @ 7:10 into the "FEDS" there is a veiled threat there..."I know where you live" I wouldn't trust the WPD or AST since they are on Palin's payroll.
Now, I totally agree with Womanwithasardinecan... right on!
And what Phil says in his blog post... the teabags are the First to bitch about "FEDS" and "BIG Gov" bla, bla, bla, but the first to get their "FREE" spot at the park, provided by FED/State funding ie: "Big Govt" or the first with hands out for federal money. Who did Rick Perry whine to about H1N1? The Feds! And to rebuild the house that was burned, the FEDS!
Another example, She was for it before she was against..."I told the FEDS 'thanks but no thanks'" But in reality she did take the money, she just didn't build a bridge with it!
Yes we are all sick of pussyfooting around these idiots and the trolls here are sickening.
Palin must have a lot of paid trolls on her payroll, or she probably calls them consultants. If you don't like what is said here...go away!
Learn to speak Teabag!
http://www.markfiore.com/political/learn-speak-tea-bag#comment-5483
Learn to speak Teabag!
http://www.markfiore.com/political/learn-speak-tea-bag#comment-5483
Why the fascination and continual recognition of such a marginal and irrelevant subset as the lunatic fringe known as the self-described Tea Party ?
If your intent is to marginalize their absurdity, ignoring their absurdity instead of continually highlighting it makes much more sense.
That 'poll' being referenced as speaking of the tea partyiers ? These so called 'Tea Party' activists ?
As is often said, there's no 'there' there.
A mere 14% of the respondents were categorized as 'Tea Party activists', but that supposed sensational 'news' is based on as little and tenuous association that some of those polled may have, at some time or other, simply forwarded a viral email.
How many wingnuts forward every email they get?
Seriously, forwarding an email qualifies you to be nationally recognized as one of the elite Tea Party activists ?
Would you better grasp reality were you to employ both hands in reaching for it ?
The sample was taken from 1,023 adult registered voting Americans, sampling shows that of those thousand or so registered adults, most were registered with an existing party. Tea Party isn't has never been included in that registration process.
Of that thousand, a mere 124 said they had taken any action which could be very widely and tenuously construed to be associated at all with something so nebulous as 'the Tea Party', (remember that 124 is including any one of which may have admitted to forwarding that viral email making any reference whatsoever to 'tea party' which they undoubtedly got from some equally uninformed, vague and amorphous source)
Once one reads what the poll actually asked, and who it was that actually got asked what specific questions,
...in other words, just how imprecise and indeterminate the data was that the so-called analysis was based upon,
... one can begin to see what the poll actually says, and the very large difference between that, and what some anonymous ambiguous pundit employing methodologically unsupported analysis may wish to have you believe.
Those who are providing the 'analysis' of this polling data want you to believe their spin, they don't want you to look beyond that spin to see just how they arrived at the particular spin they've applied.
The only sure thing demonstrated by this 'poll', is that any way you wish to view the outcome, the few who claimed any association whatsoever to the 'Tea Party' was a very small percentage of the whole.
So small, right around 10%, as to be totally negligible and easily relegated to an extremely minor status.
The 'tea partiers' have not and will not ever carry the weight that the media and the tea partiers themselves would have you believe.
Attempting to lend credibility to the tea partiers is nonsense.
Like any other very small fringe extremist minority, their bluster isn't matched by any political weight or substance.
Dwelling on the nonsense, giving them recognition beyond just scorn or derision for their abject loony tune behavior, only serves to over-inflate their delusional sense that they might have any substance or weight.
The sooner you're able to ignore being baited into their nonsense, the sooner you can direct your energies into something that does have relevance and weight.
Freeper,
I actually kind of agree with you for once. The fascination with the Tea Party is kind of crazy. The MSM could kill this much more effectively by steadfastly ignoring it as they attempted to do at first. Every story, email, and blog was vilifying them is free advertising.
Cheers,
Chris
PS - Even given the margin of error on the poll for self-identified Tea Partiers (+/- 9%), they are still more likely to be higher educated and higher income than the average respondent. Which makes sense -- taxes are a non-issue for people who make <$50K/year, and education is correlated to income.
I'd be really interested in higher fidelity (and local) data. +/-9% sampling error is large.
Phil,
One of my undergrads was in history. I'm aware of the cozy relationship between the EIC cartel and the British crown. I haven't been to one, but perhaps some of the individuals there are concerned about the similarly cozy relations between many businesses and the government today.
Even if it were intellectually incoherent for tax protesters to utilize the "village commons" as a forum -- as Americans with grievances have for centuries -- I think we could probably all agree that they have a right to peaceably assemble there. They are being rational -- Assembling on the village green imposes the least costs/barriers to entry and obtains the most free publicity, which is what any fledgling political movement desires.
Cheers,
Chris
ah, chris, you've jumped at the chance to try to endorse the notion that tea party sympathizers can be described as better educated and richer than the average joe ?
Gawd, but you're gullible....
You're assumption that you can believe what tea party sympathizers self report on their education level and income is as ludicrous as any other assumption you may hold.
Those who associate themselves with the Tea Party can't tell reality from their fictions and the fantasy they create no doubt includes inflated images of their own qualities.
That you would give credence to the answers given by a tea party sympathizer demonstrates that your ability to screen out bullshit is quite in need of an upgrade.
It's come to my attention that perhaps you're drinking a toast to your own posts and becoming drunk on the imaginary and exaggerated repute.
Freeper -- the source is a CNN poll. Are you accusing CNN of being a right-wingnut extremist Tea Party propaganda mouthpiece? If not, do you have any evidence to support the claim that all self-identified Tea Party supporters are pathological liars about their backgrounds? If so, do you have any evidence for this attack or is it an opinion?
Anyways, the demographic seems logical to me -- who protests taxes? People who pay taxes. Who pays income taxes? People who make >$50K/year. Who makes >$50K/year? Generally, higher income is correlated with higher educational attainment, so probably people with degrees (or skilled professionals/tradesmen, especially in AK).
As I have said, the interesting thing would be local data collection, conducted with statistical rigor, aimed at a lower sampling error.
Cheers,
Chris
You suggest that the Tea Party doesn't consist of pathological liars ??
You're amazingly hilarious and completely absurd to suggest they aren't.
Lies, exaggeration, fiction and fantasy is the only thing that fuels those pitiful frauds.
Or hadn't you noticed ?
You're simply pitifully unconscious to your real world surroundings.
As to CNN, their credibility doesn't amount to squat, it hasn't for a long time, and yes, there's every indication that they hire incompetent extremists and raving lunatics.
In CNN's not so distant past, they hired and promoted Glenn Beck, foisted Lou Dobbs on the public, regularly parade a string of indicted and convicted neocons and political asshats of the right before the cameras, and they more recently hired Erick Erickson.
Am I 'accusing' CNN of malfeasance and being a mouthpiece for the lunatic fringe ?
I don't have to accuse them, their very own actions negate the need to make any 'accusation', it's a self-evident fact.
Good Gawd but you're pathetically delusional,
....and not to mention, gullible to an extremely contemptible fault.
Every time you sign off with your trademark 'Cheers' it brings to mind that caricature of a guy sitting on the corner barstool that no one who has approached before would ever choose to sit down next to more than the first mistaken time.
(the reason ? ....the guy is mindlessly impaired and tends only to burbling utter nonsense, and then to top it off, his eyes lose focus every once and awhile, and he trumpets out a loud salute to his idiocy by calling out "Cheers" to punctuate his debauched iteration of each morsel of brainless lunacy )
Mr. Munger,
next time I see you lefties down at the Park Strip rallying your hate the United States crowd I'm going to ask why they are not holding said gathering in a local business.
Or even better...next time I see a group of so called Palestinians standing on a paid for with tax money street corner I'm going to tell them you would like them to do it else where.
Ah, yes, another of the Son's of the Mighty have spoken.
http://bnaielim.blogspot.com/
Follow the links and you'll find Makabit's Bat Guriel's 'blog', continue to connect the dots and you come to other 'Sons of the Mighty', such reasoned allied extremists who will provide descriptions of the US President and Secretary of State thusly:
Jew-Hater, bigot, demagogue, black supremacist, socialist, Islam appeaser, friend of Fatah, Hamas, Hezbollah, Al Qaida ..... for the former,
and for the latter:
Jew-hater, enemy of Israel, compulsive liar, socialist, felon, miserable mother, bigot, angry lesbian, criminal, former lawyer for the Black Panthers, megolomaniac, owner of monstrous thunder thighs, vindictive shrew, and now Secretary of State under his majesty President Hussein.
Amid the ads for assault weapons and the promotion of sites extolling radical and dogmatic religious exclusivity and eliminationist rhetoric in praise of extremist nativism and nationalism, you'll find Phil targeted as a primary left wing anti-Israeli blogging turd on Makabit Bat Guriel's blog
Just thought I'd add to the editorial perspective you all might consider while perusing the 'comments section'.
Freeper,
Well, I think we can agree that CNN -- like most of the MSM -- has sucky journalists. I don't watch them. I only offered it up because it is generally an acceptable source for many progressives. I think the way they gave the Bush administration a pass in the rush to war in '03 was particularly weak. I just rarely hear them blasted as an evil mouthpiece of the right! I am glad that we can agree on CNN's mediocrity, however.
Here's a different poll from Gallup (http://www.gallup.com/poll/127181/tea-partiers-fairly-mainstream-demographics.aspx). With a +/-4% margin of error, with 95% confidence they find that Tea Party supporters are pretty representative of America in general. The % of folks who make >$50K/year is still outside the margin of error, but education attainment is equivalent to the average US adult (i.e., not any lower). Of course, maybe Gallup is a pawn of the evil conspiracy as well... In which case, please suggest a polling company of choice.
Of course, you can continue to assault the basic premise of the polls. The polls do rely on the respondents replying with a similar level of honesty to the typical US adult. So if Tea Party supporters are prone to systematically lying about their biographical data in a consistent manner, then yes, the poll results would be biased. What incentive do they have to lie, however? In fact, I would argue that if they were to lie, they would have an incentive to UNDERSTATE their income and education, claim to be Democrats/Independents, and claim to be of minority background in order to dispel common "astroturfing" allegations and make the movement look like it has broader working/middle class support then it may actually have. That would be the strategic choice. In any event, that is pure speculation; I cannot prove that some tea partiers are not pathological liars (it is hard to prove a negative), but you have not proved that all (or a statistically significant plurality) are.
You seem to have a lot of anger which is focused into ad hominem attacks. I don't understand the desire to demonize those who you disagree with; it certainly doesn't help one to find common ground or win hearts and minds. I use "cheers" because I was deployed with a multinational team who used "ciao" and "cheers" all the time, and picked up the habit/speech pattern with them.
I'm getting to the point where I'll just start ignoring anything that you throw which is laced with rude personal attacks. My usual policy on the wild internet is to give trolls a chance, but then to stop feeding them -- and I don't want Phil's blog to get too cluttered with rudeness.
Cheers,
Chris
An ad hominem attack is to attack a persons character or motives as an alternative, or rather than attacking that person's position they hope to maintain.
I haven't done that, I've attacked you, your character and your motives, right along with attacking your ludicrous and idiotic positions you attempt to maintain.
And why would I be angry because you choose to represent yourself as a buffoon ?
That doesn't anger me, it might make me wonder why you persist, but then, I don't control how far off the wall you may prefer to extend yourself.
As to winning 'hearts and minds', I'm not here to appease someone or anyone's imagined social acceptance standard, I'm speaking to reality and against illiteracy,
for that matter, you haven't demonstrated you possess heart, let alone have you yet presented any evidence that you have a mind I'd bother competing with anyone in order to win it.
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