"Tea Party Express" rally Monday, Aug. 31, 2009
Updated at bottom with recap of 9/12 Tea Party:
Today, September 12, 2009, thousands of citizens will converge on the nation’s capital as part of the 9/12 Tea Party rally. Conservatives and libertarians have increasingly felt frustrated by what they see as decades of abuses of power and abridgments of constitutional rights by politicians of both parties. This frustration has recently been manifesting itself in movements such as the Tea Party protests, and the 9/12 Project. While these movements are not specifically aligned against President Obama, he is the current occupant of the White House and many of his policies, representing his own liberal inclinations, are indicative of the kind of expansive, powerful and some would say intrusive government, to which the Tea Party movement is opposed.
While many Democrats in Congress have attempted to dismiss the Tea Party movement as “Astroturf” and “rent-a-protests” and liberals have attempted to label the Tea Party protesters as "haters", many Republicans have attempted to co-opt the movement into the Republican umbrella. Though there are many points of convergence between the goals of the Tea Party movement and the “stated” principles of the Republican Party, an important element fueling the frustration of the movement is a belief that many Republicans have been little better then the Democrats when it comes to adhering to fundamental constitutional principles of limited government and individual liberty.
Despite a stubborn refusal by many in the mainstream media to take them seriously, and the dismissive attitude of many Washington politicians; movements like the Tea Parties and the 9/12 Project represent a real “bottom up” movement of concerned and patriotic citizens entreating their government for redress of grievances. This is representative government in action and the Founders would be proud.
Below are some videos from previous Tea Parties.
Update: Coverage of the event from LibertyLog here and video below. Facebook and Twitter:
Comments
Business is booming! Teabaggers gone wild!
Sorry, we don't support ACORN workers. 2010 is a'coming soon!
We attended the New Lenox, IL tea party and then today (Sept. 12) we went to Chicago! It was incredible. We are all on the same page, all trying to say it's not democrat or republican. This is about being sick and tired of our lives being manipulated from politicians and under the table deals and lobbyist. It's about being fiscally conservative and not blindly folling but telling congress what WE want. WE HIRE THEM. WE PAY THEIR VERY HIGH SALARY. They got a raise this year. We got a cut in pay and many lost their jobs. This is NOT about anger and I'm so disappointed with the media except for FOX. I plan to just stop even trying to watch the others. My 90 yr old mother and my family with children attended both parties. We were NOT angry. We were protesting. Yet our Chicagoland channel 7 news said we were angry protestors and then had a clip of Biden in the middle of the report. That's why we did this. Too big to ignore now...
The real challange of the tea party revolution is to remember your cause for 2 and 3 years. The politicians and Comrade Obama will change their tone to how responsive they are and were for the American people causes. They will talk about how you their constituency deserves better. They will ratchet up the blame game. The tea party revolution must remember that 1 year of placation does equal 2 and 3 years of getting screwed - again! REMEMBER THOSE WHO SCREWED YOU AND DON"T VOTE FOR THEM!!!!!
I think that the "hater" title is well deserved; surely you saw the classy "Bury Obamacare with Kennedy" poster that made the rounds at the 9/12 circus today? And, um, we call it astroturf when instead of being a grassroots movement organized by ordinary citizens, the protest is orchestrated by Glenn Beck and financed by FreedomWorks! When will you stop lying?
Anchorage Liberal Examiner... At least they didn't have to pay anyone to show up. How is that grassroots?
Taking a national tragedy and expropriating it for pathetic partisan anti-Obama rantings is the height of disrespect to what happened on 9/11.
Anchorage Liberal Examiner says: the protest is orchestrated by Glenn Beck and financed by FreedomWorks!
Please name me any protest that had over 500,000 people that did not have some sort of organization or orchestration. Just one.
I thought so.
Man...they DO let anybody write for this site don't they?
That_Guy says: Taking a national tragedy and expropriating it for pathetic partisan Obama rantings is the height of disrespect to what happened on 9/11.
You mean like Obama did with the day yesterday? Day of service?
You mean like Obama did with the NEA? And the head guy got fired? Like that?
Keep it real.
Teabaggers are nothing but a bunch of sheep in Fox clothing.
And where were these brave souls when G.W. Bush rammed the Iraq war down our throats and the Patriot Act through Congress?
Get real, these protests are totally aimed at Obama.
Hey "That Guy"
What is disrespectful is the fact that ground zero looks exactly as it did in 2001. WE ARE BETTER THAN THAT. Government, beaurocrats, and special interests are in the way as usual. When will any dem kool-aid drinkers understandf this? Besides the "you're racist", "your a nazi", "you;'re astrtoturf", the common argument from the left is where were you for 8 years of GWB? Well, I'll admit I was asleep...NOW I AM AWAKE!!!! Awake to the corruption, spending, and big government entitlement programs. That is NOT the foundations for which this country was built on.
D.C. Prostitute
how's the funding on the new whorehouse progressing.
I forgot to mention that this author was the first to understand this movement. Nice job Christian!
Tea is short for taxed enough already. I was just as mad at Bush starting wars and spending money as I am about Obama. I was called non patriotic then and now I’m called a racist, well so be it but I will still be against big government. Big government didn’t make this country great, small entrepreneur’s did and big government and big business, pretty much the same thing, have squashed it!
"And where were these brave souls when G.W. Bush rammed the Iraq war down our throats and the Patriot Act through Congress?
Get real, these protests are totally aimed at Obama."
You mean the Obama that promised to end the wars? Ooops! You mean the Obama that voted for the patriot act? Oops!
"the protest is orchestrated by Glenn Beck and financed by FreedomWorks! When will you stop lying?"
Cut me a break! I was on forums and attending meetings to get most of the repubes and democraps out of power long before Glen Beck appeared. It's not about dem/rep, it is now them against us!
I'm confused by the sign above that says "Keep your socialism, Kansas wants capitalism." By socialism, does the sign holder mean farm subsidies? Or perhaps the sign-holder believes that unemployment insurance, social security, and medicare are socialism? If that's what's meant, lets call a spade a spade and have argument about what we think the government should do for its people. I for one believe that our country should take care of its own, and I'm not sure what the ultimate practical vision of the tea partyers are.
One of the ultimate ironies is that it is true (and global) capitalism at work that is draining jobs from our country's midsection. But I'm doing quite well here in New York, thank you.
Since I took an oath and became a US citizen, I keep reminding myself, “America IS my new country.” Although I love this great country with all my heart, I hardly know any political wing and do not care who the great leader is or not.
People go by experience. In my viewpoint, whatever our government is doing now, that is exactly what my OLD home country, the Chinese government did 50, 60 years ago. The government did what we call today, “Spread the Wealth Around”. In the early 50’s, they hijacked almost all private businesses, and turned them into government control, which we called government properties. The regime jailed and killed many property, business owners or rich people. All those movements destroyed the old Chinese economy. In addition, the more government controls, the more people lost their freedom.
Today Chinese still cannot vote and freely express their thoughts. Even when I posted the Tea Party movement, which I joined on Sept 7 at Morris Green, on one of the Chinese forums, the Chinese government blocked the news for no legitimate reason.
In daily life, the Chinese government decides which news they allow their people to read or how to hear. That was true when I was in China, No matter how you worked, the government decided how much money you could earn and everybody had the same compensation at each level. Equal rich was not funny at all. I have many painful memories.
I had a special feeling about the Tea Party because I was there in the Tiananmen massacre. Today many Americans are doing the same thing that we did in China 1989. Even though both events were twenty years apart, I saw nothing but peaceful and ordinary citizens. Sadly, people in China are still suffering without a voice.
As an observer in the Tiananmen massacre, my family was worried, scared and felt desperate. We finally made a life changing decision to escape from socialism.
With only $50 in our pocket, we worked ourselves up from the bottom. It took us more than a decade of hard work but no government help. I still believe, if poor foreigners who do not even speak any English, they can make themselves prosper without government welfare checks, then most Americans should be self-sufficient.
Taking money away from people who pay taxes to give it to those who do not pay taxes is not a "tax cut." For people who already do not pay taxes, it looks more like a government handout, a welfare check. For me, I saw that scenario in China 50 or 60 years ago, Chinese called that socialism and Americans have created a new slogan, which is “Spread the Wealth Around.”
Today I am getting older and afraid that if our government continues moving toward the direction of socialism, my new country’s people will gradually lose their freedoms as I had before.
Where can I escape this time?
Why dont we see Tea Baggers biatching about the costs of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars?
SEND ME THIS BY EMAIL KELVIN9700@GMAIL.COM
It's unfortunate to see many people in this country are so narrow minded. Narrow-minded. I believe many of them don’t even have healthcare. They think nationalize healthcare is socialism, if it so then since social security, Medicare and Medicaid are running by the government then we’ve been living in socialist country for several decades.
We as a people we need to open up our mind and do the right thing. We call our country the greatest country on earth and the majority of our citizens don’t have the basic need of life, which is health care. Cuba has a better health care system than us. That’s terrible! For a country that we put an embargo on 40 years or so. In order to boast about being the greatest country on earth let start taking care of our citizen first by provide them with decent health care.
Bunch of sheep, easily manipulated by the real players: insurance companies and big pharma, who would be the real losers if healthcare in this country is reformed and is comparable to the rest of the civilized world. Fine then: go bankrupt when you get cancer -- you get the healthcare you deserve. Imbeciles.
To PJ: You have no idea what you're talking about. You actually compare Cuba's healthcare system to ours? The per-capita income in Cuba is less than $10k, compared to $47k in the US. If you really believe Cuba is better in any way, MOVE TO CUBA. Unbelievable! You are so naive and ignorant. You and the Dems want us to believe that 45 million Americans are suffering because they don't have acccess to health coverage. The fact is between 9-15 million people in the US don't have coverage, and many of them are here illegally. And let's say we provide healthcare for all, then what? Should we make sure that everyone has a car? Oh, and let's give everyone a new home. Hahaha............you are a joke. Entitlements are going to bankrupt this country, and what you're fighting for will simply drive us into the gutter sooner rather than later. And yes, this country has taken a more socialist path ever since FDR was president, and now we realize that this may have been a bad path to take.
You have got to be kidding! For all those who say we had no reason to protest is just another way of saying the first amendment means nothing. We are awake now and its sad to say that it took us so long to reach this point! Of course it sucks that we werent there when GWB was doing the stuff he was doing but now we are. We want are freedom and I dont want to go to college for 4 years for nursing to come out having the government telling me what to spend my money on. Believe in the will of man and there are other ways! After all we put a man on the moon and created the atomic bomb. We have worked and people have gave too many lives to just give up now because people want to be given things they havent worked for in the first place. My mom right now is work 2 jobs plus I am working and contributing to the house because she believes the sick and the mentally ill should be the only ones getting money from the government. It is with determination you will have the american dream.
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