The American Tea Parties were a huge success. Just go visit Glenn Reynolds for a great roundup with links, stills and videos.
Onwards to July 4th!
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Tea Party DayApril 16th, 2009 |
 32 comments to Tea Party Day |
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Taylor: if you were at the NYC Tea party, how about a first hand report and photos?
Here are some photos I took in Denver:
https://stpeter.im/index.php/2009/04/15/party-like-its-1773/
The Chicago one was a solid success – probably 2k-2.5k people. Not incredible, but certainly not bad.
Pictures: http://www.foundingbloggers.com/wordpress/2009/04/breaking-chicago-tax-day-tea-party-pictures/
Notes:
Needs more coherent message/image. The diversity of individuals in attendance (in values, outlook, opinions, partisanship, etc) makes this difficult in truth, but possible in projection. The Chicago Tea Party could have used 500+ medium sized Gadsden flags to project a more unified movement.
If the Tea Party movement is going to gain significant traction over the next year or so, a symbol is probably necessary. The Gadsden flag is a good option.
Thoughts?
I’m glad that people are concerned about their government and wanting to get more involved. That’s great! I’m a little concerned about the reasons so many people are doing so. No one likes taxes, I get taxed as much as the next person, and believe me, I don’t have much to spare (waitress with student loans). But I understand that a government needs money to function and I don’t believe they are taking money just to do so. While it’s great to look at our history as a role model for action, it’s not completely fair to call it “taxation without representation.” We had a vote, and hopefully you took advantage of that. And of that voting majority, representatives were chosen. I find it interesting that our new President is being criticized for following through with many of his campaign promises (more so than most of our previous Presidents, Democratic or Republican). Let’s not forget how we (the people, companies, workers, Liberal and Conservative New Networks) were calling for help when the big companies began to go under. Former President Bush initiated the bailouts and our new President is following through with the previous administration’s actions. President Obama also attempted to ease taxes on the majority with reduced Defense spending and tax cuts for the wealthy, both rejected by Congress. Don’t lose your interest in our government; continue to inform your representatives on your problems, complaints, comments, ideas, etc. That’s the best way to work towards a democracy. But please also try to be as best informed as possible. Watch multiple news networks, read articles, and seek out international news outlets. For a more effective protest, get facts straight. Nothing hurts an argument more than putting forth information that is not completely accurate. The budget that is currently in effect was repeatedly looked over, reformed by, and passed by both President Obama AND our representatives in the Senate and Congress. This is not “taxation without representation.” It is “taxation under representation.”
Amanda:
What constitutes functioning? Taxation and government spending in the US has been rising steadily for about a century. What is the limit? Should the government be spending money on agricultural subsidies?
What about ‘social’ security? If the government cannot trust people to save money for their golden years, should the government also start mandatory ‘home’ security and ‘college’ security funds, since people cannot be trusted to save money on their own for these?
Government is the problem, not the solution and if taxes are lower more wealth will be created in the long run.
Dale, why? What happens on July 4th, and why would a British site be interested in it?
Why not start a “Tea Party Security” program. You will be forced at gunpoint to pay into this fund out of each paycheck, and the fund will be used to finance resistance to government when it becomes oppressive.
Ooooops … too late.
Taxation without Representation is borrowing the illusion of prosperity, and forcing future generations to pay for it. Otherwise known as the Bush/Obama/McCain economic plan.
Amanda, the “because Bush did it” is not really much of an answer, though you are right that the GOP lost any semblence of credibility on low-tax politics – with a few honourable exceptions – some time ago. That said, the scale of the increases since The One took over are eye-watering.
You can oppose the state one policy at a time, or you can go for the heart of the hydra, the tax structure. If this is, in fact, the beginning of a new movement, it’s aimed in exactly the right direction.
I saw a clip on youtube showing a CNN harridan talking over the Dad carrying his kid to crap on about some government vote-buying/payoff idea. It was obscene.
And she had the audacity to get sniffy when she was heckled for not being a reporter.
A CeauŠŸescu Moment beacons.
In some ways the UK is in a better position than the US, for we don’t have the “St Obama” problem.
We don’t have a St Obama problem either. There are koolaid drinkers, but remember, 55 million people voted against him.
Amanda, the problem isn’t “taxation without representation”–it’s “taxation without conception”!!! I’d like to thank you, your future children, and your future grandchildren for picking up the tab. Very generous.
It’s also “deliberative democracy” without the deliberation! THEY DIDN’T READ THE STIMUPORK BILL BEFORE THEY PASSED IT! Over 9000 earmarks! There’s only 635 senators and representatives. That’s over 14 earmarks each average.
It’s K street rent seekers and “campaign contribution” seeking whores. They jigger the tax code ad infinitum, ad nauseam to “manage our behavior” and give certain patrons advantages, lessening market competition.
Bastiat said what is illegal and immoral for a man to do is also illegal and immoral for a government to do. If I cannot rob you by gunpoint, the government shouldn’t either. Yes, they have the power of gunpoint. Try not paying your taxes and they’ll confiscate and incarcerate.
The previous so-called “Greatest” generation was the greediest. They voted themselves a bunch of benefits and then refused to have enough children to support the scheme. The Ponzi pyramid is about to collapse, Social Security crashes this year or next.
China reduced their purchases of US debt, market pressure will drive the interest cost up, we are making ourselves vulnerable, and jeopardizing our sovereign bond rating. The explosion of multitrillion debts will blow up and make us a third world country.
Ah well, the American experiment was nice while it lasted.
Hey, the income tax started in 1913…we’re coming up on a century. There’s a ripe opportunity for more teapartying.
Amanda,
If Obama and the Democratic leeches aren’t stopped, you’ll never have enough money to pay off your student loans, much less buy a home. The amount of deficit spending they’ve projected is absolutely breathtaking in its magnitude. Not only are they going to screw everyone living now, they’re going two generations deep with the bill.
Of course, the reality is that the Obama bills will never really be paid back; the currency will be debased beyond redemption, the government debts will be “honored” with worthless paper, and the middle classes will be destroyed.
We’ve got the makings of a very ugly situation in both the U.S. and the U.K. at the moment. The question really is whether enough people will wake up to pull both countries back before they go over the cliff. I’m a bit more optimistic about the U.S. because there are a lot of people who have guns. The lefties have to at least think about the possibility of armed resistance. The U.K., on the other hand, is ripe for the picking, a fact not lost on its productive classes who are emigrating in numbers that match anything in British history.
The North Asians are standing back and looking at this implosion of the main Western democracies with contemptuous amusement. They’ll be happy to help both sides destroy each other and they’ll come in to pick up the pieces once it’s over.
I popped in to our small, rural, West Texas town’s tea party yesterday lunchtime and it was very well attended. Passed it again at 9PM on the way home from dinner and it was still going strong.
While paying for dinner, I made a point of indicating the half dozen, or so, permits and licenses displayed on the wall of the family owned restaurant and asking the clerk “How many hours a week do you figure you work just to pay for all the bureaucracy behind those stupid bits of paper?”
Sadly, the teenager didn’t get it, seeming to believe that such was normal and proper. I suppose that this shows that the public schools are doing their (real) job effectively, then.
I was at the tea party in St. Paul, Minnesota. The bullhorn announced 10,000 people, and I was quite willing to agree from what I saw. It all was very polite and Minnesotan, but the boos and cheers were enthusiastic. Both parties got the boos.
The problem with Amanda’s concerns is that we’re hearing “taxes haven’t been raised on 95% of Americans.” That’s a lie and it needs to be understood to be a lie. DIRECT- taxation is the necessary qualifier. INDIRECT- taxation, those higher taxes on businesses that will be passed on to others, is the heart of the problem.
Increased government spending IS a tax increase on all of us, regardless of who is directly taxed.
When you increase the taxes on oil companies, for example (and this Congress and Obama are doing that), those taxes are passed along to the consumer. Consumers see them as “gas prices rising” and will point a finger at the oil companies… and not at the government, where the blame belongs. This Administration will shake a pointed finger at “those greedy oil companies” as a distortion of the truth.
The second problem is that, while we realize the government needs money to function, we have not authorized the government to engage in the functions it has assumed. The Federal government is STRICTLY limited to defense of the nation (national security), coinage, interstate matters, and foreign affairs. Everything else they do is unconstitutional.
This Administration (and this Congress) is ignoring those Constitutional restrictions. They have no authority to engage in domestic programs. Those are for the states to manage (and raise and collect taxes for those purposes).
Folks complain about rising taxes and point fingers at a lot of people and programs, but the biggest problem (where the majority of our money is going) is on entitlement programs. The actual spending in other (discretionary) programs has remained relatively steady/flat…. until THIS Congress and Obama. When entitlements increase (and they will exponentially as Baby Boomers retire), even if every other budget line remained the same, we will see increases in spending of Biblical proportions (and that’s before Obama engages in any more socialist reindeer games). This is why people say things like “spending rose under Bush” but that’s a distortion. Social Security and other welfare programs rose, and that distorts the total spend to give folks the impression that discretionary spending rose significantly under Bush. It didn’t.
While the progression of more and more consolidation at the Federal level is not unique to this Congress and this Administration, the magnitude of the shift has been equivalent to a Tsunami. Increased spending when we’re a few years away from the pyramid flipping on Social Security makes these new programs cross the line to malfeasance.
I hope that the minimum outcome of the tea party protests will be a national sales tax (a repeal of the 17th Amendment), and a restoration of all domestic matters restored to the states. I would prefer that we simply repeal the 17th and return to the collection of all taxes to the states, with the states holding the check as the carrot to keep the Feds in line. (A repeal of the 16th would go a long way in solving the temptation to enlarge the Fed government, too.)
Actually, my real hope is that we start talking seriously about peaceful secession/division of the nation. If there are enough folks who want a socialist government, I say that we should let them have one. Give them all the rope they want.
No, but we don’t have the Tea Parties either.
Here’s the really interesting story about Tea Party Day in America.
Over a million people nationwide took to the streets, angrily yet peacefully protesting against profligate government spending, high taxes and the encroachment of socialism in our free-market society.
The most heated rhetoric of the day came not from a member of the public, but from the Governor of Texas, Rick Perry (BBUH), who was talking about… secession.
I have yet to see a mention of yesterday’s events in any U.K. newspaper (can’t speak for the BBC — we don’t get it, thank goodness).
Any comments on that one?
Sorry — I meant to write a “quarter-million”, but I had a senior moment.
I estimate it was well over 1 million,my senior friend! There were supposedly about 800 tea parties nationwide. Only 1,250 at each is 1 million. We had about 20,000 at the Atlanta Tea Party. This was my first time participating as a protestor. I think the amazing thing about the crowd was the very large majority of Mature adults attending. I saw groups of women aged 50-60. This looked more like a Chamber of Commerce meeting crowd than protestors. The signs were fantastic. It was obviously attended by smart, hard working types, the type of people who have to hire Obama voters, who are just fed up. I don’t see this slacking off. I recruited 3 friends to go to this one and we will each recruit more for the next one.
Finally, my favorite sign:
Stimulus Check: $20.32
Tube of K-Y Jelly : $20.32
Coincidence!
I think not.
G’day!
Here’s an article about the Governor of Texas talking about secession. A gentle reference, to be sure, but a trial balloon has been lofted. This will be interesting to watch!
Jerry, fair comment, but not many of the gatherings were more than a couple hundred people. In the larger cities, the crowds were in their thousands, but there were only a few of those. Most places were a lot smaller.
Regardless: hundreds of thousands of people protested; no one was injured, no one attacked the police, no property was damaged, no one was burned in effigy, and everyone seems to have picked up their trash when they left. No violence of any kind was reported — and I bet more than a few people were carrying guns…
And STILL no reports from any of the British media.
Of course, we ordinary middle-class people don’t normally protest like the Left does (short explanation: we’re property owners and have families and jobs and such).
Best part of the whole thing: a couple of Republicans asked to address the crowds, and were (politely) turned down.
Quote of the day: “Today, it’s the chance for the people to speak and for the politicians to listen.“
Demographics of Chicago Tea Party attendees:
Median age I would estimate to be about 33-35
Average age I would estimate to be about 35-38
About 70% male
About 85% white (there was one black guy with a Nobama sweatshirt, which was great to see)
Sounds like the UK media is giving the Tea Party phenomenon the same treatment that the US media is giving Sleazegate.
I guess that makes me feel a little better.
More Denver photos here on Flickr.
I would say at peak, there were 2500 attending here. Even if there were only a few hundred in every Tea Party, it is quite a strong statement that this non-party nationwide event happened without a hitch in 800+ locations.
CNN Newsreader Anderson Cooper outed himself by an offhand casual comment about not being able to talk while teabagging.
A straight man wouldn’t think you couldn’t talk while teabagging.
Anderson’s mouth is full.
Laff riot!!!
The reason the U.S. mainstream media is ignoring Sleazegate is the same reason that the U.S. mainstream media is ignoring the tea parties: they’re a bunch of Lefty asswipes.
Now, if Sleazegate had happened to a Tory government…
Can you say, “banner headlines”, children?
Other observations from Denver:
I’d guesstimate 3000 people at any one time, but people also kept coming and going. At the outside there may have been 5000 or so over the course of the day.
Northern Front Range people: having a sheriff like Jim Alderden or a DA like Ken Buck, you guys don’t know how lucky you are.
Too bad Governor Ritter didn’t have the sack to show up and explain himself. Or any of the other seven dwarves either.
I thought one thing was interesting: there was a substantial police presence (a few dozen DPD and the Capitol’s usual CSP presence.) However, they were ALL wearing class-A uniforms.[1][2] This was nothing like the DNC, the Columbus Day crap, or the illegal alien marches.
I’m guessing this may have also been an unusually-heavily-armed crowd for Denver, just judging from looking at random people’s waists. But even when the, um, “disadvantaged urban youth” at the Civic Center bus terminal or on the train started blocking the sidewalk to yell racial remarks about evil rich white people, and how aforementioned disadvantaged urban youth ‘need it more,’ nothing happened.
Whoever had the giant sign about Obama being a crypto-
Muslim: don’t stand next to me next time. You are an utter toolbag.
Speaking of toolbags, AM760 “Progressive Talk” was covering this heavily the following day. Did you know that this was an illegitimate movement and a symbol of the ugliness of American racism? And yet, there’s a serious angry undercurrent that progressives need to learn to harness.
Lastly: it’s not uncommon for people to bring their dogs to protests. I’d considered bringing Goldenretrieverfish. (Changed my mind when I learned that the light rail didn’t allow pets). But this is the first protest I’ve ever been to where PEOPLE ACTUALLY ROUTINELY CLEANED UP AFTER THEIR DOGS.
I was shocked.
[1] I’m sure that they had helmets, shields, gas, rifles, whatever. But I looked and didn’t see them.
[2] Class-A, for most agencies, is the day-to-day uniform: neatly-pressed shirt and trousers, shined leather, metal shield and nameplate pinned to the shirt, and if the officer wears armor it’s under his clothes. For cities it’s usually all navy blue, for CSP (which has primary jurisdiction at the Capitol itself) it’s a lighter blue shirt and tan pants, and a gray smokey-the-bear hat. This is not the clothing that they wear when they expect a riot to happen.
Many of the people who are involved in the Tea Party events have opposed the rise of government spending for years – the obvious example is Glenn Beck (who denounced Bush and the Republicans endlessly).
Although, of course, the “Economist” holds
that Glenn Beck has only denounced Barack Obama (not the last century of American history) as the road to socialist or fascist collectivism. But then the ironically named “Lexington” section of the Economist does not bother to actually watch the Glenn Beck show before writing about it – instead “Lexington” admits that it gets its information from the far left “Mediamatter” smear site.
As for the “mainstream media” it is difficult to know where to start.
For example, the CNN “journalist” who tried to crush a protester by saying that President Obama’s latest plan gave vast ammounts of money to the State in which the Tea Party event she was covering (the Chicago one) was being held.
Firstly it is not the role of a journalist to debate protesters at an events she is covering – still less to try and put them down and denounce the tottally peaceful event as “not family viewer”.
But more broader there was the basic ignorance of the “journalist” – the lady did not even know that government spending (such as shoving more taxpayer’s money to corrupt Illinois) was what the protest was against.
Still even the above is better than the standard media response (on CNN as well as NBC) of making endless obsene references to “tea bagging”.
Or (on NBC) denouncing the events (of so many hundreds of thousands of people) as just a collection of “racist Rednecks upset because a black man is President” (how about Walter Williams for President?) and denoucing black people who went to the events as Uncle Toms or people who suffer from the “Stockholm Syndrome”.
For years I have said that the mainstream media were far left – the products of the same education system that produces such things as the teacher training colleges. And for years friends have politely tolerated my paranoia.
Now the mask is torn for all to see.
The “mainstream media” and the “education system” that produce them are far left – simple as that.
They are the enemy.
Their objective is to brainwash the population (especially the young) in order to destroy civil society and create the collectivist state they crave.
Slash the Pentagon’s ridiculous spending by 50%, then you can have a really big tax cut.
Most of the Pentagon’s budget is spent on stupid crap which is of no use.
Throw Alan Greenspan in jail and take all his money and give it to the taxpayers he screwed.
I was at the Tea Party in Greenville, SC, Friday night. (It was scheduled two days after tax filing day, so it didn’t conflict with others.) Very well attended; several thousand people were there, for a couple of hours. All ages were present, although most seemed to be middle-aged, which (in my experience) is quite unusual for a protest rally. I’m glad I went.
Relgulus – you could “slash the Pentagon budget” by 100% and the United States would still be in deficit.
You really are behind the times.
In fact you seem to be living in the 1950s – before the rise of the Great Society entitlement programs (let alone the mega bailouts of the last six months).
This is not to attack you – after all I would prefer to be living in the 1950’s myself.
However, I agree with throwing Alan Greenspan in jail.