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| The tea party’s terrorist tactics By: William YeomansThe tea party’s terrorist tactics Illustration by Matt Mahurin. Close By WILLIAM YEOMANS | 7/29/11 8:22 AM EDT Updated: 7/29/11 5:06 PM EDT |
| It has become commonplace to call the tea party faction in the House “hostage takers.” But they have now becomefull-blown terrorists.They have joined the villains of American history who have been sufficiently craven to inflict massive harm on innocent victims to achieve their political goals. A strong America has always stood firm in the face of terrorism. That tradition is in jeopardy, as Congress and President Barack careen toward an uncertain outcome in the tea party- manufactured debt crisis.As we stumble closer to Aug. 2, it has become clear that many in the tea party are willing to inflict massive harmon the American people to obtain their political objective of a severely shrunken federal government. Their persistence in rejecting compromise, even as the economic effects of the phony crisis they have created mount, has taken their radicalism beyond tough negotiating, beyond even hostage-taking.As markets fall in anticipation that there may not be a timely resolution; as credit agencies issue dire warnings that the U.S. political system has become so dysfunctional that a credit downgrade may be inevitable, and as America looks weakened in the eyes of the world, the tea party’s hostage-taking has evolved into the intentional infliction of harm on innocent Americans to achieve a political objective – terrorism.Terrorism is a tough term, but, unfortunately, it describes tea party tactics precisely. Their first step was to vow not to vote to raise the debt ceiling.Here, as in many radical factions, there was a split between the purists and the pragmatists. Pragmatists vowed not to raise the ceiling unless draconian cuts were made in the federal government.Purists didn’t bother with an “unless.” They, including presidential candidate Rep. Michele Bachman (R-Minn.), were willing to let the entire edifice come crashing down — hiding behind magical thinking that allowed them to deny that anything horrible would happen if the ceiling were not raised.Out of this vow grew the phony linkage between raising the debt ceiling and addressing the deficit. Raising the debt ceiling, of course, has nothing to do with addressing the deficit. It simply allows the federal government to pay debts that have already been incurred, based on expenditures that Congress has already authorized.It lets the federal government pay its bills – an act of basic responsibility that every American — conservative and liberal — should embrace. Raising the ceiling is a pro forma act that Congress has performed repeatedly through Republican and Democratic administrations. Every president – from Ronald Reagan to Bill Clinton – has labeled failure to raise it unthinkable, because to do so would be to intentionally inflict harm on America.The harm is, in part, unknowable because we have always resisted any temptation to run the experiment of failing to raise the ceiling. Even if the federal government could avoid default on its loan obligations for an uncertain time, the harm would be immense. The president would have to prioritize federal expenditures, choosing whether to send Social Security checks, pay federal employees ranging from FBI agents to food inspectors to troops in the field, make Medicare payments, provide for veterans, collect taxes and on and on.Even in the absence of default, credit agencies would almost surely downgrade our credit worthiness, producing increases in interest rates that would slow the economy, increase unemployment and force families into foreclosure and bankruptcy.As the markets dropped, families would watch their retirement and education savings and their dreams disappear.Rather than reject the unthinkable, the tea party harnessed this potential harm as its weapon of mass destruction.For pragmatists, it allowed a hostage-taking. The pragmatists threatened to defeat a raise in the debt ceiling unless Congress and President Barack Obama rejected taxes on the wealthy and accepted budget cuts that would move the country toward the tea party’s idealized vision of an America. Their dream is an alternate version of the United States — before the New Deal, the Great Society and civil rights laws alleviated massive inequality and injustice — and extended American opportunity.The tea party faction could not achieve these goals through straight up democratic means because of their unpopularity. So it resorted to its threat of mass destruction. They were able to do so because they formed a disciplined blocthat gave them leverage over the House leadership and because of the threat that members who did not go along would face primary challenges from the right.Hard-core tea party members were empowered by their oft-repeated disdain for reelection. They were liberated to pursue their radical course because they were freed from the traditional constraint on members of Congress, imposed by the need to face the voters.Their goals were also served by the Republican Party’s success in selling the notion that the country faces an urgent debt crisis. Nearly every economist agrees that we face a long-term debt problem, but there is no reason it must be addressed by Aug. 2.The concern that our credit may be downgraded if we don’t enact an immediate debt reduction plan is driven almost entirely by the loss of credibility in our political system — engendered by the phony frenzy surrounding the debt ceiling legislation.
While most economists agree that we need to address long-term debt issues, many recognize that our immediate crisis is high unemployment and economic stagnation, conditions that will most likely be exacerbated by sucking hundreds of billions of dollars out of the economy in the short-term. The challenge for America is to stand firm in the face of terrorism, no matter the source. Tea party members must reassess their distorted vision of patriotism and join true patriots in Congress in raising the debt ceiling promptly until 2013, without inflicting further economic harm on already struggling Americans. The president should insist on a clean debt ceiling bill, Congress should get it to him — as it has dozens of times in the past — and the president should sign it promptly. So the nation can get on with addressing the truly significant problems that it faces. William Yeomans, an American University law professor, served as Sen. Ted Kennedy’s chief counsel on the Senate Judiciary Committee and as a Justice Department official. |
| © 2011 POLITICO LLC |
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Capitulation
August 1, 2011 – 6:54am ET
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The raw deal on the budget ceiling has been cut. The Tea Party terrorists – the extremist faction willing to hold the economy hostage to get their way – have won. The Republic, common sense and decency have been trampled.
With the economy deeply depressed, 25 million people in need of full time work, the raw deal will impede any recovery. It precludes any serious action on jobs from the federal government. It will cost jobs as spending is cut. Instead of getting serious about a plan to revive this economy and put people back to work, Washington will remain fixated on what and how much to cut. From the President to the Tea Party zealots, politicians will tell Americans that this agreement is “important to our economy.” Yes, it is important – important in the way a virus is important to a sickly patient. It will make things worse.
With Gilded Age inequality, and hedge fund billionaires paying a lower effective tax rate than their secretaries, the deal contains no tax hikes. Poor and working Americans are asked to pay to clean up the mess that Wall Street’s excesses created.
Although the terms of the agreement are complicated, the capitulation is clear. There will be deep cuts in discretionary spending—$900 billion over 10 years, one-third from the Pentagon—in the first step. There are no tax revenues, much less higher taxes on millionaires in that mix. (The President touts that domestic discretionary spending will be slashed to levels not seen since the Eisenhower administration, presenting a travesty as if it were a victory.)
Then a rump congressional committee—a gang of 12, split between Republicans and Democrats—will be given the charter and extraordinary powers to find another $1.5 trillion over 10 years, from cuts in Medicare and Medicaid or possibly with revenues from closing loopholes (raising tax rates seems to be off the table.) Republicans have already pledged to allow no revenue increases.
If the committee gridlocks, there will be an automatic $1.2 trillion in across the board spending cuts, with the Pentagon and Medicare on the chopping block, while Medicaid, Social Security, veteran’s pay and programs for the poor are exempted.
The raw deal sets a precedent that Republican leaders are already celebrating: from now on, they boast, every debt ceiling vote will be the occasion for holding the economy hostage to more extreme demands. A balanced budget constitutional amendment. A two-thirds vote for any tax hike on the rich. Privatization of Social Security. The demands will get more extreme over time.
No progressive can or should vote for this capitulation. Republicans have won big. They should be forced to produce the votes to pass this in the House. If they can’t, the president should do what he should have done from the beginning. Stop the negotiations, demand a clean lift of the debt ceiling, and invoke his constitutional powers to avoid default.
If the deal passes the Congress, then congressional Democrats should insure that no Democrat named to the Gang of 12 will accept any agreement that does not include more revenues than spending cuts, while defending Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security from a rump process.
Given Republican intransigence, that will force deadlock, triggering deep spending cuts that won’t go into effect until January of 2013. Americans can then decide in the election whether they want to vote for those who would gut Medicare and Social Security to protect tax breaks for the wealthy.
The media will trumpet the agreement; the markets will exhale; the pressure to fall in line will be great. But when the dust clears, the economy will still be in trouble, and the federal government will be less able to help. Americans will see investments in schools, research, public health, clean energy, transportation cut back. Inequality will grow; poverty will spread.
Voters will have to decide. They know Republicans are prepared to go to the mat to protect the wealthy from tax hikes, even to the point of endangering the economy. Will voters have any clue about what Democrats are prepared to fight for?
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Tea Party Terrorists: America’s Next Great Threat?
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Credit: Jesse Russell, Madison, WITea Party activists promoting white supremacist conspiracy theory at a demonstration in Madison, Wisconsin..
It used to be that only the craziest elements of the right wing espoused conspiracies and violent rhetoric. Not any more.
About this time each year, the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) publishes their report on violent rightwing extremist groups. This year’s report, titled Rage on the Right, goes beyond looking at the usual group of skinheads, neo-Nazi, Patriot militias, and nativist extremist and includes fringe elements of the Tea Party movement. Just to be clear, SPLC has not determined the Tea Party movement to be an extremist rightwing movement. Rather, the report has established that much of the Tea Party ideology is rooted in extremism. “The ‘tea parties’ and similar groups that have sprung up in recent months cannot fairly be considered extremist groups, but they are shot through with rich veins of radical ideas, conspiracy theories and racism.” However, the report does warn us, “The signs of growing radicalization are everywhere. Armed men have come to Obama speeches bearing signs suggesting that the ‘tree of liberty’ needs to be ‘watered’ with ‘the blood of tyrants.’ [1]
To be considered an extremist group they must engaged in highly confrontational actions, use hate speech, and support violent tactics. Some could argue that the tea baggers have already shown themselves to be highly confrontational and willing to use racist hate speech. Lest we forget their disruptive tactics at town hall meetings last summer or more recently the racist, homophobic vitriol and even spitting on one member of congress last weekend.
We also saw this week a concerted campaign of intimidation by a rightwing extremist group to throw bricks into the windows of Democrat Party offices. We learned that Mike Vanderboegh, former leader of a radical Patriot group called the Alabama Constitutional Militia has been advocating on his blog breaking the windows of members of congress. He states that if the rightwing breaks enough Democrat Party members windows, the Dems just might get the message, “and make defending ourselves at the muzzle of a rifle unnecessary… BREAK their windows. Break them Now.” [2]
What is important to note about Vanderboegh’s intimidation tactics and threats is that much of the anti-government, anti-immigrant, racist, militant conspiracy theory ideology he spews out on his website is now openly being embraced by the Tea Party movement, members of the rightwing media machine, and many Republicans as well. It used to be that only the craziest elements of the rightwing espoused such conspiracies and violent rhetoric. Now we see Glenn Beck and other Fox News hosts and contributors regularly make statements that could be considered inciting violence. Here for example is long time Fox News contributor Dick Morris talking last year on Your World with Neil Cavuto about president Obama working with the UN on a trade deal, “Those crazies in Montana who say, “We’re going to kill ATF agents because the UN’s going to take over’ — well, they’re beginning to have a case.” [3]
Dick Morris, Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh, and the tea partiers all claim a near hatred for government and a belief that liberals and president Obama are working to create a “New World Order.” They claim progressive liberals wish to round up the conservatives, take away their guns, and send them off to concentration camps in order to enact a socially dream in which the government controls every aspect of your lives. I know it all sounds crazy. That is because it is crazy, except for the part that many on the right believe actually this crazy conspiracy theory. A theory so crazy that it originated over twenty years ago by some of the most extreme white supremacist, Patriot militia groups our nation has ever seen. Groups like the Christian Patriots Defense League and the White Patriot Party. Groups that are currently follow people like the brick throwing wingnut Vanderboegh.
Here is an excerpt from another SPLC report, which I posted last year in an earlier article I wrote on the origins of rightwing extremist groups. I think it is worth quoting again, “the militia movement not only accepted the traditional conspiracy theories, it created a host of new ones; combined, they described a shadowy movement intent on creating a one-world socialist government no matter what the cost. This “New World Order,” using the United Nations as its primary tool, had already taken over most of the planet. The United States was still a bastion of freedom, but its own government was collaborating with New World Order forces to strip Americans slowly of their freedoms in preparation for the final takeover. The government was erecting large numbers of concentration camps in which to place American dissenters; meanwhile, the number of United Nations troops secretly encamped in national parks grew by the month. Stickers on the backs of street signs would guide the New World Order to strategic points, while the authorities enlisted urban street gangs to help enforce gun confiscation. “The Federal government and the press is [sic] fighting a war against independent thinking Christian patriots,” wrote Christian Identity adherent and militia supporter George Eaton in 1993. “The reason they have targeted patriots is simple; they will not conform or submit to the New World Order.” [4]
A Harris Poll published March, 22, 2010 demonstrates the influence extremist ideology has had on Republicans. When asked about Obama’s intentions, 51 % believed, “He wants to turn over the sovereignty of the United States to a one world government,” 45 % believe, “He was not born in the United States and so is not eligible to be president,” 61% says he, “Wants to take away Americans’ right to own guns,” 39 % believes he “Is doing many of the things that Hitler did,” and 41% answered true to the statement that Obama, “Wants to use an economic collapse or terrorist attack as an excuse to take dictatorial powers.” [5]
At one time, this type of thinking was considered rightwing extremist fringe ideology. Today, the conspiracy theories of the crazies are trickling into the main stream rightwing media. We see slogans and rhetoric splattered across the front pages of our papers that could have been written by George Eaton or Timothy McVeigh. And that is where all of this vitriol and crazy conspiracy theories ultimately can lead to, another Oklahoma City bombing. That is why all of us need to talk to our fellow Americans and listen to them without using bullhorns, racial slurs and brinks throw their windows. We need to end allowing crazy conspiracy theories to substitute honest debate on policy differences.
I suggest all Americans take a deep breath and consider the words of Fox News host Shep Smith when this past Wednesday he said, “I wonder when it is an isolated incident becomes a string of things. … You wonder when some in there, on both sides of the aisle, are gonna look in the mirror and go, my over-inflated rhetoric is causing some people…[to] go out and react given the information that they’ve been given. I just wonder if anybody’s gonna settle down a minute and go, Wow, we better settle down here, relax. … What we do know is that when leaders on either side of the aisle go with this over-inflated rhetoric and they tell us it’s the end of the world, it’s Armageddon, the Marxists have taken over Washington, it’s the end of the world as we know it, we’re moving into socialism… when they say things like that, that maybe some of them don’t believe, and then the fringes believe it, and then they go out and do stupid things…Well, I mean, it’s all kind of tied together isn’t it?” [6] Yes, Mr. Smith, it is all kind of tied together.
Dean Walker
[2] http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26315908/#36010598
[3] 3/31/09
[4] http://www.adl.org/learn/ext_us/militia_m.asp?xpicked=4&item=19
[6] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/03/24/shep-smith-death-threats_n_512378.html
Copyright © 2010 HurricaneDean
15 comments on Tea Party Terrorists: America’s Next Great Threat?
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Hey Dan,
Excellent article as usual, however totally off base on the facts!! Are there extreme elements within the Tea Party movement, I suspect there may be. However, as someone who’s personally and proudly attended Tea Party protests, I’ve never seen anything that remotely suggests what is this columnist is referencing, in fact in your opening paragraph you quote this writer “The ‘tea parties’ and similar groups that have sprung up in recent months cannot fairly be considered extremist groups”
Then he unfairly characterizing the movement as extremists, and of course being the “progressive” you are (I’m smiling as I write that), you parrot his obvious slated views to make his point. Then you continue to slander this group of “patriots” by referring to them as “tea baggers”.
Some could argue that the tea baggers have already shown themselves to be highly confrontational and willing to use racist hate speech.
Nowhere in your article do you provide first person quotes, as to the “hate speech” referenced.
Dan, with all due respect, I’m part of that movement, the majority of the quotes you see on those signs are authored for the most part by our (yours and mine)…Founding Fathers.
I don’t want to get into the Constitution and what this administration is doing to our country, that’s a debate for another time. However, you need to be accurate and factual, there are crazies on the left, and there are crazies on the right.
Amo
Report abuse
Dean, if you have read Darkness At Noon then you know how mob violence gets started, builds to a frenzy and has a culmination in horrible consequences. If I have ever agreed with anyone on FOX, it would be the statement you quoted from Shep Smith. We all need to take a deep breath, or as The Moody Blues sang, “Breathe deep the gathering gloom.”
Excellent article, Dean.
Amo, W.Bush’s own administration has used data and reports provided by the Southern Poverty Law Center. It is their evidence, plus that of the FBI and Dept. Homeland Security, which supports the facts that I have presented here and in other articles.
What I claim in this article is that the tea bagger’s rhetoric not only comes from snippets of words from our founding fathers, but also is rich in our nations most extremist beliefs and conspiracy theories. I intentionally pulled out the quote about the tea baggers not yet fully committed to violence, however, they are edging toward it. If you check out the SPLC links I provide you will find a mountain of evidence of an ever growing rightwing proclivity toward violence. I’d be happy to provide you with the links to pdf files from the FBI and DHS that supports SPLC evidence. Or, you can just go to previous articles I have written about the subject and find them and numerous other links.
The problem here is that the rightwing does not want to own their own shame. They don’t want to stand up in opposition to the violence coming from their own ranks. Rather, they make false claims like “the other side is doing it as well” in order to dismiss and sometimes even justify the violence.
The fact is, all across America their are hundreds of rightwing groups that advocate violence. The four major movements are the white supremacists, Christian Identity, Patriot/Militia, and Nativist movements. There are literally hundreds of groups that follow one or more of these four movements ideology. The tea baggers have been dangerously embracing these radical ideologies.
I believe the tea baggers needs to distance themselves from these violent extremist elements. That is one of the reasons why I wrote this article.
Tea Bagger: A term first known to be used in the Roger Waters in the film Pecker. Then incorporated by the Tea Party movement to mistakenly describe by themselves.
Carl Rove has openly spoken out against the militia, white supremacist elements within the Tea Party movement.
“The movement has also attracted members of the Council of Conservative Citizens, which supports some white supremacist causes, and from the John Birch Society and the LaRouchies. In a February 19 column in the Wall Street Journal, former Bush adviser Karl Rove described both as “fringe groups.”
“If tea party groups are to maximize their influence on policy, they must now begin the difficult task of disassociating themselves from cranks and conspiracy nuts,” Rove wrote. “This includes 9/11 deniers, ‘birthers’ who insist Barack Obama was not born in the United States, and militia supporters espousing something vaguely close to armed rebellion.”
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE62H2YW20100318
As Rove has said, Amo and his fellow Tea Party activists need to disassociate themselves from the racist militia groups. Along with their rhetoric and conspiracy theories. I keep wondering how come Amo has not spoken out against the extremism. And another question one might ask is when does someone become complicit in the racism and militarism?
It is our own FEAR that is what we need to drop. I know how insidious it can affect our lives.
Several years ago I was in 2 armed robberies ( I worked in a pawn shop) in 2 years.
Terrorist has become a common word. I have even called my dogs terrorist .You can’t rid the fear from the world by focusing on fear.
Dean even though you are an excellant writer, I am sure you were focusing on fear when writing this article.
I find that when I focus on fear I see it everywhere. So I look for a better feeling though and I see that everywhere.
We are all on the same ride. Be fearful or happy, you choose.
Lady D. Thanks for your comments. Actually I was and still am focused on fear mongering, not fear itself. I’ve spent my entire adult life standing up for peace and justice and I have no plans on changing now. Anyway, standing up for truth and justice brings me the most happiness in my life.
The more I research the Tea Party movement the more I realize just how seeped in racism, hate, and conspiracy theories they are. And now their members are teetering on violence. They have become the latest and fertile recruiting ground for nativists and white supremacists extremist groups. You can say, the Tea Party movement is becoming the political front to the extreme Patriot/militia movement.
It is time for people to speak up. It is time to call a spade a spade. The research in coming in to support my claims. We need to ask Tea Party activists why they support a movement that openly spews racist, hateful conspiracy theories. If we don’t stand up to the racist, fear mongers, we need only look at Oklahoma City to see what will happen. Let us all remember, on the day Timothy McVeigh blew up the federal building (April 19) he wore a tee shirt that said, “The tree of Liberty needs to be watered from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.”
That may be a Jefferson quote, but it is also a slogan adopted by the white supremacists, nativist militias and we are seeing it used more and more by Tea Party activists. Just look at this two minute video of U.S. Congressman Emanuel Cleaver being spit on by a Tea Party member. Or this thirty second video of Tea Party members mocking a man with Parkinson’s disease. As far as I am concerned, anyone willing to stand side by side with the people shown in these videos are equally as sick, a disgrace, and a threat to democracy. In the name of peace, justice, democracy and liberty, Americans need to stand up to the Tea Party hatred and violence. We can no longer afford to turn a blind eye.
Just don’t get caught up in the Fear. Don’t be against anything, be for something. I know it doesn’t seem like much, but it makes a difference.
You are a great advocate. I suppose we are coming from different directions.
Dean, with all due respect, I’ve read almost all of the information you’ve provided, in your article, which is simply brimming with allegations, and lots of conjecture, however nothing of substance when it comes to the Tea Part Movement.
You’re continued pejorative slang, referencing the people within the movement as “tea baggers” indicates a total lack of respect for those people and what they believe in, and sadly tells me a lot about you and your views
Incredibility, within a few short paragraphs you’ve referenced almost every single hate group imaginable. Obviously your agenda is not to write a factual narrative, but rather to smear and discredit a growing populace political movement that simply disagrees with your progressive philosophy.
Within the context of your article assessing the Tea Party Movement you’ve reverenced skinheads, neo-Nazi, Patriot militias, and nativist extremist, disruptive tactics at town hall meetings, racist, homophobic vitriol and even spitting on one member of congress last weekend. Christian Patriots Defense League and the White Patriot Party Groups that are currently follow people like the brick throwing wingnut Vanderboegh.
Then of course to add little more spice to your article, you referenced, Hitler, Timothy McVeigh and the Oklahoma City bombing.
Wow, I think you’ve outdone yourself and covered all the progressive points; however I think you could have also thrown in the earthquake in Haiti.
Seriously, you also referenced “yours truly” in one of your rants, and I was almost tempted to defend myself against your slanderous remark, that “I should disassociate myself from the racist militia groups”…however then I realized, for someone to sling this much mud in their article, how fearful must that person be?
Amo
Dean,
I sincerely believe you’ve lost perspective, in that you see a politically conservative philosophy gaining momentum and becoming a populace movement in the country, and is regaining political control, as were the cases in the last three state elections…I’d also feel a need to do something, anything to stop the momentum.
Obviously, if the guy I voted for had an almost 70% approval rating coming into office, and within less then a year drops like a stone…I’d be a bit paranoid too.
Amo
Amo, As far as I am concerned, there are at least ten ways one can tell if they are a tea bagger. Let us not forget, tea bagging is a term the Tea Party first gave to themselves. Who am I to disagree with the Tea Party on this point? There is nothing slanderous here or anywhere on this site from me. Remember, W Bush’s FBI and DHS have used SPLC research in their own reports. Everything I have said has been supported by sources which I cite. And besides that, I posted this as an opinion piece.
So, here now are ten ways you can tell if you are a tea bagger:
1) If you are part of a movement that mocks sick, disabled, or terminally ill people, you are a tea bagger. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6ik4f1dRbP8
2) If you are part of a group of people that hurl racial and homophobic slurs at elected officials. (Extra-special teabaggery awarded to those that called my former congressman and civil rights leader, John Lewis the “N” word,) you are a tea bagger. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WsCL6cxbJqk
3) If you are part of a movement that defends someone spitting on an elected official, you are a tea bagger. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/03/28/congressman-spit-on-by-te_n_516300.html?page=107&show_comment_id=43375250#comment_43375250
4) If you are part of a movement that orchestrated a nationwide campaign to disrupt town hall meetings in an attempt to stifle and shout down other citizen’s you disagree with, in order to deny them their equal first Amendment right to free speech, you are a tea bagger. http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/08/tea-party-town-hall-strategy-rattle-them-stand-up-and-shout.php
5) If you are part of a movement that holds a convention and the keynote speaker suggests we should go back to the Jim Crow laws that required a literacy test for voters, you are a tea bagger. http://rawstory.com/2010/02/tea-party-opening-speaker-suggests-blacks-voting/
6) If you are part of a movement that holds a convention and a featured speaker suggest president Obama was born in Kenya and has no legal right to be President of the United States, you are a tea bagger. http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/washington/2010/02/joseph-farah-to-cheers-at-tea-party-convention-again-questions-location-of-obamas-birth-.html
7) If you are part of a movement that believes Obama is part of a global socialist conspiracy to sell America out to a “New World Order,” you are a tea bagger. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MjulLrgEw-M&feature=related
8) If you are part of a movement that believes Obama plans on using the military against his own citizens and have FEMA create reeducation/concentration camps for white Christian conservatives, you are a tea bagger. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UASS1qFAIQ8
9) If you are part of a movement with websites that promotes recruitment for radical militias, you are a tea bagger. http://www.teapartypatriots.org/Group/Southeast_Michigan_Volunteer_Militia
10) If you are part of a movement the hosts organizations that openly support the idea of an armed insurrection and believes we are headed toward a bloody “Second American Revolution,” like the Oath Keepers, you are a tea bagger. http://motherjones.com/photoessays/2010/03/conservative-burning-man/okswebjpg
Bonus note: This past week, the Tea Party Patriots site ran a headline the other day that announced, “FBI Raids Tea Party Compound” after the arrests of members of the Hutaree militia. Once again, who am I to argue with members of the Tea Party movement if they wish to claim the Christian Identity militia as one of their own? The fact is, at least one member of the Hutaree militia has connections with the Michigan and Ohio militia. And both these militias have connections to the Tea Party movement. And, we all know Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols attended Michigan militia gatherings.
http://www.docudharma.com/diary/20216/tea-party-now-owns-the-hutaree-militia-group-you-betcha
So you know Amo, I think anyone that supports a movement with such a disgraceful record as the Tea Party movement is pretty much supporting tea bagging like behavior. And that is not slander, it is just my opinion.
Has anyone ever seen this hilarious tea bagging segments on the Rachel Maddow show last year? She shows at least a half dozen clips of members on the right encouraging people to tea bag Obama and tea bag Washington. I am also collecting photos of Tea Party members claims they are their to “tea bag Washington.” Here is a the clips of Maddow covering an early Tea Party ralley:
well as usual I believe Dean is off base on the fact, but thank to new conservative oppinion, as jack and corn; I believe they can help Dean to have a better undestanding of the tea party
Patrick, As you can see, I have provided more than enough facts to support my opinions. I’ve been studying the tea party movement for nearly six months now, and have kept an eye on them since their conception. I even visit and blog on some tea party sites.
As for Jack, he is really a clear headed conservative and I agree with you that he seems to be added a lot to BrooWaha’s comment threads.
Corn, on the other hand, is a flaming troll and I have yet so see anything positive he has contributed to the site. No one likes a looser that spews vitriol and hides behind a silly screen name.
Patrick, at least folks like you and Amo write articles and provided challenges for liberals like myself. Just going around calling other members on the site names does nothing to further the discussion.
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July 29, 2011
NBC News Takes on Tea Party ‘Terrorists’ – ‘They’re Strapped With Dynamite Sitting in Middle of Times Square at Rush Hour’
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Eric Cantor’s tea party terrorism threatens America
By DOUG THOMPSON
Jul 15 2011
House Minority Whip Rep. Eric Cantor of Va. (AP Photo/Cliff Owen)To the tea party terrorists who put their extremist agenda ahead of the best interests of the nation, bombastic Virginia Republican Congressman Eric Cantor is a hero of monumental proportions.
To opponents, however, Cantor is a political Osama bin Laden, a political bomb thrower who threatens send the financial skyscrapers of the nation’s economy crashing to the ground in a dust cloud of chaos and discord.
Even Republicans complain private about Cantor’s antics and leaders of the party gather in small, closed-door groups to discuss how to stop their own majority leader from destroying the party and the nation.
Democrats, meanwhile, zero in on Cantor’s extremism and use it to claim Republicans don’t give a damn about the nation, the economy and the future.
But the party’s problems go far beyond Cantor and the nation’s ills go back to the 2010 elections when voters — fed up with the status quo — put too many tea party extremists into office and gave them a voice they did not deserve.
Cantor and those of his ilk represent a cancer that is spreading throughout Congress, the American political system and the nation at large — a notion that compromise is bad, cooperation is unthinkable and coalitions are evil.
What’s good for America is secondary to the extremists like Cantor and those who embrace him: The only thing that matters is an extreme, right-wing agenda driven not by the the claimed “grassroots,” but by two power-mad billionaire brothers named Koch.
Cantor is their weapon of mass detraction who — like them — substitutes service to country with ego.
Cantor is a madman but he is one with a well-funded, private-agenda-driven power base that will stop at nothing to seize power and subvert what little is left of the democratic process in this country.
He — and those who follow him — represent a clear and present danger to the United States of America and they must be stopped before it is too late.
Related articles
- Some in GOP fed up with Cantor’s antics (capitolhillblue.com)
- Eric Cantor, Brutus (thehill.com)
- Reid: Cantor ‘childish,’ should not be in talks (seattletimes.nwsource.com)
- The debt ceiling vs. Eric Cantor’s ego (dailykos.com)
- Cantor emerges as player and pain in debt talks – The Associated Press (news.google.com)
- Rep. Eric Cantor’s Childish Antics Earn Him Best In Breed Debt Crisis Dog Show (mediaite.com)
- Has Eric Cantor Overplayed His Hand? (usnews.com)
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The Tea Party
Tea Party terrorists
David Fitzsimmons Copyright 2011 Cagle Cartoons
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Perriello Home Targeted by Tea Party Terrorists
It appears that the Tea Party movement has evolved from screaming epithets and spitting on people to acts of mayhem.
Federal and local authorities are investigating a severed gas line at the home of U.S. Rep. Tom Perriello’s brother, discovered the day after Tea Party activists posted the address online so opponents could “drop by” and “express their thanks” for Perriello’s vote in favor of health care reform.
The gas line connected a propane tank to a gas grill on the home’s screened-in porch, according to sources in Tom Perriello’s office.
The incident is being viewed as an attempted threat to a member of congress, sources said.
Two members of the conservative Tea Party groups in Danville and Lynchburg posted the home’s address online Monday, mistakenly believing it belonged to the congressman. The home actually belongs to Bo Perriello, the congressman’s older brother.
The local FBI field office and the Albemarle County fire marshal are investigating the incident. Police have stepped up patrols in the area as well.
[…]
Danville Tea Party leader Nigel Coleman was one of the two activists who posted Bo Perriello’s address online Monday.
“This is Rep. Thomas Stuart Price Perriello’s home address,” Coleman wrote Monday. “… I ain’t holding back anymore!!”
According to the Danville Register & Bee site, when Coleman learned that the address actually belonged to the congressman’s brother, he responded on a blog: “Do you mean I posted his brother’s address on my Facebook? Oh well, collateral damage.”
Coleman told The Daily Progress today that he is “shocked” and “almost speechless” at the possibility that someone would sever the propane line to Perriello’s brother’s house.
“I obviously condemn these actions,” he said. “I would hope that people aren’t thinking about doing anything crazy. We just wanted people to get close to the congressman and have their voices heard. Violence is not going to answer anything. I’m a little shocked and amazed.”
Not having evidence to the contrary, I’m willing to consider the possibility that Coleman is merely a complete idiot unable to conjure up the predictable consequence of sending out the address of political foes to enraged lunatics.
Thankfully, it appears “sending a message” was the extent of the damage. This time.
“While officials are not willing to characterize the exact nature of the incident because of the ongoing investigation, it did not involve an immediate threat to occupants of the residence. However officials are taking the incident very seriously and conducting a vigorous investigation,” the statement said.
But this movement is about to jump the shark unless it gets some adult supervision, stat.
As Ta-Nehesi Coates noted yesterday with regard to ACORN’s going out of business,
If you really believe that you’re facing a vile enemy armed with an array of dirty tricks, the correct action is not to be institutionally sloppy and then decry the deep evil of your opponents. You knew that going in. The correct response is to run your ship that much tighter.
Jonathan Bernstein‘s post applying the same logic to the Tea Partiers now seems eerily prescient:
Hey, Tea Party types, and conservatives in general: the same goes for you. No, you’re not all the kind of people who would throw slurs at John Lewis…so stop allowing signs and posters at your events that make you look like a group that would be fine with that. Stop using language that stops oh so carefully short of inciting people to violence. Run a tighter ship.
As to whether these ships can be run tightly, much less who would do it, though, I’m less sanguine.
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About James Joyner
James Joyner is the publisher of Outside the Beltway and the managing editor of the Atlantic Council. He’s a former Army officer, Desert Storm vet, and college professor with a PhD in political science from The University of Alabama. He lives just outside the Beltway in Alexandria, Virginia with his wife, Kim, and their young daughters Katie and Ellie. Follow James on Facebook | Twitter | FriendFeed
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6 Huge Items That Really Exploded the Debt (That You Never Hear the Mainstream Media Talk About)
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If you were a spectator in a sky box seat looking directly down on the Washington debt debate, you’d be seeing a contest both narrow and off to one edge of the field — like watching a football game being played entirely between the 10-yard line and the goal line.
The big items that added trillions to the debt are not even on the field of debate. Because the two teams are not contesting them.
— WARS: When Obama expanded the Afghan war and asked for the largest military budget in world history, the GOP largely applauded. It was bipartisan.
— BUSH TAX CUTS FOR THE WEALTHY: Obama extended them in December
— BANK BAILOUTS: Bipartisan.
— DECLINING TAX REVENUE: Resulted from recession and financial meltdown caused by years of bipartisan (Reagan/Clinton) deregulation of Wall Street. And by big companies like General Electric (whose CEO is Obama’s jobs chairman) dodging their taxes.
That’s the broad view — a perspective that sees our country in extreme debt and extremist “debate” because the leaders of the two teams collaborated in putting it there.
But this would NOT be your view if you were a mainstream reporter. Because reporting in elite U.S. media is not so much about relaying obvious and important facts as it is about positioning.
It requires placing yourself equidistant between the two opposing teams.
It means your vantage point is not an elevated or broad view, but down on the field. At the 5-yard line.
From down on the field, you easily miss how the two teams had collaborated to push the game toward the edge. Instead, you see real rancor and animosity between the two teams. You see differences in rhetoric and strategy.
From down on the field, you wouldn’t want to irritate either side or you might get hurt yourself.
With you in the middle of all the heated rhetoric flying back and forth, you might believe you’re somewhere in middle of the field and not off on the right edge.
In fact, you’d be writing headlines like this one from AP that so annoyed economist/columnist Paul Krugman: “Obama, Republicans Trapped by Inflexible Rhetoric.”
You’d be reporting claim and counterclaim over whether Reid’s Senate plan or Boehner’s House plan cuts spending by a couple hundred billion more than the other (neither gets tax revenue from the wealthy). But you’d be unlikely to step back to report on how bipartisan consensus, compromise and corruption racked up the trillions of debt in the first place.
In his column (“The Centrist Cop-Out” http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/29/opinion/krugman-the-centrist-cop-out.html) attacking mainstream journalists for “the cult of ‘balance,’” Krugman says: ”Writing news reports that always place equal blame on both parties is a big cop-out — a cop-out that only encourages more bad behavior. “
He concludes: “The problem with American politics right now is Republican extremism, and if you’re not willing to say that, you’re helping make that problem worse.”
Krugman is correct that the main problem in politics is Republican extremism. That extremism has been abetted by Democratic corporatism and appeasement.
It’s clear that the Republican leadership has been moving rightward for decades — from Reagan in the 80s to Gingrich in the 90s to W in the00s to the Tea Party today. On the Democratic side, one could also argue that Obama is governing to the right of President Clinton, who governed to the right of President Carter, who governed to the right of LBJ.
Given trends like these, is it asking too much of mainstream reporters to look around and realize they’re nowhere near the 50-yard line anymore?
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Friday, July 29, 2011
Tea Party Terrorists?
It has become commonplace to call the tea party faction in the House “hostage takers.” But they have now become full-blown terrorists.
They have joined the villains of American history who have been sufficiently craven to inflict massive harm on innocent victims to achieve their political goals. A strong America has always stood firm in the face of terrorism. That tradition is in jeopardy, as Congress and President Barack careen toward an uncertain outcome in the tea party- manufactured debt crisis.
This guy is talking about the GOP’s elected representatives in Congress, and this is after Anders Behring Breivik, a real terrorist, killed dozens in Norway. And this is also while Army Private Nasser Jason Abdo, and antiwar leftist, is being arraigned in Texas and could face federal terrorism charges. But Yoemans isn’t the only one. Idiot Washington Monthly columnist Steve Benen is slamming GOP members as “the suicide squad“, and Little Boy Ezra at Washington Post is bemoaning the GOP’s aversion to compromise, saying this reflects badly on John Boehner.
It’s to be expected, I guess. So, let’s hear it from the other side, from Byron York, “In debt fight, Dems reject Republican compromise“:
House Speaker John Boehner has introduced two bills that would raise the nation’s debt ceiling and end the current default crisis. The first, known as “Cut, Cap and Balance,” was tabled by Senate Democrats without an up-or-down vote. The second, Boehner’s plan to cut more than $900 billion in federal spending and raise the debt ceiling by a slightly smaller amount, could face a similar fate if it first passes the House …
While Obama preaches the virtues of compromise, his Democratic allies and surrogates are bashing Republicans for rejecting what the White House characterizes as earnest, good-faith efforts to find common ground. “I hope that Speaker Boehner and [Minority] Leader McConnell will reconsider their intransigence,” Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said a few days ago. “Their unwillingness to compromise is pushing us to the brink of a default.” (At the same time, Reid has been issuing absolute, inflexible statements like, “I will not support any short-term agreement.”)
But the fact is, the Republicans who admitted defeat on “Cut, Cap and Balance” showed a unmistakable willingness to compromise. “The president has asked us to compromise,” House Minority Leader Eric Cantor said Thursday afternoon. “We have compromised.”
RELATED: At New York Times, “House Passes Boehner’s New Debt Plan.”
Posted by Donald Douglas at 4:45 PM 
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Tea Party = “terrorists” to some Part II: Suicide Bombers
The terrorism references being thrown at the Tea Party continue this time it is Margaret Carlson of Bloomberg News on Inside Washington and Maureen Dowd of the New York Times.
First up Carlson:
MARGARET CARLSON, BLOOMBERG NEWS: I have to downgrade Charles here. You initially said why don’t Republicans, you know, take the victory. And it’s because there’s a nihilist caucus which is, “Listen, we want to burn the place down.” I mean, they’re not, they’ve strapped explosives to the Capitol and they think they are immune from it. The Tea Party caucus wants this crisis, and do we want to do this again six months from now? This whole two-step process is another thing which is they like the drama. They want to do it again.CHARLES KRAUTHAMMER: I thought that post-Tucson we weren’t supposed to accuse our political opponents of being terrorists.
CARLSON: Nihilists.
KRAUTHMAMMER: Strapping a bomb is a terrorist.
Good thing Krauthammer was there to at least add some civility to the discussion. Oh, and Mark Shields was there too.
Batting second Dowd:
When Obama came before the cameras Friday to say that “any solution to avoid default must be bipartisan,” many Democrats wish he had just gone all unilateral and taken Bill Clinton’s advice to invoke the 14th Amendment. They yearned to see the president beat the political suicide bombers over the head with the Constitution. Impeaching a constitutional lawyer for saving the economy would be an even more difficult sell than impeaching a rogue for fibbing about a dalliance.
There’s an image for you.
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Wed Mar 23, 2011 at 06:13 PM PDT
Just how stupid are Tea Party Terrorists?
Sadly, all too stupid. Newly elected Republicants plan to hike taxes on ordinary people in order to pay for tax cuts for billionaires.
In 12 States across the USA the political wing of the Tea Party Terrorists have started to implement moves to shift the tax burden from corporations and the very wealthyon to ordinary workers.
The Tea Party Terrorists who promised their own special “second amendment solutions” to elections if they did not get their own way now face huge hikes in tax in order to pay for millionaire tax cuts.
Three States run by the political wing of the Tea Party Terrorists are making their intentions obvious.
MAINE: Tea Party Gov. Paul LePageâs (I) tax reform package would raise the stateâs estate tax exemption from $1 million to $2 million â allowing four hundred of the stateâs wealthiest estates to escape taxation. At the same time, the tax plan would raise property taxes on middle class Mainers while freezing health care funding for working parents, cutting money for schools, and raising the retirement age for public workers. Republican legislators want to go even further, and are currently considering eliminating the estate tax altogether.OHIO: In January, House Speaker William Batchelder (R) called Gov. John Kasichâs (R) proposal to completely eliminate the estate tax one of the Republican-controlled legislatureâs âtop priorities.â But already, the bill has garnered strong opposition from local governments, who depend on estate tax revenue and are already concerned state spending cuts. Even while finding room for estate tax reductions, Kasichâs proposed budget cuts 25 percent of funding for local schools, $427 million for nursing homes, $1 million for food banks, $12 million from childrenâs hospitals, and $15.9 million from an adoption program for children with special needs.
NEW JERSEY: In his 2011 budget proposal, Gov. Chris Christie called for raising the stateâs estate tax exemption from $675,000 to $1 million even while proposing cuts to the stateâs Earned Income Tax Credit and homestead rebates for working poor families. And last year Christie vetoed a bill passed by the Legislature that would have raised taxes on the stateâs millionaires to help fund property tax relief for Main Street.
So that is the way to go. Big tax cuts for billionaires and tax hikes for every day real people who are in fact the REAL America, not matter what Tea Party Terrorist Leaders say.
The de-facto Leader of the Tea Party Terrorists was going to make a statement but she quit somewhere outside of the West Bank.
Sorry Republicants you asked for this. Sadly more will suffer but those who voted for this deserve it.
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Hooray for Me, Fuck You! Filthy Rich Protest for More Wealth
Eyes Wide Shut Up and Blow Me! (Editors note: Apologies to Billionaires for Bush)NEW YORK – Jumping on the protest bandwagon, which began with a carefully orchestrated campaign of coddled working and middle class protesters in Wisconsin and elsewhere fighting to retain their grossly overpaid wages and awesome HMO benefits, the wealthy minority of America’s oppressed upper class are staging a counter protest to keep their inheritances and legally stolen wealth, plus interest.
Fearful that the staunchly anti-capitalist government of the United States might cave in to the demands of the proletariat to make them pay more of their fair share, and thereby reduce their wealth from having absolutely everything to having almost absolutely everything, the country’s unfortunate fortunate ones have taken to the streets of Manhattan to make their silvery-spooned voices heard.
Chanting slogans like, “This is what plutocracy looks like”, and singing the Stones anthem “Sympathy for the Devil”, the designer clad one-percenters, all heavily guarded by public safety officers and private security detail, marched on Wall Street today holding what they call, A Rally for the Filthy Rich.
Their biggest gripe seems to stem from the news that Obama might follow in the footsteps of the socialist Eisenhower administration, and actually raise the tax rate on the wealthy, making it more inconvenient and costly for them to hide all their rightfully earned ill-gotten gains.
“Creative accounting costs a lot of goddamned money”, complained one protester wearing $400,000 D&G Elite sunglasses and feigning anonymity for fear of public hanging. “This will force me, and all my uber-rich friends, to hire even more corrupt accountants to create tax shelters and offshore shell companies to hide our obscene wealth. Though it’s all still a write-off in the end, it’s really unfair”, he continued.
Also at issue is the perception that the super wealthy are nothing a but a bunch of greedy, power-mad parasites, hell bent on sucking the world’s poor and middle classes dry by stealing their wealth for their own personal gain and amusement. “Nothing could be further from the truth”, said several anonymous (but we know who they are) banksters who received a paltry $700 billion in tax-payer bailout money.* “The reality is far worse than that. Don’t sugarcoat it for the useless eaters”, they added.
All of the protesters, many of whom also feigned anonymity for fear of public beheading or disembowelment, lamented the fact that their extreme wealth no longer conjured up a positive image of the American Dream, but now symbolized a widening gap between the, ‘haves and have-nots’.
“What happened to the good old days when people tuned into the Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous and thought, man, those rich and famous assholes are really cool. I want to be cool too”, a not so anonymous rich and famous asshole observed.
Some of the protesters tried to point out that, although they’re disgustingly rich, they’re not that disgustingly rich. One particularly well known douchebag appeared proud of the fact that he only owns two yachts, one private Lear jet, a private island for his own personal use, and one measly little medieval castle, among other necessary extravagant possessions. “It’s not like I own a whole bunch of these things like most people I know”, he added thinking we’d all empathize with his frugalness without having the urge to castrate him right then and there.
However, an overwhelming sense of dread plagued most of the blood diamond drenched demonstrators as they contemplated the notion of having to make any sacrifices. “Where I am I going to keep all of my luxury items if I have to give up some of my homes and estates”, stated a nervous, aging heiress who’s plastic surgeries are starting to make her look like an escapee from the musical Cats. “I mean, seriously, where is it all going to go”, her panic increasing as the thought of only owning a few million dollar Maybach Landaulets instead of several slowly started to sink in.
Other protestors terrorized by the same scenario quickly descended upon the frantic feline-in-the-making to provide pampering, spa packages, and other promotional swag. There is a strong feeling of camaraderie and sense of purpose that permeates this tiny, keeping-up-with-the-robber barons crowd, that apparently transcends their desire to devour each others’ children.
Informally calling themselves, ‘The Forbesians’, after Forbes Magazine natch, many have even made the yearly top 400 list, while some still aspire to be on it, missing it by only a billion and some change. Still, there’s a common bond that unites them all, the fact that each has more wealth than 99% of everyone else on the planet. And this seemed to be the overall theme of the day, that what they lacked in proverbial asses, they more than made up in assets.
According to several envious economists, the top 1% own as much or more than the rest of us combined, which is why, say the rich, everyone wants to take away their wealth. “They obviously want a bigger piece of our pie”, said an organizer who asked that we not print his name (you know who he is) for fear of being flayed and/or burned alive. “The poor should just be grateful for the crumbs we provide, as we could easily deny them even that”, he added.
There’s also a powerful belief among the protesters that if they give up any of their wealth, they give away all of it. Even contemplating the notion is a slippery slope to more economic equality, and that’s something that truly terrifies them.
To counteract this growing unease, the organizers, with the help of their paid pundits in the media, have launched a propaganda campaign to convince the poor that if they just work hard, do the right thing, and be a good person (like them), they too might be invited into the elite club. “It is imperative and vital that we continue the Horatio Alger-like myth that we all made it to where we are by pulling ourselves up by our own bootstraps”, several trust fund babies noted. “Let’s face it, if the masses really knew the truth of how we attained this much wealth, we’d all be in deep shit.”
As an example of what they mean, the protesters pointed out another popular technique they regularly employ to keep the barbarians at the gate: donations and charity. By setting up a charitable foundation, they can give the appearance of philanthropy and altruism, but in reality just serves as a tax-saving strategy that earns them even more wealth. As an added bonus, they get to throw lavish fundraising parties, pat themselves on the back, and see their names on things.
Unfortunately, just as soon as the rally seemed to be gaining momentum, the protesters had to quickly disband. Due to all the fawning paparazzi and fanfare that accompanied their red-carpeted gathering, some of the barbarians began taking notice, and started surrounding the rich bastards with chants of, “off with their heads!”
Fortunately, the organizers planned for just this kind of violent reaction, by having several bullet-proof limousines and helicopters fueled up and ready to whisk them away back to their gated mansions and private island getaways.
On their way out, however, several of the protesters were overheard promising that, “We will not rest until all of the world’s wealth is ours.” Will they succeed in their efforts? As one expert we asked noted, “The rich will keep getting richer. They’re too big and famous to fail.”
* Umm… make that $16 trillion and counting.
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This is a radical activist group that satirically encourages support for President Dumbass in a progressive attempt to change the Conservative winds flowing “right” through America. We use catchy slogans and subtle protests to capture friendly media attention. We dress like billionaires and praise the American Czar to wittingly scoff at his dedication to inequality and racial, social and economi…See More
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Billionaires for Bush (photo warning)
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I love it.
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US debt crisis: angry Democrats turn their fire on Obama
Angry Democrats turned their fire on President Barack Obama with unprecedented ferocity on Monday, accusing him of a capitulation to Republicans that has seriously harmed his chances of re-election in 2012.
Though the White House boasted about a triumph for compromise, Left-wingers felt betrayed, saying the price of striking a deal to raise the US borrowing limit had been much too high.
Representative Emanuel Cleaver, a Missouri Democrat, said of the deal: “On the surface it looks like a Satan sandwich.”
Another, Cedric Richmond from New Orleans, said he feared it would have a “devastating impact” on low earners, with the working and middle classes bearing the brunt of the cuts.
The bill was expected to pass the Senate on Monday night, but party leaders from both sides in the House were non-committal on whether they had the necessary votes. Today is the deadline set by the US Treasury to raise the debt ceiling and avoid the first default in the country’s history.
However, it could still run into last minute problems. An alliance in the House of Representatives of discontented liberal congressmen and Tea Party Republicans who want even more spending cuts could yet unite to defeat the bill.
The agreement reached by the White House and party leaders in the House and Senate during tense talks over the weekend will allow Mr Obama to borrow a further $2.4 trillion to allow the government to meet its debt obligations into 2013.
But it came with considerable strings attached to cut the ballooning $14.3 trillion national debt.
About $1 trillion will be cut immediately from government spending, with a further $1.4 trillion to follow by the end of the year.
Liberals who once lionized Mr Obama were enraged that the White House failed to twist Republicans’ arms in Congress and include revenue increases in the deal, through closing tax loopholes for oil companies and removing various tax deductions that benefit the wealthy. The savings are made up entirely of spending cuts, though conservatives have had to swallow unwanted savings on the military.
The left-leaning grassroots organisation MoveOn described the deal as “grotesquely immoral”.
“Our members are wondering, ‘What in God’s name is going on in D.C.?'” said Justin Ruben, executive director of the group, which claims five million members. “The country needs jobs, and Washington is debating what vital programme needs to be cut.”” Michael Tomasky, a leading liberal commentator, wrote: “This is the lowest moment of Obama’s presidency.”
While George W Bush wrecked the country “through rank incompetence”, Mr Obama “is simply handing the Republicans the keys to the house and saying ‘take what you want’,” he said in the Daily Beast.
In the New Republic, Jonathan Chait said: “There’s a limit to how much faith one can place in a man who has so badly misjudged his political opponents time and time again.”
Robert Borosage, co-director of the Campaign for American Future, a liberal think tank, accused Mr Obama of yielding to “the Tea Party terrorists – the extremist faction willing to hold the economy hostage to get their way”.
The cuts would not improve the slow recovery, which would in turn affect Mr Obama’s prospects of a second term, he claimed.
Figures revealed yesterday showed that US manufacturing grew at its slowest pace in two years in July as new orders contracted.
“I think he is in increasing danger. The whole argument against him that he has been there four years and there are no jobs, that he has failed, will be an increasingly strong argument,” said Mr Borosage.
Without a major push to create jobs, the alliance of young voters, African Americans , Latinos and single women that elected Mr Obama in 2008 may well not turn out to vote next time, he added.
“Right now, his base is all he has left from 2008. The independents and working-class Democrats have begun to flee,” said Ed Morrissey on the Hot Air blog. “This deal won’t bring those voters back, and his source of organization and funding may largely give up on him.”
The White House defended the deal, saying it was “not the case that Democrats “got nothing”.
“We think the president’s leadership has been essential to this process,” said Jay Carney, the White House press secretary.
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Democrats Call Conservatives Hostage Takers, Villains, Terrorists -(remember O’s civility speech?)
RushLimbaugh.com ^ | 7/29/11 | Rush Limbaugh
Posted on Friday, July 29, 2011 6:39:27 PM by Evil Slayer
BEGIN TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: So this Politico piece. Maybe it’s an opinion piece. I said it was a news story, because it’s bylined. But it may well be a column. The headline is “The Tea Party’s Terrorist Tactics.” Before I get to this, let me show you what a coordinated thing this is. We have a media montage of Democrats (no media in here) talking about the Tea Party. Listen.
STENY HOYER: (rotunda noise) The Republicans are holding hostage the credit of the United States of America.
DEBBIE “BLABBERMOUTH” SCHULTZ: …our Republican colleagues to hold our economy hostage.
DINGY HARRY: The Republican Party is holding our economy hostage.
CHUCK-U SCHUMER: (rotunda noise) It didn’t say, “Hold America hostage.”
LOUISE SLAUGHTER: …hold the debt ceiling hostage.
SHELDON WHITEHOUSE: One party is holding the country hostage.
JOHN OLVER: The debt limit has never before been held hostage.
BARBARA LEE: Republicans are holding our economy hostage.
EARL BLUMENAUER: …willing to take hostage the debt ceiling.
JASON ALTMIRE: Stop holding America’s credit rating hostage.
ROSA DeLAURO: The Republican majority continues to hold the American economy hostage.
CHRIS VAN HOLLEN: Let’s not hold the entire American economy hostage.
JOHN LARSON: …ideological HOSTAGE situation…
LLOYD DOGGETT: The only belt they’re really tightening is right around the neck of those hostages.
JAMES CLYBURN: Holding the American economy hostage.
JESSE JACKSON, JR.: This President is being treated differently!
SPEAKER PRO-TEM: (gavel banging)
JACKSON: No other President has been stuck up, shook down, or held hostage!
RUSH: That’s the Reverend Jackson, Jr. there bringing up the end. I don’t know what he means, “No other president has been stuck up, shook down, or held hostage!” Now we come to this Politico terrorist piece: “The Tea Party’s Terrorist Tactics — It has become commonplace to call the Tea Party faction in the House ‘hostage takers.’ But they have now become full-blown terrorists. They have joined the villains of American history who have been sufficiently craven to inflict massive harm on innocent victims to achieve their political goals.” This is William Yeomans writing. Mr. Yeomans, what in the name of Sam Hill do you think Barack Obama is?
You want to talk about the real villain in this country? It’s Barack Obama! Craven, “sufficiently craven to inflict massive harm on innocent victims to achieve their political goals”? What do you call a 1.3% growth rate this quarter, a 0.4% growth rate in the first quarter, and 9.2% unemployment? What do you call that? You call that the architecture of a craven villain, Mr. Yeomans — and the people you’re calling terrorists are trying to stop it and save the country. That’s what this is about. This is about saving the country, it’s about preserving liberty — and I don’t care how corny that sounds. It is exactly what’s going on. “A strong America has always stood firm in the face of terrorism. That tradition is in jeopardy, as Congress and President Barack careen toward an uncertain outcome in the Tea Party-manufactured debt crisis.”
Tea Party-manufactured debt crisis? The Tea Party has been in office for all of six months! I don’t want to hear any more crap from Democrats about “civility.” I don’t want to be preached to one more time by these holier-than-thou, better-than-everybody-else, smarter-than-everybody-else craven villains about “civility.” I have to tell you, folks (and I know that I am not alone): I am mad as all get out. The Democrats and their cohorts and the Drive-Bys have collectively ratcheted up this divisive, uncivil, reactionary language to trash the Tea Party — and, by extension, conservatives. We’re not terrorists! We’re not killing people. We are Americans who disagree with you! We’re Americans who disagree with statism. We are Americans who disagree with socialism, communism and liberalism.
We’re not holding anybody hostage. We are the hostages! We are equal time. We are paying the ransom all the time. We are the hostages. Our country has been kidnapped, and you’re asking a ransom from us in the form of higher taxes and less liberty and less freedom each and every day — and you dare to write pieces calling us terrorists! We don’t fly jet planes into buildings. We’re not killing people. We’re not putting people out of work. We’re not taking their money. We’re not destroying their savings. We’re not taking over the oil companies. We’re not taking over the car companies. We are not the ones in the process of destroying the U.S. healthcare system.
We’re not the ones setting up death panels, if you want to talk about terrorism and killing people. Mr. Yeomans says, “As we stumble closer to Aug. 2, it has become clear that many in the Tea Party are willing to inflict massive harm on the American people to obtain their political objective of a severely shrunken federal government.” A “severely shrunken federal government” is a pipe dream! We are trying right now to stop the inexorable growth of this monster that is strangling and squandering every asset in this country, including its people. Mr. Yeomans writes, “Their persistence in rejecting compromise, even as the economic effects of the phony crisis they have created mount, has taken their radicalism beyond tough negotiating, beyond even hostage-taking. …
“As the markets dropped, families would watch their retirement and education savings and their dreams disappear. Rather than reject the unthinkable, the Tea Party harnessed this potential harm as its weapon of mass destruction.” Oh, we’re the ones? We’re the ones destroying our own retirement and the education savings. We’re the ones doing that? We’re the ones? I think that’s Barack Obama. You want to talk about craven villains? Look no further than the Oval Office. I guess Mr. Yeomans didn’t get that memo after the Gabby Gifford service about the “new civility.” So now anybody who disagrees with Democrats are terrorists, racists terrorists.
What is this American economy that’s being held hostage? Isn’t it us? It’s our money. It’s not Mr. Obama’s money, Mr. Yeomans! The liberals do not own the wealth of this country. It’s not theirs to distribute and redistribute. “Rather than reject the unthinkable, the Tea Party harnessed this potential harm as its weapon of mass destruction.” Weapon of mass destruction. So, folks, they are cracking up. The left is cracking up, and it’s the Tea Party doing it to them. We are now all Sarah Palin. As far as they’re concerned, we are all Sarah Palin. They are scared to death of Sarah Palin. They are scared to death here of the Tea Party people, because the Tea Party in the House can’t be bought and is not concerned about re-election. They’re not playing the usual game.
Somebody tell me now why are we supposed to compromise with this? We’re supposed to compromise with people of the same mind as William Yeomans at Politico? That’s what we’re supposed to do? This is the name of the game? We compromise with this so that we don’t get blamed? We’re going to get blamed no matter what happens! Even if wonderful, great things happen we’re going to get blamed as it’s rewritten and described as terrible. We want to hold onto some of our money. For that we’re called terrorists. We oppose tax increases because we know that tax increases are not going to fix what’s wrong with the country.
Taking more of our money is not the solution here. It ain’t going to happen. Here’s Obama lecturing us in Arizona after Giffords: “At a time when our discourse has become so sharply polarized, at a time when we are far too eager to lay the blame for all that ails the world at the feet of those who think differently than we do,” he said, “it’s important for us to pause for a moment and make sure that we are talking with each other in a way that heals, not in the way that wounds.” Mr. Yeomans and the people at Politico, apparently, didn’t get that, didn’t hear that, or don’t want to act on it. No. The truth is, Obama didn’t mean it in the first place. Craven villains? Their language. That’s who we’re up against.
BREAK TRANSCRIPT
RUSH: By the way, speaking of civility, ladies and gentlemen, Obama has just sent around to his foot soldiers the tweet handles for House Republican members on Twitter so they can stalk and harass them. So Obama’s campaign is sending tweets out to the Republicans in the House. Boehner’s doing the same thing. The Republican leadership is also tweeting. Obama’s out there asking for phone calls. You and I know that you’re the ones that are melting the phone lines.
Yesterday in the New York Times, I’m not sure when this happened, but to carry on the theme Nicholas Kristof compared the Tea Party sympathizers in Congress to al-Qaeda, and Thomas “Loopy” Friedman called the Tea Party sympathizers the Hezbollah faction in the GOP. I kid you not. In the Politico we’re craven villains and terrorists. So some questions here for Nicholas Kristof and Thomas “Loopy” Friedman, is the Paul Ryan plan more like al-Qaeda or Hezbollah? Is Cut, Cap and Balance more like al-Qaeda or Hezbollah? Are you more like al-Qaeda or Hezbollah, or are you more like Mahmoud Ahmadinejad? Tell me, I don’t know. You give me the similarities. The Paul Ryan plan Cut, Cap and Balance, the Balanced Budget Amendment plan, tell me, is it more like al-Qaeda or Hezbollah?
END TRANSCRIPT
TOPICS: Business/Economy; Government; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: boehner; civility; eib; mcconnell; rush; rushlimbaugh; teaparty
1 posted on Friday, July 29, 2011 6:39:31 PM by Evil Slayer
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To: Evil Slayer
To Democrats and all who criticize TEA partiers:
You inherited a land of liberty because a group of learned individuals over 200 years ago were willing to put their lives, property and sacred honor on the line on behalf of liberty for individuals and and, later, through their written constitution, they placed strict limitations on the persons whom they would elect to serve them in government.
Today’s citizens who loosely call themselves the Taxed Enough Already party (that’s party with a little ‘p’) people (named for their ancestors who rebelled against the King’s abusive taxation)–these brave citizens are intelligent, resourceful and have studied the ideas of liberty. They understand that America can no longer be free, if the philosophy of Mao/Marx/Lenin and Keynes is allowed to prevail over the philosophy of Washington, Adams, Madison, Jefferson and Adam Smith.
Can you cite any authority on either economics or freedom who is more eloquent than Thomas Jefferson on the question of the ideas of liberty or of the consequences of debt and deficit?
“To preserve [the] independence [of the people,] we must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt. We must make our election between economy and liberty, or profusion and servitude. If we run into such debts as that we must be taxed in our meat and in our drink, in our necessaries and our comforts, in our labors and our amusements, for our callings and our creeds, as the people of England are, our people, like them, must come to labor sixteen hours in the twenty-four, give the earnings of fifteen of these to the government for their debts and daily expenses, and the sixteenth being insufficient to afford us bread, we must live, as they now do, on oatmeal and potatoes, have no time to think, no means of calling the mismanagers to account, but be glad to obtain subsistence by hiring ourselves to rivet their chains on the necks of our fellow-sufferers.” –Thomas Jefferson to Samuel Kercheval, 1816. ME 15:39
“I deem [this one of] the essential principles of our government and consequently [one] which ought to shape its administration:… The honest payment of our debts and sacred preservation of the public faith.” –Thomas Jefferson: 1st Inaugural, 1801. ME 3:322
“I sincerely believe… that the principle of spending money to be paid by posterity under the name of funding is but swindling futurity on a large scale.” –Thomas Jefferson to John Taylor, 1816. ME 15:23
“[With the decline of society] begins, indeed, the bellum omnium in omnia [war of all against all], which some philosophers observing to be so general in this world, have mistaken it for the natural, instead of the abusive state of man. And the fore horse of this frightful team is public debt. Taxation follows that, and in its train wretchedness and oppression.” –Thomas Jefferson to Samuel Kercheval, 1816. ME 15:40
Your Party’s control of the Congress since 2006, and of the Presidency for the last 3 years, along with any Republicans who have been coopted to go along with the Democrats’ policies have brought us close to the kind of “wretchedness and oppression” spoken of by Jefferson.
Thank God for technology and the so-called TEA party movement! Else, future generations would never know that there were those in 2012 who stood for liberty, not “servitude.”
2 posted on Friday, July 29, 2011 6:43:19 PM by loveliberty2
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To: loveliberty2
Tea Party = Common Sense Party
3 posted on Friday, July 29, 2011 6:46:54 PM by Evil Slayer (Onward, Christian soldiers, marching as to war)
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To: loveliberty2
I hear Van Hallen, Pelosi’s boy in Senate, He said “The Tea Party was unfit to lead this country”….I think it’s time to find a replacement Candidate for his district, don’t you. He must be a John Kerry fan, as UNFIT TO LEAD was the mantra against Kerry in 04.
4 posted on Friday, July 29, 2011 6:47:44 PM by Kackikat
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To: Evil Slayer
As an add on, can you just picture Dingy Harry saying “We don’t want any common sense running this country.” LOL
5 posted on Friday, July 29, 2011 6:48:54 PM by Evil Slayer (Onward, Christian soldiers, marching as to war)
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To: Evil Slayer
Thanks for posting the transcript. Rush has been on fire this week, more like in his better days of yore.
6 posted on Friday, July 29, 2011 6:49:18 PM by lonevoice (Bitter gun clinging schizoprenic hostage taking hobbit)
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To: Evil Slayer
Ahh the Commies are being themselves,and remember when the Bonehead was sitting with them all lovely dovie.
7 posted on Friday, July 29, 2011 6:52:06 PM by Cheetahcat ( November 4 2008 ,A date that will live in Infamy.)
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To: Evil Slayer
I am proud to be one… see my tagline.
LLS
8 posted on Friday, July 29, 2011 7:47:23 PM by LibLieSlayer (juan mccain certified Al Palin Hobbit Terrorist)
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← ‘Balanced Approach’ And Economic Suicide
Government Overestimating Growth →
Putting Country Over Party
Posted on July 31, 2011 by Ross| 1 Comment
Listening to the storyline of Democrats in the House of Representatives over the budget and debt ceiling debate, you might think there is some message coordination going on.
If you want a government that does not spend more than it has, you must be a terrorist. If you reject the growth in government and government policies that are not economically sustainable, then you must be a terrorist. Jeff Foxworthy could do a bit on this.
Referring to an opinion piece in Politico by William Yeomans, Rush said . . .
It has become commonplace to call the Tea Party faction in the House ‘hostage takers.’ But they have now become full-blown terrorists. They have joined the villains of American history who have been sufficiently craven to inflict massive harm on innocent victims to achieve their political goals.” This is William Yeomans writing. Mr. Yeomans, what in the name of Sam Hill do you think Barack Obama is?
Look at this array of examples of how the elected Democrats portray Republicans, and tea party folks specifically. Below are some quotes from the house floor . . .
STENY HOYER: (rotunda noise) The Republicans are holding hostage the credit of the United States of America.
DEBBIE “BLABBERMOUTH” SCHULTZ: …our Republican colleagues to hold our economy hostage.
DINGY HARRY: The Republican Party is holding our economy hostage.
CHUCK-U SCHUMER: (rotunda noise) It didn’t say, “Hold America hostage.”
LOUISE SLAUGHTER: …hold the debt ceiling hostage.
SHELDON WHITEHOUSE: One party is holding the country hostage.
JOHN OLVER: The debt limit has never before been held hostage.
BARBARA LEE: Republicans are holding our economy hostage.
EARL BLUMENAUER: …willing to take hostage the debt ceiling.
JASON ALTMIRE: Stop holding America’s credit rating hostage.
ROSA DeLAURO: The Republican majority continues to hold the American economy hostage.
CHRIS VAN HOLLEN: Let’s not hold the entire American economy hostage.
JOHN LARSON: …ideological HOSTAGE situation…
LLOYD DOGGETT: The only belt they’re really tightening is right around the neck of those hostages.
JAMES CLYBURN: Holding the American economy hostage.
JESSE JACKSON, JR.: This President is being treated differently!
SPEAKER PRO-TEM: (gavel banging)
JACKSON: No other President has been stuck up, shook down, or held hostage!
Limbaugh continues . . .
We’re not holding anybody hostage. We are the hostages! We are equal time. We are paying the ransom all the time. We are the hostages. Our country has been kidnapped, and you’re asking a ransom from us in the form of higher taxes and less liberty and less freedom each and every day — and you dare to write pieces calling us terrorists! We don’t fly jet planes into buildings. We’re not killing people. We’re not putting people out of work. We’re not taking their money. We’re not destroying their savings. We’re not taking over the oil companies. We’re not taking over the car companies. We are not the ones in the process of destroying the U.S. healthcare system.
Bottom line. We’ve seen and heard this kind of rhetoric from Democrats before. It is still name-calling, only now we are being compared to Hamas, Hezbollah, and al-Qaeda.
Limbaugh continues . . .
I don’t want to hear any more crap from Democrats about “civility.” I don’t want to be preached to one more time by these holier-than-thou, better-than-everybody-else, smarter-than-everybody-else craven villains about “civility.” I have to tell you, folks (and I know that I am not alone): I am mad as all get out. The Democrats and their cohorts and the Drive-Bys have collectively ratcheted up this divisive, uncivil, reactionary language to trash the Tea Party — and, by extension, conservatives. We’re not terrorists! We’re not killing people. We are Americans who disagree with you! We’re Americans who disagree with statism. We are Americans who disagree with socialism, communism and liberalism.
Considering what the Obama administration has done to “remake America,” youand I, the American people, are the real hostages. Ironically, it is the tea party people who have followed Obama’s advice to “put country over party.”
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The President Surrenders
By PAUL KRUGMAN
Published: July 31, 2011
A deal to raise the federal debt ceiling is in the works. If it goes through, many commentators will declare that disaster was avoided. But they will be wrong.
Fred R. Conrad/The New York Times
Paul Krugman
Related
-
Obama and Leaders Reach Debt Deal (August 1, 2011)
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Times Topic: Federal Debt Ceiling
Related in Opinion
Ross Douthat: The Diminished President (August 1, 2011)
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Op-Ed Contributors: Our Unbalanced Democracy (August 1, 2011)
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Editorial: To Escape Chaos, a Terrible Deal (August 1, 2011)
Readers’ Comments
Readers shared their thoughts on this article.
For the deal itself, given the available information, is a disaster, and not just for President Obama and his party. It will damage an already depressed economy; it will probably make America’s long-run deficit problem worse, not better; and most important, by demonstrating that raw extortion works and carries no political cost, it will take America a long way down the road to banana-republic status.
Start with the economics. We currently have a deeply depressed economy. We will almost certainly continue to have a depressed economy all through next year. And we will probably have a depressed economy through 2013 as well, if not beyond.
The worst thing you can do in these circumstances is slash government spending, since that will depress the economy even further. Pay no attention to those who invoke the confidence fairy, claiming that tough action on the budget will reassure businesses and consumers, leading them to spend more. It doesn’t work that way, a fact confirmed by many studies of the historical record.
Indeed, slashing spending while the economy is depressed won’t even help the budget situation much, and might well make it worse. On one side, interest rates on federal borrowing are currently very low, so spending cuts now will do little to reduce future interest costs. On the other side, making the economy weaker now will also hurt its long-run prospects, which will in turn reduce future revenue. So those demanding spending cuts now are like medieval doctors who treated the sick by bleeding them, and thereby made them even sicker.
And then there are the reported terms of the deal, which amount to an abject surrender on the part of the president. First, there will be big spending cuts, with no increase in revenue. Then a panel will make recommendations for further deficit reduction — and if these recommendations aren’t accepted, there will be more spending cuts.
Republicans will supposedly have an incentive to make concessions the next time around, because defense spending will be among the areas cut. But the G.O.P. has just demonstrated its willingness to risk financial collapse unless it gets everything its most extreme members want. Why expect it to be more reasonable in the next round?
In fact, Republicans will surely be emboldened by the way Mr. Obama keeps folding in the face of their threats. He surrendered last December, extending all the Bush tax cuts; he surrendered in the spring when they threatened to shut down the government; and he has now surrendered on a grand scale to raw extortion over the debt ceiling. Maybe it’s just me, but I see a pattern here.
Did the president have any alternative this time around? Yes.
First of all, he could and should have demanded an increase in the debt ceiling back in December. When asked why he didn’t, he replied that he was sure that Republicans would act responsibly. Great call.
And even now, the Obama administration could have resorted to legal maneuvering to sidestep the debt ceiling, using any of several options. In ordinary circumstances, this might have been an extreme step. But faced with the reality of what is happening, namely raw extortion on the part of a party that, after all, only controls one house of Congress, it would have been totally justifiable.
At the very least, Mr. Obama could have used the possibility of a legal end run to strengthen his bargaining position. Instead, however, he ruled all such options out from the beginning.
But wouldn’t taking a tough stance have worried markets? Probably not. In fact, if I were an investor I would be reassured, not dismayed, by a demonstration that the president is willing and able to stand up to blackmail on the part of right-wing extremists. Instead, he has chosen to demonstrate the opposite.
Make no mistake about it, what we’re witnessing here is a catastrophe on multiple levels.
It is, of course, a political catastrophe for Democrats, who just a few weeks ago seemed to have Republicans on the run over their plan to dismantle Medicare; now Mr. Obama has thrown all that away. And the damage isn’t over: there will be more choke points where Republicans can threaten to create a crisis unless the president surrenders, and they can now act with the confident expectation that he will.
In the long run, however, Democrats won’t be the only losers. What Republicans have just gotten away with calls our whole system of government into question. After all, how can American democracy work if whichever party is most prepared to be ruthless, to threaten the nation’s economic security, gets to dictate policy? And the answer is, maybe it can’t.
A version of this op-ed appeared in print on August 1, 2011, on page A21 of the New York edition with the headline: The President Surrenders.
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August 1 2011
Today 4:56 PM Biden: Tea Partiers ‘Have Acted Like Terrorists’ 
In his meeting with the Democratic caucus on Monday, Vice President Joe Biden reportedly told the assembled House members that Tea Party Republicans “have acted like terrorists.”
According to Politico:
Biden was agreeing with a line of argument made by Rep. Mike Doyle (D-Pa.) at a two-hour, closed-door Democratic Caucus meeting.
“We have negotiated with terrorists,” an angry Doyle said, according to sources in the room. “This small group of terrorists have made it impossible to spend any money.”
Biden, driven by his Democratic allies’ misgivings about the debt-limit deal, responded: “They have acted like terrorists,” according to several sources in the room.
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Biden Criticized for Tea Party ‘Terrorists’ Remark
Published August 01, 2011
| FoxNews.com
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Vice President Biden was criticized Monday over reports of a private meeting he had with House Democrats in which Tea Party Republicans were compared to “terrorists,” though Biden denies he described Republicans that way.
A senior Democratic official told Fox News that Biden made such comments in reaction to a heated conversation with liberal House members like Rep. Mike Doyle, D-Pa., who were venting that Republicans got too much out of the debt ceiling deal unveiled the night before and “acted like terrorists.”
The comment drew an immediate rebuke from Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., one of the most outspoken Tea Party-aligned lawmakers in Congress.
“With the president holding the American economy hostage, I would prefer to think of myself as a Freedom Fighter,” Paul said in a statement, calling the remarks “insulting.”
But the Democratic official stressed that Biden made the comment to move the conversation along. According to the official, Biden added that despite the Republicans’ behavior, “we got a lot out of this deal.”
The vice president’s office also downplayed the quote.
“The word was used by several members of Congress. The vice president does not believe it’s an appropriate term in political discourse,” Biden spokeswoman Kendra Barkoff said.
And in an interview with CBS News, Biden said he did not assert in the meeting that he agreed with the sentiment.
“What happened was there were some people who said they felt like they were being held hostage by terrorists,” Biden said. “I never said that they were terrorists or weren’t terrorists, I just let them vent.”
Fox News’ Ed Henry contributed to this report.
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1773: Boston Tea Party: Terrorism in the United States
From Amy Zalman, Ph.D., former About.com Guide
Boston Tea Party
Library of Congress
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Overview:
Tactic / Type:
Where :
When:
The Story:
The Boston Tea Party has its roots in the Tea Act of 1773, which gave the British East India Company, which was struggling financially, the right to sell tea to the American colonies without paying taxes to the British government. American colonial merchants, who did have to pay taxes on tea arriving in their ports, were furious at the unfair protection given the East India Company, especially when they had no representation in the British government (thus the famous rallying cry: No taxation without representation!)
These merchants began to pressure tea agents to abandon their support for the company and, led by Samuel Adams, to organize protests against the tea tax. When Massachusetts Governor Hutchinson refused to let three ships in the Boston Harbor leave without paying taxes, the colonists took matters into their own hands more firmly.
On December 16, 1773, 150 men disguised as Mohawk tribe members boarded the three ships, the Dartmouth, the Eleanor and the Beaver, hacked open all of the 342 tea caskets with axes, and threw it in its entirety into the Boston Harbor. They also took off their shoes and threw these into the harbor to make sure they could not be connected to the crime.
To punish the colonists, Great Britain ordered the Boston port closed until England was paid for the tea. This was one of four punitive measures that together were called the Intolerable Acts by the colonists.
Boston Tea Party
Boston Tea Party and Terrorism
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In Light of Recent Events 