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Republican

8 (7%)

Democrat

16 (13.9%)

Other Party (There are more than two? Amazing!)

20 (17.4%)

FUCK the political party system!

24 (20.9%)

I'm one of them foriegnerz and I'm just voting so I can annoy Heli

47 (40.9%)

Total Members Voted: 115

[Gorjo MacGrymm]

On a personal note: I've met my share of Tea Party members. I will say most of them seem to be pretty nice people as long as you stay away from politics (Actually, most people seem to be this way.) They do tend to attract a lot of the survivalist type people though. Again, not necessarily bad people, just... not who I'd pick to run the country.

That is not my experience, but then again I live in a very cosmopolitan city.  Not alot of survivalists in the concrete metropolitan jungle.

[RedKing]

Tea Partiers are like those annoying gits who like indie music, until a band they like gets popular, then they have to dump them and find something more obscure. All their supposed "cred" is based on their being avant-garde / "maverick".

IMHO, they're the political descendants of Ross Perot's mid-90's Reform Party, merged with the mid-90's militia movement and general wacky right-wing fringe. Fiscal conservatism may be their overarching justification for everything, but there's a lot of people within the movement using that "fiscal conservatism" as cover for a variety of social conservative agendas (case in point: attacking lots of little expenditures like the arts, public broadcasting, women's health services, services to the poor, etc. while totally refusing to consider rescinding tax cuts to the wealthy or corporate subsidies).

[GlyphGryph]

So when Gorjo says he's a member of the Tea Party, theirs quite a few different ways to interpret it. the only widely accepted issues seem to be "reduce debt", "no public healthcare", "no gay marriage", and "limit or remove environmental protection legislation"

So, gorjo, what do you believe the planks of the tea party to be? And how does it differ from those of the Republican party?

If u think that is a tea party platform, you know ZERO about the tea party.

Oh, I'm well aware that not all of these aren't part of the tea party platform. Many early and important tea party members would vehemently disagree. But when polled, those who claim to be followers of the tea party often have those four issues as their primary point of agreement, well, as far as the tea party agrees on anything remotely specific. It is true that like 80% agree on "reducing the federal government", but that doesn't mean anything in and of itself - once you get to specifics, the highest you seem likely to get is 60% agreement. (From various polls, mostly pew and CBS, so maybe my numbers are wrong. Feel free to argue them). According to one of the recent "contracts for America" (based on results from 365,000 survey responses), limiting the power of the EPA was at a whopping 70%, second only to a rather vague requirement that laws passed be constitutionally justified, and BEFORE any economic issues. They also generally agree that Obama is doing a bad a job, but thats not much of a policy agreement since there's no consensus as to why. Hell, only 56% agree with getting rid of the government healthcare, and a significant portion thinks we should have MORE government healthcare!

Look, with my libertarian leanings, I'm glad the tea party exists. But they are a very fractured movement, and they have pulled most of their members from the Republican party, run lots of Republican candidates, and gotten tons of Republican support. Unfortunately, they've been pretty steadily driving towards support for a lot of classical Republican issues, in large part due to the "Republican Hijack attempt" as you call it.

I understand and support a lot of the tea parties motivations, but just can't understand the wide support for issues that seem inherently anti-tea-party or just plain dumb. They say we should balance the budget, but simultaneously push for cutting funding of the IRS - the one branch of the government that brings in more money for every dollar spent (and they get the money from criminals who are evading taxes!). They want to get rid of federal debt, but are utterly opposed to raising taxes, cutting medicare and social security, or cuts to the military - and without doing any of those, its simply not possible. In fact, we would have to do all three to get rid of the federal debt any time soon.

[Leafsnail]

...If they are merely "fiscally conservative" without ideological leanings, why support, say, Christine O' Donnell, who's socially conservative in the extreme?  Why support Sarah Palin?  I mean, a movement's made up of the people in it, after all.

[Farmerbob]

...If they are merely "fiscally conservative" without ideological leanings, why support, say, Christine O' Donnell, who's socially conservative in the extreme?  Why support Sarah Palin?  I mean, a movement's made up of the people in it, after all.

Because Bob the Carpenter might be fiscally responsible enough, and even well enough educated to suit the party, but nobody wants to listen to Bob because nobody known him.

You have to bring name power into the party in order to have any power at all.  Unfortunately these days, most persons that are fiscal conservatives have so much toxic garbage attached to them that there are very few "good" choices for any party.  The few "good" choices out there that are both big enough names and have little toxicity attached to them are normally smart enough to want to stay away from any government office above governor.

[GTM]

The "tea party" in america are just scared, ignorant old white people who want simple, laconic solutions to problems.  In other words, they're a joke and most of them will be dead sooner or later.

Before the tea party was taken over by assholes, it began as a libertarian uprising within the republican party, aligned with guys like Ron Paul.  Back then, it was actually something admirable, but the name and the concept have been irrevocably sullied.  I was never a tea party fan, but in lieu of scientific evidence either way I sympathize with the original tea party for its pursuit of freedom and human dignity.

But again, it has become the dumbest wing of the already stupid republican party, and I feel sorry for anyone still involved with it.

[RedKing]

Agreed. There was a time period when this was starting to build, sometime between 2006 and 2008, when I was actually sympathetic to them too. Back when they started off bitching about how the GOP, "their" party, had abandoned the principal of fiscal conservatism. I could fully agree with that, and I'm a fiscal conservative at heart myself. Never been all that crazy about Ron Paul, but at least the guy was willing to say, "Iraq was a big f**king mistake."

But then something happened, and it seems like it happened during the 2008 election campaign. Palin, Bachmann and a few others (and certain bespectacled TV pundits) started endorsing the Tea Party (and vice versa), but they also began inserting bits of dog-whistle rhetoric about "socialism" and "Muslims" and a "foreign-born President named Barack HUSSEIN Obama", etc. Didn't take too long for that ilk to scurry out of the woodwork and hide under the cover of the Tea Party movement.

[Gorjo MacGrymm]

The "tea party" in america are just scared, ignorant old white people who want simple, laconic solutions to problems.  In other words, they're a joke and most of them will be dead sooner or later.

As a tea party member, and as someone who has repeatedly stated in this thread that i am a tea party member (since post #2), let me say: [flaming]

...If they are merely "fiscally conservative" without ideological leanings, why support, say, Christine O' Donnell, who's socially conservative in the extreme?  Why support Sarah Palin?  I mean, a movement's made up of the people in it, after all.

Thats the point, social ideologies are immaterial.  Fiscal conservatism is supposed to be the only key.

So when Gorjo says he's a member of the Tea Party, theirs quite a few different ways to interpret it. the only widely accepted issues seem to be "reduce debt", "no public healthcare", "no gay marriage", and "limit or remove environmental protection legislation"

So, gorjo, what do you believe the planks of the tea party to be? And how does it differ from those of the Republican party?

If u think that is a tea party platform, you know ZERO about the tea party.

Oh, I'm well aware that not all of these aren't part of the tea party platform.

Here is the tea party platfrom for the Dallas, Tx tea party.
http://www.teapartypatriots.org/Mission.aspx
Please make note of the last two sentences of the "philosophy".

As a comparison, here is the 2010 Texas Republican Party platform.  Its funny because it has been whitewashed to more appeal to tea party members (that whole hijacking thing). https://www.1888932-2946.ws/TexasGOP/E-ContentStrategy/userfiles/2010_RPT_PLATFORM.pdf

Also, as a disclaimer, I am so voting against Kay Bailey Hutchinson and John Cornyn.  They are both Republicans I find despicable.


Edit:  Is Kay even in congress anymore? gotta go look.

[Max White]

Wish we had a tea party party. I freaking love tea! And ice, and sapphires, and robes...

[Aqizzar]

...If they are merely "fiscally conservative" without ideological leanings, why support, say, Christine O' Donnell, who's socially conservative in the extreme?  Why support Sarah Palin?  I mean, a movement's made up of the people in it, after all.

Thats the point, social ideologies are immaterial.  Fiscal conservatism is supposed to be the only key.

And yet, it just keeps not working out that way.  Big huge influx of "Tea Party" aligned Congresspeople.  Jobs jobs jobs, deficit deficit deficit.  First item on the table when Congress enters session?  Making abortions harder to get.

[Gorjo MacGrymm]

...If they are merely "fiscally conservative" without ideological leanings, why support, say, Christine O' Donnell, who's socially conservative in the extreme?  Why support Sarah Palin?  I mean, a movement's made up of the people in it, after all.

Thats the point, social ideologies are immaterial.  Fiscal conservatism is supposed to be the only key.

And yet, it just keeps not working out that way.  Big huge influx of "Tea Party" aligned Congresspeople.  Jobs jobs jobs, deficit deficit deficit.  First item on the table when Congress enters session?  Making abortions harder to get.

Remember Aqizzar, John Boehner is not part of the tea party.  He's a boehner.  I wish I could erase the confusion over tea party members and republicans, but the current sitting (pre 2010 election) republican congresspeople are making a hash of it.  They are trying to backhandedly use tea party principles to attack their petty social issues.  Trust me, this annoys tea party members (at least the ones I converse with).

[Aqizzar]

Y'know what, I've got an idea.  Take the list of current Congresspeople, and you tell me which ones are the Tea Partiers and which ones are just plain old Republicans.  Because sitting on the outside, I have no idea which is which, because they all call themselves Tea Partiers, and I don't know the how to tell the believers from the poseurs.

[ToonyMan]

The only tea party I would go to is the one with black tea served by Ronove.

[Gorjo MacGrymm]

Y'know what, I've got an idea.  Take the list of current Congresspeople, and you tell me which ones are the Tea Partiers and which ones are just plain old Republicans.  Because sitting on the outside, I have no idea which is which, because they all call themselves Tea Partiers, and I don't know the how to tell the believers from the poseurs.

damn, now I got homework. *palmslap

[breadbocks]

Gorjo. Quit being asinine. It is NOT the Tea Party. It is the Tea Party MOVEMENT. You can say "mfw repubs" but that doesn't change the fact you are following a cause you are uninformed about, which is worse than not voting at all. That is like a guy voting for Obama, just because he's black (And yes, I actually asked some people. They said that's why they voted him.) while not caring about his platform. It is just another sect of "repubs".

Either get informed about what you are so blindly waving about, or get out until you do. The country is in bad enough ways without people saying "i h8 red so i vote for red" in a roundabout way.