Tea Party Militias?: Telling Mainstream Conservatives from Right Wing Extremists

"It is hard to know how to account for this phenomenon." he says. Yes, I imagine it is. It's always hard to account for a phenomenon that exists mainly in one's head.

Let's be perfectly clear about this: any overlap between the tea-partiers and white supremacist groups is minimal and accidental. At most, the hate groups see a popular movement and are glomming on to it in hopes of leaching members. They were not invited and are generally disinvited as soon as they are identified.

Frankly, the racist groups would probably disappear if groups like Sojo would pay less attention to them. If you didn't stir up false hopes among bigots by repeating over and over again your own cockamamie theories that conservatives and libertarians are secretly bigots, they would probably give up and go home.

LV

Frankly, the racist groups would probably disappear if groups like Sojo would pay less attention to them.

Wishful thinking.

Many of these groups are considered by the financial aristocracy to be their own version, in reverse, of Lenin's "useful idiots." Through influence-peddling, the government is almost completely under the sway of the banksters and their various financial elite allies. The paid demagoguery these fund is simply designed to deflect and neutralize any of the deserved blame they would otherwise accrue, by playing up any and all fears - appealing to base instincts to distract. Government is in no danger of going away - and poses their only threat - so bandying it about as the epitome of all evil (except when performing the service of warfare or bonus bailouts in their own financial interests) gives them the twofer of neutralizing any possible threat to their hegemony over the rest of us, while encouraging the demonization of convenient but powerless blame proxies like some poor guy trying desperately to feed his family.

"Suspicion of the federal government appears to be at an all-time high."

If my public education was accurate it seems to me that suspicion of the federal government ran very high in the late 1700's as well.

"It wasn't the government that created the current economic meltdown. Government failed us by doing too little to regulate Wall Street and the financial industry, too much regulation was the least of our worries."

For that to be the case, you would have to show that banks violated regulations, regulators refused to enforce regulations, or that regulations were eliminated that would have prevented the crisis. None of the above happened. Even the much praised Glass-Steagall act would have done nothing. G-S prevented banks from engaging in investment banking. No commercial banks did. They purchased mortgage backed securities because all regulators, all politicians, and all mainstream economists declared them to be the best investments ever invented. Even Greenspan said they reduced risk, as did the IMF.

The best theory of business/financial cycles there is lays the blame on loose monetary policy by the Federal Reserve, which is an agency of the federal government. As popular as the "regulation failed" theory is, it is not even mentioned as a viable theory among the dozen or so theories of business cycles. It's nothing but populist fantasy.

There was an (editorial) article today that argues that the Tea Partiers are in reality motivated by racism, although they're probably smart enough to not admit it. Lee Atwater's Southern strategy is brought up, and yes at least a non-negligible segment has racist overtones because frankly, if one looks at the facts, there's nothing the current administration is doing/has done that would get the right so riled up, when they were so silent during the tenure of GWB.

Since my dad, an elderly pentecostal preacher, stays plugged in to certain talk shows 24/7 as if they speak truth, he has assumed Obama is in a conspiracy for anything from removing Christmas from the White House, In God We Trust from our money, and Toyota from a competitive market place. No matter how much fact checking and proof I offer him, he is first and foremost loyal to an entertainer, who keeps him feeling important and alive by foretelling the beginning of the end in all things.

As my dad, who does love the Lord, said to me, the man wouldn't lie, or he wouldn't be on the radio. And there we have it folks. The rise of a whole new group of people, taught by a few. No wonder we are like sheep gone astray.

No amount of biblical references to listening to Godly counsel, and avoiding contentious, strife-making, fear mongering voices, no amount of pointing out that God's wisdom, like James says is pure, peacable, full of good fruit, EASY TO BE ENTREATED works to sway my dad. And so his end of days are taken up with praying away the wickedness in our land and waiting for the Lord to return.

I for one, resent my own upbringing that robbed me of the glass half full, pro-active, love my neighbor as myself attitude I've come to so late in life. I've missed out in so much of God's Goodness, as I armed myself for every evil and depravity that lurked out there. And onward Christian soldiers. The call is crystal clear as those who believe themselves the only faithful, breed fear and fail to disseminate the hope found in the gospel. What more can the extremely fearful do, than to group up and get ready to be victims. Fight or flight. Lord may grace reach the hearts of those who fear and may love cover a multitude of sins.

I think the racism charge is overstated -- after all, we saw even worse things said against Bill Clinton. The difference is that the Clinton "scandals" were largely made up by and in the right-wing media machine, which began to collapse with the impeachment. As such, conservatives can no longer pretend and have no need to hide their hatred, so they don't bother.

As Reagan said of the citing of floods of misleading statistics (and I can see his head shaking sadly even now), "There he goes again..."

Fundamentalism is commonly used as a pejorative term, probably because of its profound link to narrow ideologies that are held as articles of faith, flying in the face of experience and thus reality, rather than being subject to correction by reasonable inquiry. Richard Dawkins has used the term to characterize religious advocates as clinging to a stubborn, entrenched position that defies reasoned argument or contradictory evidence.

So are you a religious "fundamentalist," or an economic one?

The really scary thing to me is the parallels between what is happening in our country (and has over the past 10+ years) with the rise of the right, and the rise of the NAZI party in the 20's in Germany. ie blocking anything that is not our agenda, attacks with no factual basis, entertainers posing as media.

I'm not afraid. You see, the right wing is a wounded animal right now and feels it has nothing to lose by what amounts to a final assault on the "enemy." Thing is, the generation now in its 20s and 30s isn't anywhere near as extreme ideologically and can't relate to old baby-boom resentments from the 1960s, so in 10 or 20 years we'll see a much different tone.

That's really amusing to see the Right compared with the Nazis. The problem is that we want smaller government, not bigger. The Left is the one moving that direction. You have the President, both houses and the media. You've been swallowing too many scare tactics from MSNBC!

"It wasn't the government that created the current economic meltdown. Government failed us by doing too little to regulate Wall Street and the financial industry, too much regulation was the least of our worries."

Wrong. The government took away the risks from the banks. Bad idea. They made risky deals and got all the winning and none of the losses, because they always get bailed out.

What a passive-aggressive post. You act like you are showing the difference, when it was really just an excuse to call conservatives RAAACISTS! Pathetic.

"The unswerving assumption is that free enterprise is good and government is bad. This dogma makes it impossible for the Tea Party zealots to understand what's going on. It wasn't the government that created the current economic meltdown."

I have to disagree with you anaylsis of the governments cupability in the current financial problems of this country. More than $100 trillion in unfunded obligations and mandates does not promote prosperity for anyone.

I realize many will disagree, but government regulation, i.e., the community reinvestment act, was a major force that lead up to today's financial demise in this country. Social engineering almost always has bad unintended consequences. Government needs to stay out of issues it has no right to try to affect because the constitution prohibits it.

Something to watch. I am not saying this is right or wrong, but I am saying this is what is going to happen. If healthcare gets pushed through in its present state. Expect to see a lot more civil unrest. Enough the MSM will not be able to ignore it. Expect the Tea Party movement to escalate. Whether it comes from conservatives and independents, or so called right wing extremist I can't say. But I tend to think it will be mainstream citizens, not the loonies.

I am curious, which of the scandals were made up?

...and using political patriotism and God and bible to keep the fervor rising!

You need to watch Hitler's rhetoric only to see the similarities.

I'm expecting a follow-up post from Sojourners about how many of the country's teacher's unions and university educrats oppose Obama and Duncan's educational reforms. I doubt that the percentage of minority ed unionists and professors is much higher than that of minorities in the Tea Party. As Joel Klein of Time magazine noted, one of the biggest obstacles to true educational reform is the teachers' union and the educational establishment.

But I won't hold my breath.

Care to elaborate? Hitler wasn't pro-life. He appears to have created the first abortion clinic -- http://tinyurl.com/yjkafza . He wasn't small government. He wasn't for lower taxes. He wasn't pro-right to bear arms. He wasn't pro-free speech. He didn't support home schooling. And on and on . . .

The community reinvestment act has ? what kind of record for default? It is weird that we equate poverty and opportunity and equal access, with poor return. One just has to study the business practices of our own Donald Trump, to see how lending to the wealthy works out.

Lending to the poor without interest is a great way to elevate the economy where everyone benefits. Call me selfish, but I'd much rather see just lending practice laws spread across the face of a nation, and not just liberally thrown at the already wealthy. Even the wealthy should understand at some point if they hold all the cards, there will be no one left to play their game.

I thought it was the relaxing of regulations by Reagan, and extended by Clinton that sort of created loopholes for our banking industry to spiral out of control and create our current crisis. Or was it our own greed to make quick and fast wealth no matter what the cost that drove us to this point.

There are many many verses that talk about those who lend to the poor, lend to the Lord. So can't say I agree with you on these points. People have always predicted the end of democracy as we know it, when major change happens.

Electing President Kennedy, did not bring in the rule of Rome as many thought, nor will adding health care to the many other benefits our country offers, break us. It will simply reinvent how we do things, something we've been doing as a flexible nation since our inception.

The only one that wasn't made up at least in part was Monica, and even that was a setup. Clinton was impeached as the result of a collaboration between Linda Tripp (who got Monica to confide in her), Ken Starr and lawyers from the Rutherford Institute representing Paula Jones -- and illegally, as things turned out.

But that's an aside. Obama by contrast is scandal-free in his public and private life, and since his enemies no longer have the cover of "serving the public interest," their only available tactic is to go right after him. And that's where they'll trip up again.

Social engineering almost always has bad unintended consequences. Government needs to stay out of issues it has no right to try to affect because the constitution prohibits it.

What do you think the civil-rights movement was?

Expect the Tea Party movement to escalate. Whether it comes from conservatives and independents, or so called right wing extremist I can't say. But I tend to think it will be mainstream citizens, not the loonies.

I don't agree at all; it would have happened already because many people on both sides of the aisle would have signed on by now. The "tea-partiers" make a whole lot of noise and get a lot of coverage disproportionate to their true numbers. (There are a lot more people involved in anti-abortion efforts -- but they still don't have much pull.)

"But much of the rage and resentment we have witnessed in recent months is rooted in dark political fantasy with very little basis in fact."

Bingo.

And, that's why it's nearly impossible to convince them with facts and logic. They prefer their dark fantasies and refuse to consider reality.

When high level members of President Bush's administration were bragging about creating their own reality, this darkness is what they were talking about. The ease of their success and the gullibility of those who are so easily manipulated is astonishing and tragic.

Yes and progressives believe in diversity in everything but thought. George Will