tea parties

 We have all had a little giggle over the stories of the fraudulent voter registration application filed in the name of Mickey Mouse in Florida, or the the applications being filed in the names of individuals, who some have been deceased for 10 years. The reality of the situation is that with the utter imbecility of these cases there are just as many of them  that we never hear about,and that is were one of the most sacred, and honored institution in America is being tarnished.  If the American political electoral system becomes a free for all where fictitious characters, and even the deceased are able to cast votes then essential any election can be bought for the right price.      

 In Texas' Harris County the King Street Patriots Tea Party headed by Catherine Engelbrecht, has rolled out the True to Vote initiative which provides Tea Parties not only in Harris County, but nation wide the resources to ward off the widely known flaws in America's electoral process. In March of this year King Street Patriots held the True to Vote Summit, were activist from 27 states attend to hear of the trials Kings Street faced in the 2010 elections, and how instrumental it was to maintain voter integrity not only in Texas, but throughout the entire nation. With the unveiling of tactics used by the left to sully the American election system, and the proven efforts used by Tea Parties to seal the cracks, the movement is spreading throughout the country. On Saturday April, 30th The Wisconsin campaign for Liberty Annual Conference is being held in Rothschild, Wisconsin. Where activist training will be held on voter fraud, and voter registration. The training will provide information on voter laws, and GOTV efforts that can be implemented to close the ever widening voter fraud gaps in the system.

In comparison to the Lefts' GOTV efforts, the right has become the grandmother that refuses to let go of her rotary phone because using a cordless phone just seemed wrong. With the George Soros, Ford Foundations, and Herb & Marion Sandlers of the world throwing seemingly endless amounts of cash at the left, It begs the question who is burden with the brunt of the rights' GOTV activities. As of late its has been the grassroot Tea Parties who have taken it upon themselves to implement the GOTV measures. Private blue collar citizens' find ways to volunteer there time, to either register voters or even be poll watchers.

The god giving liberties that we as American have a right to, also come with the responsibility to fight, and safeguard those liberties when others will devalue and corrode them until they are rendered useless.  For some the responsibilty of this fight is an honor an privilege to have.

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… and didn’t like what it found. Conservative writers, myself included, are enamored with the emerging Conservative majority in the country. We observe closely, in awe of seeing a free people exercising their fundamental right to remove from office those they have strongly come to oppose. We are truly witnessing a shift in the fabric of American politics.

Rick Santelli

Rick Santelli of CNBC financial news is the one who is credited with the term Tea Party, but if you check on the net you’ll find about ten pages of folks who claim to have invented it. That’s part of the mystique of the Conservative Patriot Movement.

The Patriot groups have literally sprung up all over the country. That’s one of the things that is just driving the DeMarxists nuts about the Tea Party groups. They just can’t visualize the Patriot Movement. It doesn’t equate… there’s no national movement or leadership. It’s entirely independent from any political party or organization. Leftists just can’t register that one… a popular movement they couldn’t match even in their wildest dreams… and one which has grown with logarithmic abandon.

America took one long look at the socialist assault on our country and made a conscious decision to stop it. As the election rapidly approaches, more DeMarxist weaknesses and vulnerabilities become apparent. Some prognosticators are saying that as many as 100 seats could change hands in the House alone. The Senate looks more vulnerable every day, also.

There are going to be a lot of Tea Parties in the run up to the elections. Get online and find your local group and get out there and support them. Talk to your friends and neighbors about America, the Constitution and Freedom.

Semper Vigilans, Semper Fidelis

© Skip MacLure 2010

In the five day news cycle of politics, that’s the blink of an eye. Liberals got a good look at the real America when Glenn Beck’s call to God and country caused a mere 600,000 or so of you to pay your own way to travel to Washington DC.

I wrote in February 2009 that there was a ‘different’ feel out here… people were visibly, and more importantly audibly, upset at Barack Hussein Obama’s abrupt shift to the left. I said, that in this day and age of instant communication, he wouldn’t be able to hide who he really is for long.

I was gratified to be right, as layer after layer of spin, cover and distortion were stripped from Obama’s public persona, and people were able to see beyond the glitz and canned goodies into the frightening, gray world of deprivation and poverty that would be the inevitable result of the triumph of the left.

The people came together, first in town hall meetings and then at the Tea Parties which sprung up all around the country like mushrooms after a spring rain. Their message was remarkably consistent, though they had no apparent leadership on anything other than a local volunteer level.

Conservative values, the defeat of the Obama agenda and the reversal of health care, smaller government, tax cuts and preservation of the Republic are consistent messages throughout. We The People… we’re coming to take our country back. Then we’re going to be asking some very pointed questions.

The Republican leadership is under scrutiny as well. There are many who think that, if given the opportunity to lead again, they’ll revert to type and be the ‘Democrat light’ party insiders who perpetrated us getting thrown out of the leadership to start with. Just being elected to office is not going to guarantee anything any longer. We’ll monitor every person we elect. We’ll question and criticize and, if our elected representatives don’t toe the line, we’ll replace them.

Constitutional Conservatism is sweeping the country. Americans are rising up against the threat to our freedoms. Support them. Get active in your neighborhood and with your district Tea Party. Urge everyone you know to register. Tell them that this will be the single most important vote of their entire lifetimes.

Semper Vigilans, Semper Fidelis

© Skip MacLure 2010

It’s like, “Ok, what’s next from this bunch?” We think in terms of protecting ourselves from, or mitigating, the damage caused by our own government.That’s a shame. We’re starting to get a bomb shelter mentality. What impetus that grows out in the private business world, to expand or to hire new employees, is crushed by government regulation and the threat of more regulation and higher taxes.

The virtual catatonic condition of the economy in our state of California, and the country at large, is causing people who never before paid much attention to political matters to find themselves joining their friends and neighbors in groups of like-minded patriots, who have banded together to proclaim the freedom and greatness of this land in the face of the real and present danger to our Republic from the radical left, now in control of the country.

The left’s pet press, and the bleating class in Hollyrude, continue to carry the DeMarxist water, running interference where they can and spinning like crazy. Interesting thing, that spin… it works usually because people have busy lives and don’t have the time or the inclination to check any further than the specious trumpeting of the lame stream press.

The spin machine has broken down. The reason it’s broken is because of the new media. Spinning is no fun if every time you open your mouth there’s some guy talking to millions of people saying “Wait a minute”. That’s the effect the new media has had on the DeMarxist spin machine. They just can’t get a lie in edgeways before five writers are tearing it apart.

As the country descended toward the abyss which is Socio-Marxism, like-minded people began to join together in a celebration of American exceptionalism. These came to be known as the Tea Parties. They swept throughout the nation, empowering Americans and uniting them against the Marxist threat. Better than 60% of the people in this country are in the Patriot Movement, or are in agreement with our message.

Yeah, we’re angry… and many of us have reason to be. There’s a difference though. It’s a focused sort of anger. It’s like we know where the problems are… we’ve done our homework. Obama and the DeMarxists will never be more dangerous than they will be between now and November 2. Let’s see if we can give them a good long rest.

Semper Vigilans, Semper Fidelis

© Skip MacLure 2010

After running across this piece in the Economist today, I was reminded of that timeless adage "You'll attract more flies with honey than with vinegar." That's a woefully good reminder for the Right as Election Day draws nearer.

Plenty of noise has been made in the past few weeks about the abrupt resignation/firing of Dave Weigel from the Washington Post blog "Right Now." I have been a defender of Weigel's, in large part because I think people's expectations of Weigel were too high - and that's not to disparage Weigel at all, whose work I have followed for a couple of years. The problem was, in my view, that lots of activists expected him to counter Ezra Klein's "Wonk Book" with an editorial style, using his platform at the Post to propel the Tea Party to the revery where so many believed it belonged. Another part of the problem is that, as Dan Gainor at the Media Research Center notes, the Post was never clear about why it had hired Weigel in the first place. Reporting? Check. Opinion? Maybe? I still think Weigel does a good job of reporting, and if he's guilty of anything, it's a preoccupation with man-bites-dog narratives. Aside from all that, I don't have much to add to the gallons of punditry sloshing around the Internet about Weigel-gate.

The reason I bring Weigel's short-lived stint at the Post back up for discussion is that the reaction from the activist community to Weigel's resignation - particularly on Twitter - was pretty vicious, with lots of "Good riddance" and "we told you so." Then came the announcement that Weigel would be a paid MSNBC contributor on Countdown with Keith Olbermann - and activists were once again a-Twitter with disgust. Thankfully there was an equivalent outpouring of support for Weigel. I disagree with Keith Olbermann frequently, particularly when it comes to his sneering punditry and progressive worldview. I appreciate that he was the first (and for a long time only) mainstream media personality to cover the devastating flooding in my hometown of Nashville earlier this year, and he and I share in New York Yankees fan-dom. But why the Weigel witch-hunt on the Right?

And then it hit me: the Right and center-right are still obsessed with (plagued by?) litmus tests that, unchecked, can be impossible to pass. And not normal litmus tests either - sure, nobody wants to see another John McCain presidential campaign - I mean the conservative base is so energized right now that it has become bloodthirsty, and it's beginning to feed on itself. Long-time allies to conservatives - the libertarians - have begun to take notice.

I urge everyone to check out this written exchange between Cato Institute's Brink Lindsey, AEI/National Review Online's Jonah Goldberg, and FreedomWorks' Matt Kibbe, a debate on where libertarians belong on the 21st century ideological spectrum, and how they can, should, and might play in the activist/political component of the Tea Party movement. Romantic libertarians like yours truly hope wistfully one day to inform a more rigorous social policy agenda - one that actually gets government out of people's lives, including their marriages and sex lives - to complement existing tenets of economic freedom upon which, for the most part, everyone right-of-center seems to reaching consensus. But because of these purity tests, many libertarians worry that the emergence of centrist rhetoric at Tea Party rallies is nothing more than a ruse to grab handfuls of votes on Election Day 2010 and 2012, and then Big Government conservatism does us all in - again.

I am sympathetic to Brink Lindsey's point in this respect. Libertarians - who often sacrifice opportunities to "get involved" in lieu of safeguarding transcendent philosophical values for the sake of practical virtue - should not compromise their core beliefs just because Sarah Palin said we need less government and more personal responsibility. But I also think Matt Kibbe makes great points - the Tea Party movement is as fascinating a paradigm shift in American politics as I will likely ever see in my lifetime. It has unbundled the Left almost completely, who has tried to use every tool at its disposal - from race-baiting in formal media outlets to unscientific opinion polling - to couch the Tea Party movement as garden-variety Republican, and quintessentially racist, xenophobic, and homophobic. Kibbe insists that many Tea Partiers don't know where to place themselves on an ideological scale, and notes that many have never been involved in political discourse before now. This groundswell provides libertarians with that romantic opportunity to inform the policy debate - especially issues like gay marriage, which Tea Party groups support, and like Kibbe, I think it's hasty to accept Lindsey's premise with open arms. So Lindsey's libertarian protectionism can be just as dangerous and self-defeating as the Gainor conservative witch-hunts.

The Tea Party movement is still today very fragile, despite the noise the movement has made and the support it has drummed up. If libertarians and conservatives can agree about anything, it's opposition to power-drunk Democrats; it's probably best that everyone focus on that for now, instead of running reckless with purity tests, and when Republicans win, it will be up to them to follow through on promises they're making to people getting involved for the first time. Those people don't know where they lie on the ideological spectrum, but they know that the government is screwing them.

That’s an apt description for the groundswell that has become the Tea Parties, the various patriot movements and citizens of all stripes and persuasions to whom the message of Conservative Republicans is resonating. That number is growing, as evinced by polling data and the surprising inroads being claimed by Conservative Republican challengers, some in heavily Democratic districts.

Yes, this is a grassroots movement, but it is much more than that. It is a uniquely American grassroots movement, which in turn has its roots in the very foundations of this country. It is indeed a home brew. It is a recipe that sadly I don’t think would work for our European brethren. It’s not that they are not smart enough or brave enough. It’s just that they haven’t been inculcated with the spirit of freedom. It’s a magic transformation. Once introduced to the idea of freedom and liberty few will choose to revert to subservience. Here in this country in the last sixteen months we have witnessed events that would have precipitated rioting in the streets of many countries.

The world will be watching us to see how we deal with the orderly transfer of power in the November elections. The players on the world stage will be watching too, because they know that if the DeMarxists lose Congress in November the free ride is over. The bad guys get the message too. They have the President, his administration and party pegged as a bunch of vacuous radical lightweights without a coherent foreign policy or diplomatic message. They see Barack Hussein Obama as weak, vacillating and apologetic to all the wrong people… Obama has an uncanny attraction for the worst sort of people. It’s an example of things finding their own level.

It would do well for us to remember that not only Israel, but we also have a very large target on our backs, that the threats of annihilation coming at us daily from Islamo-fascists around the world are real and that words have meaning. Are you listening, Barack?

Semper Vigilans, Semper Fidelis

© Skip MacLure 2010

Tomorrow will put finish to the contention that the ‘Tea-Party’ or Conservative Patriot movement has reached its zenith and would soon cease to be a threat. That’s what they’d like you to think. The MSM (so-called mainstream media) has consistently underestimated the real strength of the Patriot movement. They’ve expended so much time on trying to discredit our movement and everything about it. They’ve tied us to every wild-eyed fringe maniac they could find. They have painted us with that usually reliable liberal brush.

Wonder of wonders, it didn’t work. The Patriot Movement has emerged from their collective scathing stronger, smarter, more determined and much larger. More and more people are seeing how deeply they have been betrayed by the passage of health care and the rest of Obama’s economy and job killing policies. These people will gravitate towards their local patriot groups too.

Tomorrow we will see an expression of American values, our traditions, our Constitution and our profound belief in God and the God given freedoms we defend. Millions of Americans will attempt, once again, to get a message through to a government in Washington, which so far has proven deaf to the growing crescendo of unrest around the country. As ominous as all the indicators are for the DeMarxists in the coming midterms, Patriot activists are working extra hard to make sure we retire as many people as we can who facilitated the passage of the health care bill.

Tell all the friends you can reach about the tea-parties in your area, support your country and join with your local Patriots in this peaceful expression of our freedoms. All over America people are joining together and repudiating the Socio/Marxist aims of Barack Obama, his administration and Democrat-dominated House and Senate.

Semper Vigilans, Semper Fidelis

© Skip MacLure 2010

There's blood in the water. Republicans are licking their chops. But these very lucky partisans had better think very clearly and carefully in the coming months. Things have changed. The dynamic is tentative, fragile and fortunes can turn on a dime. The calculation for politicians has changed, too. People are empowered like never before. And they're watching.

Scott Brown is what many might call a RINO. I know, I know. He may help America dodge a legislative bullet in Obamacare. And, of course, for Massachusetts, beggars can't be choosers. Still, we must be leery of stuff like this, from Senator-elect Brown: "In Massachusetts, I support the 2006 healthcare law that was successful in expanding coverage, but I also recognize that the state must now turn its attention to controlling costs." The Massachusetts healthcare plan is the last thing Congress should emulate. (So tread softly, Scott. Or should I say "don't tread.")

Unlike 2000-2006, principles have to come first. Otherwise, the independents and RINO hunters will find you and take shots. If you come into office with an incumbent-mentality - cozying up to special interests and building bridges to nowhere - they will call you out. They will cool your ambitions in the icy waters of truth. Why? People are tired of the 'lesser of evils mentality', for what has it gotten us?

Also, the old calculation was a system that rewarded crony capitalism: i.e. if you ensured that regulations, subsidies and pork projects benefited supplicants in your district, more than likely, you'd keep power. Then, occasionally, you'd get to do something idealistic that would obscure the dirty deals that really kept you in office. Not any more. The Democrats are learning a very difficult lesson about a very different age.

Your job will be to cap spending, reduce the debt and pass regulatory review to begin stripping out the perverse incentive systems both your party and the Dems have woven for your respective benefit. These systems pick winners and losers. They are destroying competition and thus our economy. Indeed, the special interest state is destroying our very institutions.

It used to be that the logic of collective action was such that the costs of organization favored special interests. It was too costly to organize taxpayers and people of principle, being so many people with so little access to information and means to organize. But technology has lowered those costs. They're organizing now. They're RINO hunters and they're coming to your district. When they arrive, they'll hold your feet to freedom's fire. So if you have anything else in mind but something like First Principles, your time in power will be short. If you're the product of some old-boy network and ran in order to serve that network, they'll find out. Your political life may be but an asterisk in the New Book of Purgation.

There are armies - mad as hornets - carrying flashlights, too. They are bringing to light your practices. They are coming armed with ideas and principles. So again, the calculation has changed. The blood you smell in the water by 2012 could be an elephant's.

Your new motto is "Principles First." Don't like it? To succeed, you will serve principle slavishly. Not self, not career, not power, not the crony-capitalist complex your party helped the Democrats to build (and that Barack Obama and the Democratic Congress have perfected). You will serve principle. Your job will be to free the American people,  American free enterprise and renew that contract with America.

Otherwise, your career may be a one-term proposition. Why? Because you'll be temped to cozy up to the special interests in your state. But these unholy alliances won't keep you safe. You may try to hide behind the moralistic rhetoric of this issue or that, but it does not trump principle. Your elections and reelections will depend on navigating the waters between the Scylla of special interests and the Charybdis of the RINO hunters and tea-partiers. Either way, term limits will be imposed from without. Welcome to 2010.

I have to confess I’ve been conflicted over whether Michael Steele was a true Conservative, or just another product of the go-along get-along Republican National Party we’ve so come to despise. I’ve swung both ways on Mr Steele. Early on he made what I considered to be some major blunders, in particular when dealing with the phenomenon known as the ‘Tea Parties’ and us homespun and rough shod Conservatives out here in the hinterland.

What he failed to recognize, which at that time eliminated him from my choice in the new Conservative party leadership, was that ours was not a flash in the pan movement and it was not a coalition of mythical right wing fringe groups, as the increasingly marginalized and ineffectual so-called mainstream press was trying to label us, that would fade with time. Some of the things he said reminded me far too much of some of the previous leadership which had brought themselves, and us, to ruin. Conversely, on a couple of occasions he did surprise me with statements that you would expect to hear from a true Conservative. I found myself wondering which Michael Steele was the genuine article.

Michael Steele

I’ve said that we needed courageous, no-nonsense political brawlers that would not only be willing but able to go bare-knuckled and toe to toe with the DeMarxists and not concede an inch. After all, it’s the exact style of politics that the opposition has been using on us for forty years or more. The problem with Republicans has been that they were always quick to back off of a point or accommodate on an issue the very second they were confronted, as to not offend someone or to stop from looking like the bad guys. Another big lesson Conservative Republicans have got to have driven home is to not allow the DeMarxists, or their lapdog cronies of the press, to DEFINE us. A lesson I’m not sure Michael Steele has learned. That remains to be seen. If you allow them to define you then they have taken the issues away as well.

Today I was lucky enough to catch Michael Steele’s interview with Mark Levin on Mark’s syndicated radio talk show. I confess to being pleasantly surprised. Michael was talking about his new book and it’s ‘twelve steps to Conservative victory’. Very impressive. I don’t think it’s quite that complicated but it’s a guideline and they’re all sound salient points. What remains to be seen is if he’s the COMBAT COMMANDER we wish to follow. If he wants to lead us, then he’ll show us that he has the cajones for the fight. It’s like this Michael… Lead, follow or get out of the way.

Semper Vigilans, Semper Fidelis

© Skip MacLure 2010

Flickr photo by Mike Bryant

Lost in the hubbub about the tea parties, the health care town hall protests, Joe Wilson, and the ACORN sting is the outcome of a long-simmering meta debate about the vibrancy of the grassroots right and its capacity to organize online. Along with a slew of other bad political indicators, the perception that the GOP might be stuck in a permanent Luddite rut reached its peak with the election of Obama and the role the Internet played in his victory.

Nearly a year later, not only have things turned around, but they've done so faster than anyone could have dreamed or imagined in those post-election doldrums.

First, hundreds of thousands of people showed up, flash mob-like, at Tea Parties not even three months after Obama Nation reached its apogee with the inauguration. The left was caught flat-footed and stammered that it must have been the creation of Fox News, although Fox News existed in the latter Bush years and during the McCain interlude and was unable to conjure up a similar display of enthusiasm in that period.

In August, the rightroots gained further velocity with the health care protests. This was significant in that it was the first head to head match with OFA and the unions, and it was no contest.

The third key moment came when Joe Wilson was able to raise as much (if not more) money than his Democratic opponent after the "You lie!" outburst. The left's immediate rallying around Rob Miller was a textbook netroots play, aided by ready-made infrastructure (an ActBlue page ready to accept contributions without crashing and display real-time feedback). For a Republican -- especially one deemed to be on the "wrong" side of a PR war -- to have been competitive in money raised with a netroots Democrat is something that simply would not have happened in the Bush years. This is especially striking given that Markos, Stoller, Bowers et al. made money raised for candidates the sine qua non of the netroots, an outgrowth of the left's 1970s era obsession with countering "big money" in politics.

Finally, the O'Keefe/Giles video bust of ACORN -- the right's biggest media coup since Rathergate -- showed the right to be getting its sea legs in investigative journalism, a space virtually patented by the left in recent years.

What we seem to be witnessing is the Feiler Faster Thesis in action, with a robust grassroots opposition to Obama, aided by the Internet, taking shape far more quickly than anyone could have predicted, and comparatively speaking, in a far more timely fashion than it took the left to gets its act together against Bush.

(The big asterisk in that comparison with the Bush years is 9/11 and the wars, but looking back to August and early September 2001, the Democratic opposition to Bush was weak and defined largely by spineless Washington pols like Tom Daschle rather than a sea of grassroots protest, which became apparent only later when the Internet became a viable organizing vehicle.)

So, the fear that Republicans would be disorganized for months if not years after Obama taking office has proven to be unfounded. The right's rise online (and offline too) has been a pretty automatic reaction to Democratic hegemony in Washington, disproving the notion that there is anything intrinsic to the right or the left driving the use of specific tools. And wrapping this up in a neat little bow, the political environment turns out to be the decisive factor in how emphatically people use the technology, not the other way around.

Understandably, not all of this has been online. Talk radio, and yes, cable news, still plays a role, particularly in the critical task of driving calls to member offices. As I noted on Twitter in August, 

For all the talk about lefty activism recently, it seems the right has an institutional advantage in contacting Congress... on every issue

From immigration to health care, most of the time you hear about a lopsided disparity with one side shutting down phone lines on Capitol Hill, it's conservatives doing it. While the political climate may dictate how effectively the tools get used, the right and left still have a tendency to focus on different things, with the right jumpstarting its movement in recent months with legislative advocacy and moving bodies to events, and while the left first built the netroots around raising money for candidates.

As a skeptic of the hegemony of money in campaigns and a believer in shoeleather organizing, it's not surprising to me that a newly resurgent right has made such an explosive impact on the national debate in the last two months. All the folks who wondered for five years where our response to the netroots was now have their answer.