DC Tea Party
White House, April 15, 2009
God knows I love a good protest. My office is next door to the Washington Post office and two blocks from the White House. There are protests all the time and I go out of my way to join in even if I don’t know what the protest is about or what side I’m on. Doesn’t matter. There are certain things I like to take advantage of simply because I live in The Most Powerful City In the World (insert sinister laugh here) and I likes me a goooood protest.
Favorite sign from yesterday? Hocus POTUS
Republicans are, you know, so compelling and all with their boo-fucking-hoo, cry-me-a-river, we’re-paying-too-much-in-taxes. And I especially LOVE to wipe those tears away before they cuddle into a velvet booth at a high-priced restaurant in downtown DC or nestle into the heated seats of their Mercedes before heading west on the Toll Road into suburban Virginia. Hate the stimulus plan? Then hate the Bush administration for running up the tab in Iraq and Afghanistan.
I sit squarely in the 28% tax bracket, down from 33% tax bracket I’ve been in for the last two years. I have one deduction: a tiny condo whose square footage is less than most master bedrooms in suburban Maryland. I pay taxes for schools for children I don’t have, sidewalks so that those same kids don’t have to walk in the street to get to these schools and a whole plethora of county services that I may never avail myself of.
Such is the case with a functioning society. Call it Socialism if it makes you feel better. Put it on a bumper sticker and wax poetic about the “good old days” when George Bush cared about you. And by “you”, I mean privileged, white men because that’s who the Republicans care about. Build a bunker of bottled water and enough canned food to stave off the impending doom that Fox News would have you believe is as eminent as the sun rising in the east. Buy into the fear and live within the mental walls of a scarcity mentality that suggests that no matter how much you have, it’s never enough. Protect your bunker with Waco, Texas amount of guns and munitions and white knuckle your money whispering ”mine, mine, mine” under your breath, a self-soothing mantra.
And do all of that in Lafayette Park, where homeless men and women sit crouched together in the mud.
There’s a reason I’ve never much cared for tea.
haha brilliant Jen! Brilliantly funny actually
I love the way you write, it’s terrifically funny and usually insightful however in this instance I must disagree. I too was at that rally and I met many people who don’t drive Mercedes, don’t live in fancy homes and end up in tax brackets much lower than what we most peole seem to expect from the right wing. Many of those present were livid with Bush for his particpation in and initiantion of the bailout era but it is only the relentless continuation of the bailouts and reckless spending that has pushed people to finally come out and protest. It’s not an Obama thing, had Bush or McCain presided over the last three months you can bet that most of those people would have been out in the rain just the same.
Love every word of this!
One of your best political posts to date. False Uncle and I were talking about the Tea Party issue this morning, and agreed that the proponents of this were very much off the mark in tying this to the original Boston Tea Party. It was not a bad PR event, but I doubt there will be much lasting effect.
In addition, while the Republican Party claimed they weren’t behind this effort and tried to bill it as a grassroots activity, there were many conservative groups actively promoting these tea parties across the country.
Okay, the only thing now is for me to sit back and see what Republican Dude has to say about this. We are always on opposite sides of the viewpoint, but I love sparring with him!!!
i went to the tea party here in kc by default. we were with the band that played. i liked that some people espoused the nonpartisan nature of the event but in reality it was another anger filled anti democratic rant to me. i will say the 17 year old that spoke was quite well spoken and brave for his first speech ever. all in all i was disappointed because some very conservative folks tried to make it their platform.
the fact that obama is getting all the blame would be funny if it weren’t just plain crazy. how long has he been president? how long did dubya have to run things into the ground?
I’m still trying to figure out why the conservatives didn’t organize tea parties when Reagan (their hero) increased debt from $1.2Trillion to $2.8Trillion, or when Bush 1 ran it up from $2.8Trillion to $4.4Trillion, or when Bush 2 ran it up from $5.8Trillion to over $9Trillion…of course they fail to recognize that from 1978-2005 democrats have had an average increase in the debt of 4.2%, a 9.9% increase in federal spending and an average increase in GDP of 12.6%. In that same time 1978-2005 republicans have amassed a 36.4% increase in the debt, 12.1% increase in federal spending, yet only 10.7% increase in GDP. Why aren’t Hannity, and O’reilly, and Church, and the other right wing Reganites talking about these facts? Why are they throwing tea parties to eliminate something that they have created, mastered, and are far better at than ANYONE else? I watched Hannity last night, and saw the 500 people that showed up in Atlanta to tea bag each other. Faux did everything they could to make that crowd look impressive, but alas, the american people aren’t falling for the lies, trickery, and slight of hand of these snake oil salesmen…..thank goodness(link to article where above figures were gathered) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_debt_by_U.S._presidential_terms
I am pretty sure the prop 8 protest we saw was bigger.
Amen !!