AlterNet: Ron Paul Helped Inspire the Tea Party Movement, and Now It Could Take Him Down

[marmar]

AlterNet / By Daniela Perdomo

Ron Paul Helped Inspire the Tea Party Movement, and Now It Could Take Him Down
Facing three GOP opponents affiliated with the Tea Party movement in the primaries, Paul is concerned that building anti-Washington sentiment could take him out as well.

February 10, 2010 |


Ron Paul, the libertarian congressman from Texas' Gulf Coast, faces three Republican challengers this year -- more than in his six past primaries combined. All three opponents are affiliated with the Tea Party movement. What makes this so fascinating is the fact that the Tea Partiers got their unofficial start through Paul himself.

Sarah Palin may be the face of the Tea Party movement today, but it started with Ron Paul in 2007. That December, on the 234th anniversary of the Boston Tea Party, Paul's presidential campaign supporters participated in a "money bomb," a one-day online fundraising blitz that raked in $6 million from 40,000 people nationwide, and drew upon the 1773 protest's anti-tax sentiments.

Officially a Republican, Ron Paul was denied a speaking slot at the GOP convention in St. Paul, so he held his own well-attended event across town. While Paul only tallied 41,905 votes on Election Day, his fundraising prowess and widespread appeal among disaffected fiscal conservatives who have grown uncomfortable with the Republican Party's easy reliance on corporate money and gay-bashing base, made political observers across the spectrum take note of the scrappy outsider.

In 2009, right-wingers saw the glimmers of a populist movement in the anger directed at President Obama's stimulus spending and identified it as a chance to unify a strong opposition movement that could bite into Democrats' majorities in both houses of Congress by 2010. One group was inspired by Paul's Boston Tea Party metaphor and started organizing Tea Party protests throughout the country, opposing -- as Paul does -- big government and a "runaway" federal budget. .........(more)

THe complete piece is at: http://www.alternet.org/news/145630/ron_paul_helped_inspire_the_tea_party_movement%2C_and_now_it_could_take_him_down

[frazzled]

1. Funny how people are willing to donate money ...

to a campaign or movement, but if you told them their taxes were going up by the amount they donated, they'd be screaming in the streets. $6,000,000 donated by 40,000 is an average donation of $150. Wouldn't they be better off giving it to the government, who could actually provide some kind of service--a repaired bridge, a new high-speed train, etc.--with it?

I have never figured this one out.

[gmoney]

3. It's like fighting for peace

or f**king for virginity

[WhiteTara]

2. they guy who invented the electric chair

died in it as did the guillotine inventor. I guess you could (c)rudely say Ron is be hoisted on his own petard.

[tnlefty]

4. Thanks for posting this, I was looking for confirmation of it.

I thought that I heard this around 4 a.m. in a NyQuil induced state of not being quite certain of what i heard. I did see something about it from a source I wouldn't dare reference here.

The teabaggers in my area are Paul fanboys/girls and I've been wondering how pissed they're gonna be when they learn about this.:popcorn: Could be very interesting.