Just back from our local gathering of Teabaggers.

[Atticus]

We stood on the edge of the "crowd", clearly identified as liberal NON-Teabaggers.

Though advertised as a "nonpartisan" event, one of the featured speakers was the county Republican chairperson. The primary speaker was a doctor, in a white lab coat, no less, who was the most virulent of the five or so locals who tried to make themselves heard over the LAME sound system they used.

The good doctor asked the "crowd" if they were studying Spanish, 'cause you know "those Democrats" are in favor of a "totally wide open border" which will let all those "illegal aliens" into "our America". Just after this nugget, he got a cheer from the crowd when he ridiculed "Nancy Pelosi and her crowd" for "lying about the Tea Party being racist"!

Everyone agreed that Obama and the Democrats were "evil" and "socialist" and "Marxist" and, of course, had raised their taxes to support their "liberal agenda". Each of the speakers congratulated themselves and the crowd for being "patriots" and "real Americans" and, just after saying that it didn't matter what political party one belonged to, insisted that one's loyalty should be "first to country, second to CONSERVATISM and third to their party."

It was pretty much a fact-free zone, except for a small group of sign-toting liberal college kids who even shouted "YOU LIE" after one of Dr. Strangelove's especially transparent whoppers.

I could go on, but reliving it is making my dinner try to climb my esophagus.

Oh, the size of the "crowd"? Maybe 600, but I'm sure the local paper will put it much higher than that.

One more thing: best speaker of the evening? The guy who cruised past in a convertible and shouted "You people are all a bunch of ignorant assholes!"

[LiberalFighter]

1. It would help to get more background about the event.

Like where it was held.

It might be a good idea to research and find out who is the doctor. If he is a doctor. What type of practice he has.

[Atticus]

2. Small town, midwest, VERY conservative county. And, yes, the doc was a doc.

Everyone knows everyone in this community.

[goclark]

3. Love the cruiser!

[kentuck]

4. Excellent report !

+1000

[saltpoint]

5. Atticus you are a sturdy soul indeed to withstand the anger and

stupidity of a Bagger gig.

The guy in the convertible -- maybe it was Alan Grayson? Well, maybe not. But whoever it was, it's a great quote.

[Oilwellian]

9. ROFL...what a great visual

I can even see a scarf flying behind him. :D

[nadinbrzezinski]

6. Que bueno, a lo mejor

ese doctorcito va a aprender un poco de cultura.

That is good and perhaps

that doctor will learn some culture...

Yep cannot wait to take over the country. I mean we will get Disneyland...

:-)

But they are not racists... no sireee.

By the way, replace Mexican for Polack or Italian, or hells bells Chinaman. Some things NEVER EVAH change.

[lpbk2713]

7. The drive-by in the convertible was the most eloquent of all.

:rofl:

[Subdivisions]

8. I attended the Lone Star Tea Party event in Grand Prairie, TX. Remember the

YouTube guy that did the http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pKFKGrmsBDk">Thomas Paine schtick? He was there. I'm too tired to type it all up tonight so I'll file my report, with pics, here in GD tomorrow morning.

ETA: I also got some audio I'll be posting.

[Cha]

10. Hightlight! You saved the best for last..

"One more thing: best speaker of the evening? The guy who cruised past in a convertible and shouted "You people are all a bunch of ignorant assholes!"

[Ramulux]

11. Did you actually interact with any of these people?

Your at a tea party rally, how do you benefit by just standing there and looking angry? Maybe try to engage some of the less extreme people there and you might end up having a surprisingly reasonable conversation. I went down to a tea party rally down the street from my house and ended staying there for like 2 and a half hours talking to this genuine libertarian dude who was actually pretty intelligent. My point is if your going to go to one of these things maybe try to engage these people a little, there's no point just going there and standing around.

Call me crazy, but as much as some of you may not want it to be true, there are individuals at these rallies who are genuinely fed up with the bullshit from both sides and are reasonable. I may not agree with them, but its perfectly possible to have a decent debate if you find the right group of people.

[ConsAreLiars]

12. You call a libertarian who argues that giving more power to the corporations,

less regulation and lower taxes, and to the uber-rich. gives more freedom and power to the people, "reasonable?" They are total dumbass pawns parroting jackass slogans designed only to support the most vicious and criminal overlords of this system.

[Ramulux]

15. Your super judgemental and close minded

Do you even understand what libertarian means? As I said before I disagreed with many of the things I heard from this guy, but he was not unintelligent and definitely not calling himself a libertarian while promoting tax cuts for the rich and all sorts of other neo-conservative bullshit that has nothing to do with true conservatism. Your so quick to just label anyone who disagrees with you and has different political opinions pawns and morons, I would love to see you in a debate with this guy I talked to, he would have talked circles around you if these are the kind of ignorant ad hominem personal attacks you use in face to face confrontations.

[ConsAreLiars]

19. Your mama must be so proud that 'your" not not aware of being a "judgemental"

something or other who would resort to "ignorant ad hominem personal attacks" as displayed in your reply.

I'm sure the jackass you admired talked circles around you very easily. Look out for the LaRouchers or Scientologists. They'd turn you into a slave for life in a half hour, if the usual simple-minded crap sloganeering and nonsense from that dumbass seemed to make any sort of sense.

And sure, "libertarian" means "selfish moron who thinks that sucking up to the powers that be and serving them loyally will get him some."

[truedelphi]

18. Whereas Obama's good buddy, Mr Geithner, calls for

Little regulation and he sees to it that he and Bernanke give away trillions to the Big Banksters who destroyed our economy, just as the Paulson/Bernanke of the Bush Administration did before.

So who do we listen to? Right now, who is it that makes any sense?

And yes, yes, yes, I am aware that as I type this, everyone on Capital Hill is working so hard to get some financial reform to happen. But only after they receive their orders from their buddies on Wall Street will any legislation be approved. So again, who do we listen to? Who can we trust?

[Atticus]

13. First, I wasn't "standing there and looking angry". I wanted to let some of the more timid

in the community know that not everyone believed this blather. We did have some very pleasant conversations with a handful of folks who were also present wearing shirts, caps and buttons that made it clear they were not baggers.

Second, you don't know these people. We do. They were not there to engage in "reasonable conversation". They were there to hear an assortment of reasons why it is not only OK, it is downright patriotic to oppose this black man who ACORN got elected. It is no more complicated or sophisticated than that.

An old neighbor whose children used to play with ours, approached, smiled, saw my wife's "Obama" cap and anti-Palin buttons and walked past looking the other way without speaking. We were "shunned".

We are white. We stood for some time talking with the ONLY black male at the rally and had to put up with hostile looks and a trio of young punks who clearly wanted to start something but weren't sure if the young black guy and the old white guy were more than they could handle.

It would have been interesting.

I agree that there are "individuals at these rallies" who are not true-believer wingnuts and, yes, as I've posted before, we should be trying to reach out to them. But, if you believe that many of the Teabaggers are just well-intentioned but misinformed folks, you have, IMHO, grossly misjudged them. I strongly believe that the majority are angry that we have a non-white President and they know it is no longer acceptable to simply shout out racist remarks to win political arguments.

In some ways, "socialist" is the new "n-word" and I will not dignify these jackasses by pretending to respect their "opinions".

"---and the mule they rode in on!"

[Ramulux]

17. Weak

You just said that there were hundreds of people at this rally, and now your claiming that you "know" all these people. If that's true, that's pretty amazing that you somehow have a personal relationship with every tea party member in your area, otherwise you are looking at many of the ridiculous members of the tea party and simply applying that judgment to everyone in attendance. Now I see that as extremely ignorant, because your just lumping all these people together without actually talking to them.

I have an idea, why dont you put away your Obama pins and signs and approach these people from an independent standpoint, because they are not going to talk to you when you are waving signs letting them know you think they are a joke. Approach these people like human beings and listen to the things they have to say and if they dont know what they are talking about move on to the next person. I 100% guarantee you that you will find at least one person you can have a cool conversation with. I dont see any other reason any non-tea party supporter would attend these things except to engage them.

[Marr]

14. Really.

How many of these things have you actually attended? Watching video of one online does not count, nor does having a pleasant conversation with your Republican uncle who once attended one of these things.

These people are loud, obnoxious idiots who want nothing more than to vent the anger that Limbaugh's been cramming into their ears every day. You can't have a discussion with some reasonable person at a Teabagger rally. They didn't go there to be reasonable. They went there to feel empowered by standing in a crowd of like-minded idiots.

[Ramulux]

16. Sigh

Dude, listen, I am not arguing with you over the fact that the "large majority" of the people at these rallies are morons, that's pretty well established. What I am saying, from my personal experience at 2 of these rallies and knowing other tea party members, is that there are reasonable people at these things who are not foaming at the mouth and are more than willing to have an in depth conversation with someone they disagree with. Now, admittedly I have only been to 2 of these things and I do not know what they are like in the rest of the country, but from what I experienced there are simply a lot of disenfranchised republicans and libertarians at these things who are not retarded.

I am having trouble understanding why people are so dead set against even the possibility that members of the tea party have working brains. Its kind of sad, because as a liberal this kind of gross generalization is something that is usually coming from the other side of the political spectrum. So yeah, when you say these are nothing but loud obnoxious people who you "cannot" have a reasonable conversation with your just wrong, because I have had multiple "reasonable" conversations with these people and I fucking personally know members of the tea party who are "reasonable". Your just making these assumptions about something you obviously have no personal experience with and that is a very republican thing to do, so i suggest you do some reflecting on what it means to be a liberal.