Charles Blow goes to a Tea Party rally - A must read

[impik]

On Thursday, I came here outside Dallas for a Tea Party rally.

At first I thought, “Wow! This is much more diverse than the rallies I’ve seen on television.”

Then I realized that I was looking at stadium workers. I should have figured as much when I approached the gate. The greeter had asked, “Are you working tonight?”

//snip


They saved the best for last, however: Alfonzo “Zo” Rachel. According to his Web site, Zo, who is black and performs skits as “Zo-bama,” allowed drugs to cost him “his graduation.” Before ripping into the president for unconstitutional behavior, he cautioned, “I don’t have the education that our president has, so if I misinterpret some things in the founding documents I kind of have an excuse.” That was the understatement of the evening.

//snip


It was a farce. This Tea Party wanted to project a mainstream image of a group that is anything but. A New York Times/CBS News poll released on Wednesday found that only 1 percent of Tea Party supporters are black and only 1 percent are Hispanic. It’s almost all white.

And even when compared to other whites, their views are extreme and marginal. For instance, white Tea Party supporters are twice as likely as white independents and eight times as likely as white Democrats to believe that Barack Obama was born in another country.

Furthermore, they were more than eight times as likely as white independents and six times as likely as white Democrats to think that the Obama administration favors blacks over whites.

Thursday night I saw a political minstrel show devised for the entertainment of those on the rim of obliviousness and for those engaged in the subterfuge of intolerance. I was not amused.



http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/17/opinion/17blow.html?ref=opinion

[zeemike]

1. But that minstrel show made them some money.

sold some books and made Sara a whole lot of money.

[fasttense]

2. It has a surreal quality to it.

As if the tea-baggers are a parody of a political party.

They spout nonsensical slogans and decry minor issues. They broadcast rabid hatred of policies that do them no harm. They carry hastily misspelled signs against issues that would help them. Their viciousness is too overblown for such minor complaints. Their lies are transparent and silly. It's like really bad acting that comes across as funny. Yet, they don't mean to be funny, so it comes across as merely sad.

It all has an overacted fake feel to it.

And the reason it looks and feels so absolutely phony and overblown is because it is organized, advertised, and funded by Corporate America. Corporate America has no real understanding of genuine political movements. The only experience they have in that regard is how to stop progress and prevent the success of grassroots movements.

So when they try to orchestrate a fake movement, when they attempt to advertise a political group into existence, they are only able to bring out the hate-filled racists, homophobic and selfish money grubbers.

As each successive tea-bagging event gets more polished and better organized, the artificial, exaggerated feel gets worse and worse.

[Cha]

3. Kick

[KakistocracyHater]

4. kick it up

1% Hispanic, 1% Black, in the really, mostly White Tea Party. They're repulsive.

[jenmito]

5. I can't believe that the Black people who ARE teabaggers don't realize that the

only reason THEY'RE accepted when Obama is not, is because they have no power or are there to entertain the rest of them. Black people have been accepted as entertainers for a long time.

[FrenchieCat]

6. Some think they are the exception,

and that's how they like it! It's all they have going for them. Sad, but true.