Still Clueless After All These Years

Commentary By Ron Beasley

Just when I thought the overinflated and clueless ego of Thomas Friedman couldn't become even more clueless and inflated he pens a gem.  The "Green Tea Party?"

I�ve been trying to understand the Tea Party Movement. Sounds like a lot
of angry people who want to get the government out of their lives and
cut both taxes and the deficit. Nothing wrong with that � although one
does wonder where they were in the Bush years. Never mind. I�m sure
like all such protest movements the Tea Partiers will get their 10 to 20
percent of the vote. But should the Tea Partiers actually aspire to
break out of that range, attract lots of young people and become
something more than just entertainment for Fox News, I have a
suggestion:

Become the Green Tea Party.

I�d be happy to design the T-shirt
logo and write the manifesto. The logo is easy. It would show young
Americans throwing barrels of oil imported from Venezuela and Saudi
Arabia into Boston Harbor.

The manifesto is easy, too: �We, the
Green Tea Party, believe that the most effective way to advance
America�s national security and economic vitality would be to impose a
$10 �Patriot Fee� on every barrel of imported oil, with all proceeds
going to pay down our national debt.�

Poor Tom has once again not been paying attention.  The Tea Party movement is made up of old white Republicans who are still fighting the civil war.  Anything that is even a shade of green will be seen as a socialist/fascist plot to take away their pickup trucks and SUV's.  What they are really upset about is a black Democrat in the White House and they are being played like a fiddle by the rich oligarchs who have everything to lose if environmentalism takes hold.

So why don't you just go back to your modest little home Tom and spare the rest of us your idiotic ramblings.  

More Reactions:

Steve Benen;

One of the reasons I'm inclined to write about the Tea Partiers is that
there are still many in the political establishment who believe the
political mainstream should do more to take the Tea Party crowd and its
hysterical cries seriously. This strikes me as silly -- most of the
activists seem to have no idea what they're talking about. Why explore
substantive challenges with angry mobs who reject reason and evidence?

John Cole;

They weren�t around protesting during the Bush years BECAUSE THE TEA PARTY IS REPUBLICANS. They don�t care about the deficit. They care that a Democrat (and a black �Muslim,� to boot), is in the White House. They don�t care about fiscal restraint, they care that a Democrat is in the White House. They don�t, as some foolishly pretend, care about the Wall Street excesses. Certainly Cenk Uyger is not the only one who has noticed that the tea party bubbas could all be shipped to protest HCR, but the big money boys aren�t running the buses to protest Wall Street. They care that there is a Democrat in the White House.

And those crowds of angry white old people screaming �keep government out of my medicare� and waving signs of �Drill, baby, drill?� They sure as hell don�t care about the environment and are not going to become some sort of �Green Tea Party.�

All they care about is that there is a Democrat in the White House.