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Taxy Teabaggers

By Fannie

Happy Tax Day everyone. In case you haven't heard, a "revolution is brewing."

Today, a bunch of so-called "fiscal conservatives" are engaging in "grassroots" Tea Parties protesting what they call "out of control government spending," the "bankrupt liberal agenda of the White House Administration and Congress," and the "Stimulus Bill and pork filled budget."

Neat-o, huh?

It's my personal opinion that many of these folks are still reeling from the shit taco they've been chewing on since November 2008 and are essentially using these protests to air more of their stinky Barack Hussein Nobama Socialism breath, but that's a tangential point. Oh, and some of them seriously advocate tea bagging, but that's just a small point that I find amusing. I do have three real things to say about this.

One, I know that there are issues with the stimulus bill. It's not perfect and, aside from the specifics, I think many people of all political persuasions would at least agree on that. But for the love of all that is holy can these so-called fiscal conservative teabaggers give us a little intellectual consistency here? Let's talk about government spending, shall we? Where were these "fiscal conservatives" when George W. Bush increased defense and non-defense federal spending at its fastest rate in decades thereby causing the largest budget deficits in US history and passed his, albeit smaller, stimulus bills? Was Bush's spending lucky, magical, thrifty unicorn spending? Why no nationwide protests?

Secondly, as much as some present these Tea Parties as some sort of Spontaneous Grassroots Uprising of the People, corporate lobbyists have actually been helping to orchestrate them. As Think Progress reports, two lobbyist-run think-tanks called Americans for Prosperity and Freedom Works are providing all the logistical and public relations work necessary for "Average Joes" to plan coast-to-coast protests including coordinating conference calls, giving them sign ideas, feeding them sample press releases, and providing guides for delivering messaging. This is similar to how members of the anti-gay "grassroots" Digital Network Army blogs are fed, from mysterious "Team Captains," stories to blog about. In both instances of orchestration, Average Joes and Janes are pretty heavily involved, but at least some of it is being coordinated from above by "professionals" whose livelihoods are dependent upon keeping certain issues relevant.

Third, some of the biggest conservative promoters of these protests are, like Michelle Malkin, those who endlessly criticized the LGBT community for protesting Proposition 8, exaggerated every instance of aggression in what were by and large peaceful uneventful protests, and accused the LGBT community of crimes that have yet to actually be linked to LGBT people. Again, I have to point out the double-standard. Why are conservatives so special and lucky that when they are unhappy with democracy in action their protests are legitimate, but when LGBT people are unhappy with democracy in action, we're just being fascist "Angry Gay Mobs" who should just accept things the way they are?

Full post as published by Fannie's Room on April 15, 2009 (boomark / email).