Clearing the Air: Common Tea Party Misconceptions


1.  The Tea Party Movement (TPM) is not grassroots, it is an astroturf offshoot of the Republican Party.
  • The vast majority of Tea Party organizations, like the one here on Staten Island, are completely independent of any political party or club; they tend to be a group - in some cases just an email list - of like-minded individuals who are united by a narrow slate of issues.  These issues, in almost all cases, are centered around out-of-control spending, impossible deficits, the dismantling of free-market capitalism by a command-and-control Congress, and infringements on our individual liberties.
  • The Republican Party, and tax-and-spend Republicans known as RINOs, are often the recipients of TPM attacks.  Witness the outcry against Republican Dede Scozzafava in NY23 and TPM attempts to unseat John McCain, their last Presidential standard-bearer.
  • According to surveys done by the Staten Island Tea Party, 22% of its group are either Democrats or Independents.

2.  The TPM is a racist movement; they organized only after the election of the first black President.
  • The only reason that the TPM did not arise during the Bush Administration is because America's hard lurch to the left did not begin until the Obama administration began to enact its agenda.  Remember, the TPM had its birth in February of 2009, after the Rick Santelli rant against mortgage bailouts.
  • The seed of the TPM was planted during the concluding year of the Bush presidency, since they routinely condemn the spending sprees of the Bush Administration, particularly TARP 1 and the first round of stimulus.  Bush is also condemned for doing little about border security and for not achieving energy independence after 9/11, along with a host of other issues.
  • The TPM is about fiscal responsibility, smaller government and the preservation of individual liberties.  The Obama administration is so antithetical to these values that it is easy to see why his administration spawned the birth of this movement.  Skin color is a convenient excuse for those who do not wish to face the truth about the rise of the TPM, which is opposition to the "fundamental change" Obama threatens to bring to America.

3.  The TPM is on the extreme right wing - a bunch of anti-gay, anti-choice, gun nuts who wish to pay NO taxes.
  • Rarely does a local Tea Party group stray into cultural or social areas.  Most have no position on Don't Ask Don't Tell, gay marriage, or abortion.  Most are "gun nuts" only in the sense that they believe in the U.S. Constitution and the rights guaranteed therein, including the second amendment.
  • So-called "9/11 Truthers" have no place in the TPM, and it is the rare Tea Party group which will entertain the question of Barack Obama's birth certificate or religion.
  • The TPM movement does not believe that there should be NO government, or NO taxation, they merely believe in limits on the power of the federal government as defined in the constitution.  Of course government is necessary, as are taxes, to fulfill their constitutional obligations - but only in those strictly defined areas.
  • Tea Party members are ordinary hard-working Americans; they are your friends, neighbors and co-workers.  They are the people you do business with every day, or sit next to at school or at your place of worship.  They are coaches, teachers, shopkeepers, doctors, plumbers and the unemployed.  Their common thread is a love of individual liberties, along with the free-market capitalist system and the rewards it can bring

4.  The TPM is against helping those individuals who cannot afford healthcare.
  • As a matter of fact, the TPM thinks the need for health care reform is obvious - the cost of health insurance is burdensome and restrictive.  However, to bring down these costs, free-market solutions should be employed, not government interference.
  • The TPM believes that most people are happy with their health insurance and health care, and we believe that there is no reason to bring such dramatic upheaval to the best healthcare system in the world.

5.  The TPM is a bunch of rich, old white folks who "got theirs" and don't want to share any of it with poor people.
  • People in the TPM do not believe in wealth redistribution, but do believe that the American dream should belong to all people.  The best way to achieve economic independence is to have the government get out of the way, so individuals can set their own goals and keep more of what they earn.
  • The ethnic makeup of the TPM mirrors the population in general, and there membership hails from every profession, every economic stratum, every community, every religious group and every political party.

6.  The TPM wants across-the-board de-regulation, which got us into this fiscal mess in the first place.
  • The TPM recognizes the need for basic, common-sense regulation.  However, over-regulation will not mask the fact that government intrusion into the mortgage industry, by encouraging sub-prime lending, was the single most destabilizing force in this nation's economy.

7.  The TPM is led by Sarah Palin, or Glenn Beck, or Rush Limbaugh - or some combination of these three.
  • The effectiveness of the TPM in re-shaping the nature of politics in general and the Republican Party in particular lies in the fact that it is truly grassroots, despite every attempt by the left and the media to paint it otherwise.  The TPM has no "leader," and each individual, small-town tea party organization resents the implication that there is any over-arching national organization "calling the shots."
  • With few, if any, exceptions, anyone calling himself a "tea party leader" on national television is a charlatan: someone attempting to inject him or herself into the movement for either political gain or profit.