Anyone who has ever attended a large protest rally is bound to encounter his fair share of kooks, loons and assorted fringe elements.  At the Santa Monica Tea Party I attended in April 2009, I talked with a 9/11 Truther, who seemed to have showed up not so much because he agreed with the small-government rhetoric of the assembled protesters, but because it was, well, a gathering of protesters.  And he wanted the chance to wave his sign.

Over a Politico, in a piece lamenting that despite promise that the of Barack Obama would “transform the charged, stilted ‘national conversation’ about race into a smarter and more authentic dialogue,” Ben Smith finds that instead “the conversation just got dumber.” He observes further that “while MSNBC scours the tea party movement for racist elements, which one could probably find in any mass organization in America.“

Except MSNBC won’t tell you that.

They’ve been rooting around for racism not as a means to expose bigots, but as as a part of their campaign to discredit conservatives.  Their goal (as well as that of others peddling the racist narrative) isn’t honest reporting, but, to borrow a famous phrase, the politics of personal destruction.  Maybe they’re trying to convince themselves that conservatives really are the horrible, no good and very bad people they imagine them to be.

They want to match the reality of the world to the images inside their head.  And to do so, they have to pretend that it’s only at rallies protesting Democratic politicians and liberal policies than you find nutbags and kookooheads.  They have, as one scholar put it, “overplayed” the race card.  And in so doing, Democratic politicians and left-of-center pundits and reporters have, if anything, exacerbated racial tensions in this country — undermining, more than anything perhaps, the greatest promise of Barack Obama’s election in 2008.

UPDATE: Glenn Reynolds links an article on race and quips: “REUTERS: Analysis: Race issues beset Obama’s “post-racial” presidency. Well, he’s played the race card nonstop, but it’s no longer trumps.”

While, on its surface, the video that Bruce posted earlier today presents pretty strong evidence of the NAACP welcoming the racial attitudes of an Obama Administration official, like the Anchoress, “I want the rest of the story before I start passing judgment on it“:

I want to see the rest of the tape. I cannot believe Sherrod ended on “I took him to one of his own.” Either she said something much worse after that (which we would have seen) or she said something much better.

If it was something “better” then we should have seen that, too.

Via Instapundit.

That said, with the attitudes of the Department of Justice toward the Black Panther case as well as this woman’s initial attitude toward a white man in need, we have considerable evidence of racial attitudes in the Obama Administrations, attitudes that the mainstream media is all but ignoring while dwelling on the NAACP resolution and a few isolated racially-tinged signs at Tea parties.

It seems that whenever I have gone to the gym these past few days, I look up to see something on CNN about the NAACP resolution; the “news” network almost always features the same stock footage of four, maybe five signs, only two clearly racist, one likely a fabrication of a Tea Party crasher.  (Wonder if CNN investigated the phenomenon of Tea Party crashers.)

Now, I wonder if the NAACP has been harping on the alleged racism of the Tea Parties, basing their resolution, in large part, on unsubstantiated charges, in a desperate bid to make the organization relevant in an age when most Americans increasingly see race an increasingly irrelevant and warm to Dr. King’s dream that his children “will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.”  Well, maybe not so desperate given the makeup of the MSM today. (more…)

Over at the Kansas City Star, Derek Donovan posts the entire NAACP press release on its resolution condemning “racism within the tea party”:

The resolution condemns the bigoted elements within the Tea Party and asks for them to be repudiated. The NAACP delegates presented this resolution for debate and passage after a year of vitriolic Tea Party demonstrations during which participants used racial slurs and images. In March, members of the Congressional Black Caucus were accosted by Tea Party demonstrators and called racial epithets. Civil rights icon John Lewis was spit on, while Congressman Emanuel Cleaver was called the “N” word and openly gay Congressman Barney Frank was called an ugly anti-gay slur.

(H/t:  Gateway Pundit)

Seems they based their entire resolution on a jaundiced view of the Tea Parties.  By their method of argument, if fringe elements of a large movement use hateful rhetoric, that rhetoric can be used to criticize the movement.

First, what the resolution is asking to be done (not sure who they’re asking given the use of the passive) has already been done.  Tea Party leaders have repudiated the handful of racist slurs at image, heart and seen at a handful of Tea Party (yet described in a plethora of media reports, blog posts and opinion columns).

Second, look at the actual “facts” cited by the organization.  Despite a $100,000 prize for video evidence of such activity, no one has stepped forward to provide the video and claim the money.  As Deroy Murdock explains:

If such comments actually were uttered, the NAACP and its leftist allies would have played them over and over and over and over and over and over and over to embarrass and humiliate Republicans, conservatives and the allegedly racist tea party movement. In fact, no one has stepped forward to collect Andrew Breitbart’s $100,000 prize for any documentary proof that these supposed race bombs ever were dropped on their targets.

February 18, 2009: Attorney General Eric Holder calls USA a “nation of cowards”

July 13, 2010: NAACP Passes Resolution Condeming “Racism of Tea Parties”

Mr. Attorney General… who are the cowards now?

RELATED STORY: The Racism of the NAACP – BigGovernment.com

In the short history of the Tea Party there has been one racist incident, one, and it was a Tea Party protester who was the victim. The NAACP has abandoned its mission and become a partisan political organization.

Sadly the NAACP has forgotten the words of Dr. Martin Luther King:

This is our hope. This is the faith with which I return to the South. With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to transform the jangling discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith we will be able to work together, to pray together, to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom together, knowing that we will be free one day.

-Bruce (GayPatriot)

While I would prefer that the Tea Party groups acknowledge how Judge Tauro’s use of the Tenth Amendment could further their small government agenda, I do take a least a little bit of comfort in their decision to remain silent on the ruling:

While many conservative organizations immediately decried a federal judge’s decision last week to invalidate the federal ban on recognizing gay marriages, tea party groups have been conspicuously silent on the issue.

The silence is by design, activists with the loosely affiliated movement said, because it is held together by an exclusive focus on fiscal matters and its avoidance of divisive social issues such as abortion and gay marriage. Privately, though, many said they back the decision because it emphasizes the legal philosophy of states’ rights.

The comfort I take is related to that part I emphasized above.  The silence provides further evidence of the Tea Party focus on matters fiscal and further and so helps undermine the left-wing/media/Democratic narrative of sinister racist or anti-gay forces dominating the movement.

Washington Post writer Sandhya Somashekhar quotes one activist who pretty much sums up what’s at issue here:

Everett Wilkinson, state director for the Florida Tea Party Patriots, agreed: “On the issue [of gay marriage] itself, we have no stance, but any time a state’s rights or powers are encouraged over the federal government, it is a good thing.”

NB: Tweaked the text slightly as I had initially written it in haste.

Recall how last year as the Tea Party emerged in response to the big government initiatives of Obama and the Democrats, Beltway insiders and Democratic leaders were quick to call them Astroturf?  This despite no evidence whatsoever that conservative groups spearheaded the movement and abundant evidence of spontaneous protests across the country.

Indeed, the conservative groups who got involved were johnny-come-latelies, trying to latch onto a popular uprising.  Now, we have another example of liberal groups trying to imitate the success of the Tea Parties, only it’s leaders of left-of-center organizations trying to spearhead the movement:

In an effort to replicate the tea party’s success, 170 liberal and civil rights groups are forming a coalition that they hope will match the movement’s political energy and influence. They promise to “counter the tea party narrative” and help the progressive movement find its voice again after 18 months of floundering.

The large-scale attempt at liberal unity, dubbed “One Nation,” will try to revive themes that energized the progressive grassroots two years ago. In a repurposing of Barack Obama’s old campaign slogan, organizers are demanding “all the change” they voted for — a poke at the White House.

H/t: Mark Hemingway.

Wonder if Nancy Pelosi will call this Astroturf.

This post on Instapundit got me a-wonderin’:

GOOD GRIEF: NAACP Leader: Kenneth Gladney Not Black Enough.

More here: ” Apparently, a HuffPo writer was present. You can see her laughing at the remark in the video.”

I mean we support the Tea Parties and all.  And when in Boston, I bought a “Don’t Tread on Me” mug.

Today, as we celebrate Independence Day, we would do ourselves well to recall Calvin Coolidge, the only president born on the Fourth of July as did my friend Rick Sincere in his wonderful essay for the Richmond Times Dispatch:

In his 2008 book, The Cult of the Presidency, the Cato Institute’s Gene Healy wrote that Coolidge is remembered “mostly for his reticence and for fiscal policies that combined Yankee parsimony with generous tax cuts.”

That “Yankee parsimony” is on display in a short film that is thought to be the first time a U.S. president appeared in a “talkie” — a movie with sound.

In this four-minute clip. . . , Coolidge says that he wants to “cut down public expense. I want the people of America to be able to work less for the government and more for themselves. I want them to have the rewards of their own industry. This is the chief meaning of freedom. Until we can re-establish a condition under which the earnings of the people can be kept by the people, we are bound to suffer a very severe and distinct curtailment of our liberty.”

Read the whole thing (and this too).

On this Fourth of July, it is particularly important that we recall that president born on the Fourth of July.  He truly got the meaning of Independence and understood the ideals to which our Founders pledged their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor.

Tea Party protestors use language and symbols (e.g. “Don’t Tread on Me” flags) of our founders should be pleased to note that the ideas we express are nearly identical to those expressed by Coolidge in, what is believed to be, “the first presidential film with sound recording“:

So, on this Independence, let us recall the ideals of our Founders and listen to them so well expressed by the one president quite literally (and also figuratively) born on the Fourth of July.

Back in 1980, folks in Jimmy Carter’s campaign were salivating at the chance to take on Ronald Reagan in the fall.  They thought that he was so far to the right that they could easily dispatch the former Governor of the (then-)Golden State.  The Gipper won in a landslide, carrying all but six states.

Similarly, outgoing Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Mt. Crumpit) is salivating at the chance to take on Sharon Angle, the Tea Party-backed candidate who yesterday won the GOP primary in Nevada.  Portrayed as eccentric by some, the Republican nominee polls worse against Reid than did her major rivals for the party’s nod.  Still, despite spending millions of dollars in a state he has represented in the Senate for 24 years, Reid garners only about 40% of the vote in most surveys, not a good sign for a man with high name recognition.  

One thing we know about Angle is that she can rally her base.   That’s going to mean a lot of volunteers making phone calls and knocking on doors, generating enthusiasm for her candidacy and helping get people to the polls in November.

Reid may attack her eccentricities, but that could backfire given his unpopularity and the national mood.  And one thing we’ve learned from campaigns going as far back as the Gipper’s is that a candidate who can rally his base stands in good stead against an unpopular incumbent. (more…)

One of the greatest things about this trip has been the change to meet our readers. I was delighted that in Atlanta when one of our left-of-center readers joined us, he found that he and the readers more in line with this blog’s point of view shared a fascination with cooking and TV food shows.

Right now, a good number have RSVPed for the Boston dinner, tomorrow Wednesday June 9 but we still need find a place. Drop me a note if you have any ideas.  Thanks to our wonderful readers, we have found a place. Contact me for details.

Also some readers who have busy schedules have asked if they can come late for an after-dinner drink.  Of course you can.  We’d be glad to see you whenever you can make it.  

Let me know if any of you are free during the day on June 9 and want to join me (and at least one other reader) in taking a walk along the Freedom Trail. Together, GayPatriot fans can help trace the path of the original American patriots.

And don’t forget Brattleboro, Vermont on Sunday, June 13.  Here at least, we seem to have settled on a place.

E-mail me to RSVP for either or both of those dinners (as well as the walk along Freedom Trail).

NB:  Bumped & Updated

Now that I’m about to dine with some Atlanta readers, I wanted to remind y’all of our next dinner on my journey, a week from today, Wednesday, June 9 in Boston. 

I intend to arrive in Boston on June 8 so I can do something I’ve never done before in Beantown (though have long wanted to do it) — take a walk along the Freedom Trail.  If any of you are free during the day on June 9, it would be great to trace the path of the original American patriots with some GayPatriot fans.

And don’t forget Brattleboro, Vermont on Sunday, June 13.

E-mail me to RSVP for either or both of those dinners (as well as the walk along Freedom Trail).

In the course of this cross country trip, I have met readers from a number of jurisdictions (Chicago, Washington, D.C. and Charlottesville) who have participated in Tea Parties, with most being quite open about their sexuality.  And, well, guess what?  None of them has had a problem.  They have all been welcomed.

Indeed, each of these participants has more evidence of a welcoming attitude toward homosexuals than he does of widespread racism among activists.  Yet, we have seen numerous articles in the MSM and posts on left-wing blogs about that supposed racism.  At the same time, in those media, I have uncovered no stories about gay participation in Tea Parties.  (If you have seen some, please let me know and I will update this post accordingly.)

Seems an interesting story that the most dynamic grassroots movement in America today — which happens to enjoy broad support among American conservatives — has been so welcoming of gay people.  Yet, the media ignore it  while focusing on a much, much, much smaller segment of the movement.

As I e-mailed a friend who has been active in the Charlottesville Tea Party, “If the Tea Parties are racist because of a handful of kooks, then they’re at the forefront of the gay movement because of a handful of homosexuals.”  And reports from our readers indicate that there have been more than a handful at Tea Parties across the nation.

I’m not sure I’ll be blogging tonight, but don’t let that stop you from using this space to comment about the hot Senate races in Pennsylvania, Kentucky and Arkansas.

Goodbye, Arlen Specter.

And of course, I’ll be paying close attention to the PA Congressional District #12 Special Election (RIP Murtha) where I am praying that Tim Burns pulls an upset.  If this race is of interest, I’d suggest monitoring results AT THIS LINK.

-Bruce (GayPatriot)

It’s unfortunate that despite all the media bellyaching about the supposed racial component of the Tea Parties based on a handful of signs and the prejudices of those writing about the grassroots movement for the nation’s major dailies or reporting on it for the major broadcast networks (as well as minor cable news networks) that they have all but ignored the gay presence there.

Indeed, despite my calling our presence “infiltration,” it seems that I am not the only gay person to have been made welcome at such rallies. Since I first posted on the matter, I keep receiving reports, like this comment of gay people made welcome at Tea Parties:

Dude. Infiltrated? I just showed up at our local rallies, EVERYBODY knows I’m gay – NOBODY cares. I get TONS more hate at the (gay) bar cos I don’t like ol’ Bammy….

Brian’s experiences parallel my own.  I find get more grief for being a gay conservative in gay circles than I do for being gay in conservative circles.  But, I’ve said this before.

So, why doesn’t the MSM address this narrative?

In  his reflection on the Maine GOP’s decision to adopt a new Tea Party-flavored platform at its convention this past weekend, James Taranto offers a great insight into social conservatives and Tea Parties:

In truth, most of the religious right is part of the spectrum of respectable political opinion in America. While everybody deplores racism, opposition to abortion and to same-sex marriage are mainstream positions to everyone except extremists on the other side. To call the tea-party movement socially conservative or “religious right,” then, does not have the same sting as calling it racist or violent.

Yet it does seem to be almost as inaccurate. An April New York Times poll found that while tea-party sympathizers were more conservative than average on social issues, by 78% to 14% they said economic issues are more important–nearly identical to the response from non-tea participants. While tea-party sympathizers were less pro-abortion than others, 40% said Roe v. Wade was “a good thing.”

One can see why liberals and Democrats would be eager to pigeonhole the tea-party movement as socially conservative. A substantial number of voters are put off by the religious right, either because their views are more liberal or because, even if not, they find its preoccupation with matters like abortion or gays creepy or beside the point.

Emphasis added.

Given this focus on economic issues, it’s no wonder Tea Party participants have not been averse to the homosexual infiltration we’ve detected.  Now, we wonder how those social conservatives would react if the media reported on gay participation in the movement which, by our observation, far exceeds that of extremists hoisting racist signs or spouting hateful racial epithets.  (Indeed, by our estimate, there have been more gay men and lesbians at Tea Parties in the Los Angeles area alone than racist epithets hurled by Tea Party participants at protests across the country!)

In his very self-important piece that Mark Lilla penned for the New York Review of Books, that very smart man has a real problem of putting things into context.  He writes that Obama

. . . has been elected president by a healthy majority and is grappling with a wounded economy and two foreign wars he inherited—and what are we talking about? A makeshift Tea Party movement whose activists rage against “government” and “the media,” while the hotheads of talk radio and cable news declare that the conservative counterrevolution has begun.

Yet, he is absolutely clueless how Obama built that majority.  If he had paid the slightest bit of attention to the Democrat’s campaign rhetoric, he might better understand the roots of Tea Party activism.  It’s as if Lilla believes that because Obama represents the more liberal party and because he won a majority, therefore people must accept the big-government initiatives he proposes.

Alas, that Mr. Lilla seems blissfully (deliberately?) ignorant of the rhetoric the Democratic nominee used to win over voters in the middle.  Recall, as I pointed out in a recent post, how Obama promised, in the campaign to hold the line on spending:

“In his half-hour infomercial” the Wednesday before the 2008 election, the Washington Post reported, candidate Barack Obama “repeated earlier assurances that he had ‘offered spending cuts’ to pay for every cent of the post-election bonanza that he plans to shower on his fellow Americans.”  (Emphasis added.)  Indeed, in the third debate that fall, pointing out ”that we’ve been living beyond our means and we’re going to have to make some adjustments” he told what he’d been doing ”throughout this campaign”: he had proposed “a net spending cut.”

Not just that, Obama was going to go line by line through the federal budget to root out waste.  Guess Lilla takes Obama’s campaign rhetoric as seriously as does the candidate himself.

So filled is Lilla with contempt for conservatives that he blinds himself to the circumstances of Obama’s (electoral) success and the sincerity of our concerns, concerns which parallel Obama’s campaign rhetoric.  And, as per my prior post on his essay, he’s all but blind to the economic reality (worldwide debt problem) which has, in large measure, spurred our activism.

A number of conservative bloggers have been having fun taking down a very self-important piece by Mark Lilla in the New York Review of Books.  Basically, this very smart writer is the latest intellectual to badmouth the Tea Parties, letting his ideology prevent him from understanding what’s really going on.

His piece (which I couldn’t finish because I was certain I had read this before on multiple occasions at least since Ronald Reagan’s landslide reelection in 1984) basically repeats a lot of liberal clichés about conservatism and shows an incredible contempt for his ideological adversaries.  Not only does he repeat some of the common misrepresentations of the conservative movement, but he also misrepresents the past, trotting out the standard leftist lie line about the selfish 1980s:

A new strain of populism is metastasizing before our eyes, nourished by the same libertarian impulses that have unsettled American society for half a century now. Anarchistic like the Sixties, selfish like the Eighties, contradicting neither, it is estranged, aimless, and as juvenile as our new century. It appeals to petulant individuals convinced that they can do everything themselves if they are only left alone, and that others are conspiring to keep them from doing just that. This is the one threat that will bring Americans into the streets.

So, selfish were the 1980s that charitable giving rose as our tax burden went down, with the American people demonstrating a generosity that has very much defined our history and which conservative politicians like Lincoln and Reagan so greatly appreciated.

If I had time, I might join my fellow right-of-center bloggers in taking on the clichés Lilla dresses up as an intelligent argument.  Let me first note this — in the portions of the article I read (and the remainder that I skimmed) I could discover no evidence he had taken any time to talk to a single Tea Party protester to ask why he (or she) took to the streets.

Then, there’s this:  I discovered Lilla’s article on Memeorandum not far below a series of links to posts on the nearly $1 Trillion European Union rescue package which would, to quote the New York Times on the matter, “to combat the debt crisis that has engulfed Europe and threatened markets around the world.“

And I wondered this:  is Mr. Lilla aware of the burgeoning debt of nations which have adopted policies similar to those Mr. Obama and the Democrats propose? (more…)

Given, as I observed yesterday, that “clearly more gay men, more lesbians even, in the Tea Party movement than there are racists,” I’m surprised the homosexual Tea Party narrative has not yet taken hold.  But, now that it’s out there, I’m beginning to wonder if the movement might start breaking apart, given what our critics tell us about social conservatives and the participation of known homosexuals in the Tea Party movement.

The facts:

• At a recent Tea Party in Los Angeles, at least two openly gay men spoke, including one who has repeatedly called for allowing homosexuals to serve openly in the military.
• A lesbian was spotted at a Tea Party in Boston, proudly advertising her admiration for a homosexual web-site.
• A gay man advertised his sexuality at a Philadelphia Tea Party.
• A left-leaning lesbian has been seen at Tea Parties at multiple Los Angeles-area Tea Parties.
• A gay man boasted on the web about participating in a Pleasanton, CA Tea Party.
• Gay Patriots have been welcomed at the most recent LA Tea Party.
• A libertarian-leaning liberal Lutheran lesbian has been “making many friends from the local Tea Party movement” in Phoenix

And these are just some of the stories we have received of homosexuals participating in the Tea Party movement.  We now have more examples of this gay infiltration of the movement than we do of ugly racial epithets hurled at these rallies.  As soon as the media pick up on this narrative, we’re bound to see a social conservative exodus from the movement.

Over at Just One Minute, Tom Maguire comments on “Charles Blow['s], the NY Times other professional grievance columnist” explanation “that the Tea Party is racist until they can prove otherwise”:

According to an article accompanying a Washington Post/ABC News poll released on Wednesday: “About 61 percent of tea party opponents say racism has a lot to do with the movement, a view held by just 7 percent of tea party supporters.”

This gulf of perception has left Tea Party organizers struggling to scrub the stain of racism from its image, but those efforts may fly in the face of the facts.

Once again, relying on the critics of an organization to determine the beliefs of the organization’s members.

This is like a film critics writing a series of scathing reviews of a movie and then talking about the gulf of perception that leaves the films producers struggling to scrub the stain of bad notices from the flick’s image.  This isn’t the pot calling the kettle black.  This is the pot photoshopping a picture of the kettle to make it black and then pronouncing it so.

And while Blow blathers on about “facts,” he offers no facts whatsoever to justify his accusations, trotting out only an interpretation of a study “highly skewed by political bias.”  Those looking for racism in the Tea Party movement will surely find it, just as those looking for gay participation in such rallies will also find it.

But, no one is accusing the Tea Parties of being focal points of the homosexual agenda.  It just doesn’t fit the narrative.  From my experience, however, there are clearly more gay men, more lesbians even, in the Tea Party movement than there are racists. Far more, far, far, far more.

Ponder that for a minute as you consider the left-wing narrative.

Last month, I read that a left-of-center friend of mine, a decent person who shows great respect to her ideological adversaries, likened some of the Tea Party language to “hate speech”, with the rallies providing cover for racist rhetoric.

She has, like many critics of this dynamic, grassroots movement, not yet attended a  Tea Party and, like many busy professionals, doesn’t have time to look to as many alternative sources of news as do bloggers.  Thus, given the tilt of the media coverage of the Tea Party, it’s not surprising that the average consumer of news, has a jaundiced view of this phenomenon.

People busy with his work and family don’t have time to surf the web to confirm every story they read in such left-leaning dailies as the New York or Los Angeles Times.  Thus, it is no wonder, as blogging law professor William A. Jacobson observed, a Washington Post poll found that 28% of Americans find racial prejudice underlying the Tea Party.

. . . the fact that “nearly three in ten” Americans perceive the Tea Parties as racist is amazingly low considering how much time WaPo and NY Times columnists, Democratic members of Congress, and left-wing blogs spend calling Tea Partiers racist.

The only reason Tea Parties are “battling perceptions of racism,” as the Post puts it, is because of the prejudices of the reporters from papers like theirs as well as from various and sundry mainstream news outlets.

Since these journalists are predisposed to find racism on the right, they will play up the handful of nasty slogans they see on random signs at our rallies or the occasional nut-bag who happens to show up at the protests they cover.  As we (and other conservative and libertarian bloggers) have said repeatedly, there are nuts in every political movement.  But, somehow, the isolated extremists are supposed to define ours.

Nobody was asking Barney Frank to differentiate himself from the mean-spirited anti-war protesters in Bush era who likened the then-president to Hitler and wished for his death.  Why then are his ideological allies in the halls of Congress and the offices of mainstream news outlets then defining our movement by its fringe?

NB:  I cleaned up a few typos and changed a few expressions to improve the flow of the piece.