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Have you ever wondered where the Tea Party rage was during the Bush years when the Constitution was breached, civil liberties were violated, international laws were broken, an illegal war shamed us before the world and corporate greed tanked the economy? Where was their rage when tax cuts went to the wealthiest 2% while poverty increased 26.1%? If this did not take them shouting through the streets, we can be pretty sure something else is going on now. The Tea Party - whose members range from the sincerely frightened to the patently unhinged – is portrayed as a spontaneous grassroots movement. Not true. This firestorm is being skillfully manipulated and stoked by a consortium of media barkers, rabid partisans, and guileful corporate operatives. Manipulating fears and prejudices is routine strategy for advancing an antigovernment ideology. The economic meltdown along with the election of Obama provided a wide opening for marshaling an angry directionless movement, and the health care bill was a handy ruse. (These think tank schemes are perpetual and broadly targeted – influencing organizations, academic curricula, government policy, and all in between.) Tea Partiers - primarily white, suburban, and conservative - are convinced that minorities and immigrants are largely to blame for the mess we’re in. (That ACORN is small potatoes, that minorities are not prime recipients of entitlements, and that low income people did not crash Wall Street are left out of the narrative). Strategists know which match to strike and what smoke to blow. Blaming the poor plays. Dick Armey of Freedom Works, Tim Phillips of Americans for Prosperity, and Don Blankenship of Massey Coal are three highly visible astroturfers who’re gaming the Tea Party. Armey, the de facto leader of the Tea Party, worked (until last August) for a lobbying firm serving the likes of GM and big pharma. Tim Phillips is president of AFP, a self proclaimed “premier grassroots organization” that’s the 3rd largest recipient of money bestowed by the Koch foundation - a $100 billion a year industry whose operatives are dedicated to bringing about a “libertarian" corporate America.” They actually organized and funded the first Tea protest. Blankenship along with Verizon and other US Chamber cronies spent $1 million sponsoring last year’s Labor Day Tea Party “Friends of America Rally”. Blankenship, dressed in stars and stripes, railed against corporate greed, big government and, in his best home boy dialect, proclaimed, “We are here today to defend labor.” No one could make this up! Embedded corporate interests and their long term strategy to change America explain other seeming contradiction in the Tea movement. Take, for instance, their praise of the late writer, Ayn Rand. Rand, a right wing guru whose philosophy is most closely aligned with libertarian politics, is championed by Tea Party folks – the very people whom she admittedly despised. (She characterized average people as “ugly, stupid and irrational.”) She was an atheist and denounced democracy as “a totalitarian manifestation.” She believed only “absolute individual freedom” separates superior beings from lesser ones and only “free-market capitalism” rewards the cream of the crop – all others deserve their lot. Rand contended that selfishness is the highest moral good. Altruism and kindness are, in her words, “moral cannibalism.” The worthy person is one who “produces,” makes money, and lives without regard for others. He stands alone – contemptuous of all government and all lesser beings. Such is her fictional Superman, John Galt, in Atlas Shrugged - the hero Tea Partiers are honoring in their “Go Galt” slogan. An atheist and high priestess of the corporate world seems somehow un-American, but, in fact, Rand has enjoyed a long and lauded presence in the US - especially with the “big military - small government - tax cuts for the rich” crowd. Allen Greenspan and Clarence Thomas are among her many fans. Thomas reportedly requires his clerks to read Rand’s novel The Fountainhead, whose hero, Howard Roark, “…was born without the ability to consider others.” Marshall University is one of several universities who says it took grant money for agreeing to teach Ayn Rand. Then there’s the patriot groups/militia arm of the Tea Party. Their prototype is the swaggering demonstrator with strapped-on firearms carrying threatening signs like, “It’s time to water The Tree of Liberty.” Southern Poverty Law Center findings show a 300% jump in militia groups during 2009 – all fueling fires of insurrection. Oath Keepers, the patriot group said to be the hub of the anti-Obama movement, was founded a year ago by Yale-educated lawyer and ex Ron Paul aid, Stewart Rhodes. He and others at the helm are reportedly “savvy and smart.” The core members are uniformed men and women who recruit military buddies and stash weapons for a showdown when Obama declares martial law – which they are convinced he will do. If this seems to be in lunatic territory, it’s because we’ve failed to notice the ever increasing expanse of mainstream borders. This group has been accorded legitimacy by such regulars as Pat Buchanan and Lou Dobbs, and some ole’ familiar faces surface very close to it – including Ralph Reed, Dick Armey, powerful lobbyists and members of Congress. The Tea Party, whose mantra is “More Freedom, Less Government, and Lower Taxes,” should be reminded that a freedom movement predicated on contempt for the “least among us” is a sham. Individual freedom is not being free to shop, to own guns and decide rights irrespective of consequences for others. Moreover, market freedom is not human freedom. A greed-driven free market is antithetical to democracy, and only government can render safeguards against corporate powers that treat the world like a balance sheet and human beings like expendable goods. At the end of Blankenship’s Tea Party speech, he quoted George Washington: “Truth will ultimately prevail where there is pains to bring it to light.” We can only hope he’s right. |
