[manic4organic]

As I said in another thread yesterday, there is no Tea Party. There are Tea Parties, and they will continue to thrive.

[Roccus]

As I said in another thread yesterday, there is no Tea Party. There are Tea Parties, and they will continue to thrive.

Accept NO "leader."

Do not allow the movement to be "co-opted" by ANY politician (Boehner) or media (FOX)

[Plumres]

The tea parties are working to get conservatives elected. The are not really a 3rd party. It is are luck that almost all conservatives are Republicans. The Republicans will benefit most from the tea parties. We must get the gavel from Pelsoi! We can worry about the degree of conservative the candidate is after we sweep the libs out of power!

[Richard Kimball]

The Tea Parties are a reaction to politics as usual by both parties. Although not aligned with either party, at this time, the Republicans are the only viable option to get a candidate elected.

The more I watch the Dark Knight, the more I think about Alfred's comment, "Perhaps master Bruce, you're dealing with someone you don't fully understand." The nature of the Tea Parties is outside the understanding of either party.

During the relative political stability that has existed since WWII, politics has coalesced around a group of political operatives that form into groups to force legislation that either funds their group, enacts laws that require entities to spend money for their group, or otherwise establish a legal advantage for their group.

The biggest risk to the Tea Parties is from within. The Tea Parties exist because of the basic premise that we want the government to quit spending money we don't have on things we don't need. The risk is that if they adopt too many other causes, the thrust will be diluted. While I strongly support gun rights, right to life, and several other causes, I believe it is better strategy to pursue those goals through groups other than the Tea Parties. If the Tea Parties start adopting other goals, eventually the original cause will be diluted and there will be battles over things such as the libertarian "should drugs be legalized" issues.

What confuses politicians now is that the Tea Partiers can't be bought by slathering a little more pork into a bill. They don't have a frame of reference to deal with a group that can't be bought off.