Free Republic

In The Taming of the American Crowd: From Stamp Riots to Shopping Sprees, I argue that unlike the kind of crowds that have surged across the pages of American history and unlike crowds in certain other parts of the world, today's American crowds seldom even figure in the news. We have crowds of shoppers, spectators, and travelers, but these are ill-prepared to act as one. Then, in April 2009, when Taming was well along in Monthly Review Press's publication process, some American crowds did begin to make the news. On April 15, thousands of angry Americans attended Tax Day "tea...

For Democrats like Harry Reid, who called them "evil-mongers," and Nancy Pelosi, who called them "unAmerican," the NBC News poll must have hit like a sucker punch at a Georgetown wine-and-cheese. The Tea Party movement, those folks rallying against spending last spring and Obamacare in the summer town halls, are viewed more favorably than the Democratic Party. Forty-one percent of Americans have a favorable opinion of the Tea Party movement, to 35 percent for Obama's party. Only 24 percent view Tea Party activists unfavorably, while 45 percent hold a negative view of the Democrats. While Tea Party types played a...

Looks like the steadily growing list of constitutional, ethical and political outrages that constitute the Harry Reid version of Obamacare is sparking a rebellion in the states, as AP reports South Carolina's attorney general plans to investigate the vote-buying that surrounded the proposal in the Senate majority leader's office. According to AP, South Carolina's Henry McMaster is being joined by the attorneys general of Michigan and Washington state in a suit to determine the constitutionality of the Obamacare proposal. Their initiative was prompted by a request from South Carolina's two senators, Lindsay Graham and Jim DeMint, both Republicans. Attorneys-general in...

Former Governor Sarah Palin via Twitter said that this morning’s vote to takeover healthcare by the Senate will “ awaken a sleeping giant” and action will be taken. She then says Americans will take action when light begins to shine on big government growth and corruption. c tomrrw's Healthcare Takeover vote=the sleeping giant will awaken&action will b takn by"average"Americans as lite shines on big govt growth - Sarah Palin The Senate joined the House this morning in thumbing their noses at the American people by passing healthcare reform. The bill actually has nothing to do with reform and more to...

Sen. Ben Nelson's, D-Neb., abandonment of his alleged "pro-life" commitment brought Harry Reid within reach of a Christmas Eve vote to approve a Senate version of Obamacare. When that happens, the political battles over the future of American medicine and especially the care of seniors will shift to the conference committee and then to the House. Though many conservatives are demoralized, they should instead be gearing up to peel off enough votes from among the 220 who voted for Obamacare when it passed the lower chamber. If the 215 who voted "no" on the first round stay firm, only three...

From General McChrystal to Hillary Clinton to Chelsea Handler, Meghan McCain names the men and women who made a difference this year—the good, the bad, and the nutty. This year has been full of people who let us down—from politics to entertainment to sports. (Is it too late for Tiger Woods, Mark Sanford, and David Letterman to rent a ski condo for the holidays?) But not everyone has been a disappointment. There are plenty of folks who made the world a lot better, more interesting, and just plain fun in 2009 Here are people who made my year. (snip) Hillary...

‘Wow.” That was the response of a cynical Florida Republican politico recently reacting to poll numbers showing former state speaker of the house Marco Rubio tied with Gov. Charlie Crist. The two are expected to face one another in an August Republican primary for the Senate seat abandoned by Republican Mel Martinez. Rubio, the son of Cuban immigrants, is wowing even the professionals; his performance is especially impressive because the weight of the Republican establishment is behind Crist, as it has been for most of the year — the National Republican Senatorial Committee endorsed him back in the spring. The...

Let's face it FRiends, if the unconstitutional healthcare bill passes, the socialist coup d'etat will have advanced well beyond the point of no return! There is nothing in the constitution that authorizes this illegal federal power-grab and plenty that forbids it. If the Obama/Reid/Pelosi Marxist attempted coup pulls this off without the people resisting to the hilt, then they'll have no restrictions whatsoever on implementing the rest of their Liberty killing Marxist agenda. America will be no more. The whole idea of our constitution is to severely restrict the federal government to only its dozen and a half expressly listed...

Subject: DO NOT GIVE UP! Senate Watch TONIGHT with NATIONWIDE Virtual Vigil Greetings Patriots,It is five days before Christmas and it looks as if the Scrooges in DC aren't packing it up and going home.  Instead, they have decided to call Ba-humbug and pass this legislation that 61% of Americans do not support.  This past week, even Howard Dean came out and said it was not good for this country because it is a bailout for big insurance companies.  On Thursday, MoveOn.org sent a message to their members that they do not want the legislation passed either and that...

This is a great video. It should be played where the politicians can hear it, loud and continuously. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dc_-L4fyLUo

The United States has finally reached a pinnacle where the radical-left are cheering. With the complete domination of main-stream media, education, welfare, the unions and the Democratic Party we now have a group of liberal socialists that have moved from subliminal attack against humanity to full frontal assault against all people who stand in their way. Their final conquest was the United States government with its ability to tax, control, ruin and, in general, subvert the Constitution. Did the people in this country see it coming? Apparently not soon enough! Are these radicals destined for immortality? Absolutely NOT! Socialism never...

...Anger and opposition to Washington's policies and edicts--no matter now egregious--hardly ever translate into anything beyond words of frustration. And Washington politicians don't pay much attention to rhetoric--not even their own. You see, the wizards in Washington and on Wall Street have us figured out. Along with their compatriots in the propaganda press corps, they know that no matter how loudly we scream, how much we protest, or how angry we become, the system is rigged to protect them. The best we the people can seem to come up with is "throwing the bums out" every two or four years....

Liberty Republicans need to think about strategies to counteract the cooptation of the revived liberty movement that Rockefeller or Progressive Republicans will attempt. The Tea Party movement’s explosion shows that liberty Republicanism can succeed. As well, the failure of Rockefeller Republicanism under the Bush administration might keep big government Republicans from success, especially when we liberty Republicans refuse to cooperate with them. Because the Tea Party movement is composed of many fine and well meaning but inexperienced activists, it is susceptible to the same tactics that coopted the libertarian movement in 1980. If a Progressive Republican calls himself a “libertarian”...

Democratic Senator Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania is running even with relatively unknown Republican challenger Pat Toomey for a 2010 race that could help determine the balance of power in the U.S. Senate, according to a poll released on Friday. Specter, 79, is a longtime Republican who broke with the party in April and joined the Democrats, helping them reach the 60-vote threshold in the 100-member Senate, a super majority crucial for overcoming Republican opposition to legislation. The Quinnipiac University survey found voters split 44-44 percent between the two candidates when asked who they would elect if they were to...

So here we are, not a year into the Change & Hope presidency, and we're already divining Obama's demise. We're not talking about the actual presidency, which has three years to run. We're talking about the illusions and promises we wrapped around him. Promises dashed, compromises made, fortune reversed. So much gone so soon. We've got a president in a tailspin. His base is in revolt, his party in disarray. We've got a health care reform bill that has no reform left in it, and which even those who back it call "crap." We've got a Senate where one man...

Rick Perry, where are you? In Texas, and across the Nation, we are watching the inexorable advance of unconstitutional federal legislation across our borders. What recourse do Texas citizens have when the federal checks and balances established by our Founding Fathers are overrun? We will be looking as we vote for our next Governor for strong, principled leadership.

Earlier this week a crowd of 2,000 to 3,000 "Tea Partiers" gathered on Capitol Hill in Washington for an afternoon rally to protest the Democrats' health care legislation. The crowd was far short of the organizers' expected turnout of 15,000, suggesting Angry America either isn't as large or as well-organized as anticipated. Tea Partiers are radio talk show host Glenn Beck's army: upset, irritated, and loud. They began to organize in the wake of President Obama's election and the U.S. financial collapse of 2008, to protest the expansion of government, and just about anything else linked to the Democrats. Decentralized,...

The Patriot Post · http://patriotpost.us The Time Has Come By Mark Alexander · Thursday, December 17, 2009 "It is natural to man to indulge in the illusions of hope. We are apt to shut our eyes against a painful truth -- and listen to the song of that syren, till she transforms us into beasts. ... Are we disposed to be of the number of those, who having eyes, see not, and having ears, hear not?" --Patrick Henry The 2008 presidential election was much more than a referendum on the two candidates; it was a referendum on the ability...

Rob Wittman was 40 minutes late to his town hall meeting in Montross on Dec. 8, where he received less than the hometown treatment from TEA Party members. Held at Washington and Lee High School, the town hall meeting, sponsored by the Westmoreland County Citizens Association, was the public's opportunity to question Wittman on everything the actions of Congress and federal government. While many questions posed to Wittman, first congressional district representative, dealt with health care and the economy, the show was quickly stolen by TEA Party members. Catherine Crabill, former Republican candidate for the 99th district seat in Virginia's...

From NBC's Mark Murray and Domenico MontanaroJust how angry is the public with the country's two leading political parties? Angry enough that the conservative, libertarian-leaning Tea Party movement is more popular than either the Democratic or the Republican parties, according to the latest NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll. The Republican Party maintains its net-negative favorable/unfavorable rating in the poll, with 28 percent viewing it positively and 43 percent seeing it in a negative light. For the first time in more than two years, the Democratic Party also now holds a net-negative fav/unfav, at 35-45 percent. By comparison, the NBC/WSJ poll...

The Tea Party movement is working to put “America back on track” as a majority of elected officials are doing “great damage to this nation,” one organizer of a local group says. The Starkville and Columbus Tea Party groups will gather Saturday in Starkville in a public town hall meeting at the Starkville Sportsplex from 10 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. The event is free. In explaining the Tea Party movement, Robert J. Allen, who co-founded with Gary Chesser the Starkville Tea Party, said: “We have happening in our country right now something that has never happened before, at least to...

The Government Is Monitoring Facebook And Twitter By Noel Sheppard Created 2009-12-14 11:59 "The government is increasingly monitoring Facebook, Twitter and other social networking sites for tax delinquents, copyright infringers and political protesters." So ominously began an editorial [1] in Sunday's New York Times. Those with accounts at such websites should pay attention, for according to the Times, and other sources, Big Brother is watching you: The Wall Street Journal reported this summer that state revenue agents have been searching for tax scofflaws by mining information on MySpace and Facebook. In October, the F.B.I. searched the New York home of...

Election 2010: Florida GOP Senate Primary 2010 Florida GOP Senate Primary: Crist 43%, Rubio 43% Tuesday, December 15 Governor Charlie Crist and former state House Speaker Marco Rubio are now tied in the 2010 race for the Republican Senate nomination in Florida. A new Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of likely GOP Primary voters finds Crist and Rubio each with 43% of the vote. Five percent (5%) prefer another candidate, and nine percent (9%) are undecided. Crist’s support has fallen from 53% in August to 49% in October. Rasmussen Reports noted at the time, “The fact that Crist has fallen below...

The "tea party" movement that gained steam shortly after President Obama took office is seeing a surge in popularity, with a string of candidates and officials willing to take up its cause and a political infrastructure that's starting to mirror that of an actual political party. What started as a conservative protest klatch has evolved into a political force with enough muscle to potentially alter the course of the 2010 mid-term elections. The "tea party" movement that gained steam shortly after President Obama took office is seeing a surge in popularity, with a string of candidates and officials willing to...

Conservative leaders are eager to turn Tea Party anger into election-year cash – and to do that, they’re launching a flurry of new political action committees aimed at collecting small-dollar donations from newly engaged anti-tax, anti-spending activists. The latest entrant: Take Back America PAC, to be launched this week by FreedomWorks, the conservative group and Tea Party leader run by former House Republican leader Dick Armey. Armey said the goal of the new PAC is “to show that if Republicans pick their candidates with a message of restraint of big government and respect for individual liberty, it will translate into...

Sen. John Kerry's new fundraising letter seeks to make a bogeyman of Sarah Palin and the Tea Party movement and rally liberals for the 2010 midterm elections.A new fundraising letter from Sen. John Kerry (D) of Massachusetts gives a strong hint about how Democrats may try to stir their base to action during the 2010 election season: scare them with the prospect of a Sarah Palin nation.“Think GOP obstruction is bad now?” Senator Kerry asks in a fundraising letter sent out Tuesday morning by the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee. “Just imagine what Washington would look like if a bunch of...

A new fundraising letter from Sen. John Kerry (D) of Massachusetts gives a strong hint about how Democrats may try to stir their base to action during the 2010 election season: scare them with the prospect of a Sarah Palin nation. “Think GOP obstruction is bad now?” Senator Kerry asks in a fundraising letter sent out Tuesday morning by the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee. “Just imagine what Washington would look like if a bunch of new senators – inspired by Sarah Palin and the tea party crowd – took over.” In recent months, the political right has been energized by...

In the predawn hours this morning, over 30 people loaded a chartered bus in a parking lot across from Ross Park Mall were seeing red and it had nothing to do with getting up before 3:00 a.m. "We want to let Washington know that we are not going to let them pass legislation without them knowing how we feel," said Pam Smith of Evans City. Smith was part of a group of grassroots activists and concerned citizens heading down to Washington, D.C., this morning to issue a "code red" alert to stop the health care overhaul legislation from advancing in...

Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) is putting Capitol Hill on a "Code Red" alert Tuesday in an effort to stop the Senate's health care reform legislation. In a release from his office Monday, DeMint announced he will speak at what is being billed as an "emergency rally" coordinated by several groups, including the American Conservative Union and the Susan B. Anthony List. "The event has 'tea party' trimmings and plenty of muscle, including grass-roots support from six states," according to the GOP senator's Web site.

Former Governor Sarah Palin is once again crisscrossing America, this time to promote her new book "Going Rogue: An American Life." Judging by the huge crowds lining up at the book stores for a chance to meet her, she is fast becoming a political rock star. As the debates on the economy, jobs, health care reform, government spending, terrorist trials, and the Afghan War heat up-and the President's poll numbers head south-her timing couldn't be better. Not everyone, however, is happy to see her take center stage once again. Many liberals and left wing media pundits have been downright apoplectic...

Conventional political wisdom pegs Republicans as the most threatened by pollster Scott Rasmussen's shocking finding that a Tea Party party would draw more support today than the GOP, but Democrats have even more to fear. Consider the situation facing Rep. Dina Titus, D-Nev., an incumbent representing one of her party's most reliable congressional districts in the country, thanks to the 18 point registration advantage Democrats enjoy over Republicans. Her district is so solidly Democratic that Titus has voted with the liberal Democratic majority on all three of the major issues before Congress this year, including President Obama's $787 billion economic...

Are today's American Tea Party patriots anything like the Jewish Maccabees of ancient times? The Jewish eight-day holiday of Hanukah began Friday night. The holiday marks the successful BCE revolt of the Jews of Judea over their Greco-Syrian occupiers. For many years, the Jews of Judea were resigned to their fate and accepted the presence of their conquerors. With the passage of time, however, the Greco-Syrian occupiers began to force their pagan ways upon the Jews and prohibit Jewish religious practices. The loss of rights proved too much to bear for many Jews and a grassroots opposition movement began, led...

Anti-Obama sentiment brewing on internet as Tea party threatens boilover WHEN Stacy Mott, a stay-at-home mother of three children, started writing a blog after the election of President Barack Obama last year, she had no involvement in politics and simply wanted to vent her frustration at financial bailouts, healthcare reform and legislation to combat climate change. The former marketing executive at Toys R Us quickly found she was not alone. One year on, her blog, Smart Girl Politics, is an organisation with 23,000 members and co-ordinators in almost every state. "There are a huge amount of people out there...

On Saturday, Sen. Mary Landrieu, political commentator James Carville and a committee of prominent Democrats will host a fundraiser for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada at the home of David Voelker, chairman of the Louisiana Recovery Authority. Tickets to the affair start at $1,000 and escalate to $4,800 for co-hosts supporting Reid, who is locked in a bitter re-election campaign for 2010 and raising money in the districts of his Democratic Senate colleagues nationwide. When he visits New Orleans, political donors as well as Tea Party activists from throughout Louisiana will greet him. They have labeled their rally...

Washington Post: Movement Has the Potential to Unite and Rally Republicans, But Could Also Splinter the GOPThe energized "tea party" movement, which upended this year's political debate with noisy anti-government protests, is preparing to shake up the 2010 elections by channeling money and supporters to conservative candidates set to challenge both Democrats and Republicans. Buoyed by their success in capsizing a moderate Republican candidate this fall in Upstate New York, tea party activists and affiliated groups are unveiling new political action committees and tactics aimed at capitalizing on conservative opposition to health-care reform, financial bailouts and other Obama administration policies....

"Tea party" organizers are not taking a Christmas vacation. Feisty plans for a cross-country "Tea Party Express III" have taken shape, accompanied by vows that grassroots folks are emerging with newfound, serious intent to promote conservative ideals and frugal government. Things get under way with a "mega rally" on March 27, staged right in Searchlight, Nev. - hometown of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.

Rasmussen reports the Tea Party Movement, which percolated only months ago, is beating the Grand Old Party. That's amazing -- and good -- news. A nascent grassroots movement is more popular than a long-established political party. Republican Party leaders should be embarrassed. Instead, the Republican establishment disdains this populist uprising. Rather than embracing this genuine movement, establishment politicians and consultants are calculating how to co-opt, sideline or even defeat the newest phenomenon in politics - tea partiers. That would be arrogance, not leadership. It could be the downfall of Republican leaders, who have taken the Party of Reagan to the...

For the past few weeks we've been hard at work putting together what will be the biggest Tea Party Express of them all!From March 27 - April 15, 2010 the "Tea Party Express III: Just Vote Them Out" tour will cross the nation holding tea party rallies in dozens of cities across America, culminating in the grand daddy rally of them all in Washington, D.C. on tax day!We'll be kicking off the effort with another mega rally - on the opposite end of the country, in Searchlight, NV - Harry Reid's hometown (population of just over 500 people).  We're...

Tea parties: time to look at the big picture December 8, 7:37 AM It was reported on AOL this morning that the tea party movement may be fracturing. There are several different groups who make up the overall movement, and each is trying to put its stamp on the direction in which they are headed. Further, some think the drive is being co-opted by the Republican party for its own use. It can seem a tangled web.*snip* Without Washington our nation would not have been formed. Without Lincoln the Civil War may have been lost. Without Reagan the prosperity of...

Harry Reid likens Healthcare protesters to people who supported slavery December 7, 5:31 PMBaltimore Conservative ExaminerAl Ritter Reid with partner in crime Sen. Mikulski AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais This has to be not only the most contentious comment ever made in the Senate, but also the most false. I’m not exactly sure what Harry Reid wanted to accomplish with this falsehood, but his knowledge of history is sorely lacking. I can’t help but to liken his comment to someone who would make the very comparison of the Tea Party participants to followers of Hitler. Yes Nancy Pelosi, I am talking...

Lordy, Lordy, Lordy, look what the pollsters just brought in. A pair of new surveys revealing that Democrat President Obama is still declining and has hit a new low in job approval among Americans just 56 weeks after they elected him with a decided margin. And -- wait for it -- Republican Sarah Palin is successfully selling a whole lot more than books out there on the road. Even among those not lining up in 10-degree weather to catch a glimpse of pretty much the only political celebrity the GOP has these days. First, el jefe. Facing double-digit unemployment, rising...

Outgoing Virginia Gov. Tim Kaine, chairman of the Democratic National Committee, recently told participants at the 11th annual American Democracy Conference in Charlottesville that the "corrosive" Tea Party movement was "devouring" the Republican Party. A recent Rasmussen poll, which found "Tea Party" more popular than the GOP, seemed to confirm Kaine's point. The growing grass-roots movement will indeed destroy the political careers of many politicians who fail to heed the warning it delivered Sept. 12, when 1.7 million angry voters (according to a crowd estimate by Zac Moilanen of Indiana University) descended on Washington to say they were totally fed...

BY STEPHANIE SIMON DENVER -- To retake Colorado, the Republican Party wants voters like Michael Schneider. A proud member of the diffuse 'tea-party movement' that gained steam during this summer's town-hall meetings on health care, Dr. Schneider is on the hunt for candidates who promise to buck the political establishment, defy the party elite and hew tightly to conservative principles. Colorado Republicans last week made a bold move to woo him and other restive tea-party activists by setting forth a conservative agenda -- dubbed the "Platform for Prosperity" -- and encouraging all candidates for state office to adopt it. The...

A new Rasmussen poll finds that the tea party movement's popularity is growing, so much so that it garners more support than the Republican party on a generic Congressional ballot. The poll hints that the burgeoning discontent among conservatives within the GOP threatens to splinter the party at a time when the popularity of President Obama and the Democratic-controlled Congress are waning as we head into an election year.

<p>Protesters march through Washington at a Tea Party Express rally on September 12.</p> <p>Washington (CNN) -- It emerged in anger and it threatens to split in anger.</p> <p>One major group in the Tea Party movement -- named after the famous Boston Tea Party -- is set to host its first convention in February, with former Alaska governor and 2008 Republican vice-presidential candidate Sarah Palin as its keynote speaker.</p>

In a hypothetical three-way contest, the latest Rasmussen national telephone survey found Democrats would attract 36 percent of the vote. A Tea Party candidate, if there were one, would attract 23 percent of the voters, while just 18 percent would be inclined to vote for a Republican candidate. However, 22 percent of the voters are undecided. In the survey of 1,000 likely voters, respondents were asked to assume that the Tea Party movement organized as a new political party. The survey was conducted Dec. 4-5. However, in a standard two-way race, Republicans hold a modest lead over Democrats. “It appears...

In a three-way Generic Ballot test, the latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds Democrats attracting 36% of the vote. The Tea Party candidate picks up 23%, and Republicans finish third at 18%. Another 22% are undecided.

"The stunning Rasmussen Poll showing the Republican Party finishing a decided third to a hypothetical 'Tea Party' candidate should send shock waves through the GOP. It demonstrates once again that the timid, tepid Republican leadership is leading its party to the brink of disaster. Tens of millions of Americans are looking for strong leadership to stand up to the Obama-Reid-Pelosi leftwing onslaught. Instead, the Republican Party is giving them the same shilly-shally two-step that cost it a majority in Congress, and the Oval Office. Looks like the American people are telling the GOP in no uncertain terms, 'Lead, follow --...

Just about every blockbuster movie is followed by a sequel, or two. The tea party cross country caravan, it appears, is no different. A Tea Party Express official tells CNN that they're planning a third national tour in late March and early April that will culminate in the nation's capitol on April 15, tax deadline day. Levi Russell, a spokesman for the group, which is organized by the conservative political action committee Our Country Deserves Better, says the slogan for the tour is "just vote them out." Russell says that with the crucial 2010 midterm elections just months away, the...