Tea Party activism is not about political dissent - It's about vile, storm trooper sound bites

New York Daily News ^ | Monday, March 29th 2010 | Mike Lupica (Sports Columnist for liberals who don't watch sports)

[presidio9]

We are 100 yards, no more than that, from the front entrance to the school. There is a stop sign here, and underneath the word "Stop" someone has spray-painted "Obama."

Stop Obama.

Why has somebody done it? Because in the current climate, people have been convinced they can. Or, more likely, that they should.

My son is in the seat next to me in the car. He says, "This isn't the only one. There are others in different parts of town."

At least here it is only vandalism about this President and the country's new health care bill, not phone threats left for some members of Congress. It is not an honorable old hero of the civil rights movement like Rep. John Lewis hearing the kind of racial insults he heard nearly 50 years ago in America. Or other congressmen being spat upon, all in the name of democracy at work.

At least here it is not Rep. Bart Stupak, a Democrat from Michigan, being called a "baby killer," or a brick through a lawmaker's window. It is not Sarah Palin on her Twitter page - this woman who officially puts the twit in Twitter - posting the following message:

"Commonsense Conservatives & lovers of America: Don't Retreat, Instead - RELOAD."

As always, you wonder where this patriotism and righteousness and Tea Party activism was during Bush-Cheney. You wonder if all the people who want to take to the streets - and to the television cameras now - decided they weren't needed for eight years because they thought the country was going so good. Or maybe they have just convinced themselves that the Obama who must now be stopped didn't just inherit this America, he created it.

This is no longer about political dissent. It is about storm trooper sound bites, and hate. This isn't the kind of honest debate on which our system of government has been built. It is vile, back-alley fighting, getting worse by the day, with no end in sight. People say that opposition to all Presidents, even the most unpopular white ones, sounds like this. No, it doesn't.

"It's so good to be here for the showdown in Searchlight [Nev.]," Palin says on Saturday. "So proud to be with all you who are proud to be Americans."

Palin is in Nevada because Sen. Harry Reid is a Democratic candidate she and other lovers of America are "targeting" this November. Of course, the implication, as always, is that anybody on the other side of the debate - about health care or anything else - isn't nearly as good an American as she is.

Palin is such a fighter and great American that she quit on her stool as governor of Alaska because there was more money to be made in the other 49 states, shouting about death panels and health care and "European socialism" and writing unreadable books. In so many ways, she is a perfect media darling for our times. She doesn't scrawl graffiti, she thinks in it.

If you even think that this President ought to be given a chance, that he might have some good in him, that he doesn't hate America the way the radio idiots say he does, then you must be someone just like him and she will help shout you down. You are another lousy, lefty Socialist who doesn't understand the new health care bill is unconstitutional. Why? Because the screamers say so, that's why. They learned it online.

"The country does not like this [health care] bill," Republican strategist Mike Murphy says on television Sunday.

The country. Another guy speaking for the whole country, coast to coast, Washington Heights to Starbuck, Wash. Is America divided over health care right now? Sure it is, the way it was divided over Social Security under FDR and Medicare under LBJ and just about every important social program in the country's history.

Will a bill be presented to my children and their children on this bill someday? It likely will be. And economists say that Iraq will eventually be a $3 trillion war for this country. But all those who have taken to the streets because of the bill that Obama signed the other day must think that Iraq has paid for itself, no matter how much money it continues to cost this country, how many dead or broken bodies.

But Obama is the one who must be stopped, on health care and everything else. Stop Obama. Sometimes you wonder what that really means. Sometimes you probably find yourself wondering just how much you have to hate this President before you love America enough.

[Thane_Banquo]

I tis amazing to me that people, even here on FR, do not see what is happening. The intent from Obama is to get everyone, or at least enough people, to believe that Republicans, Conservatives, and Tea Partiers are inciting and encouraging violence on a daily basis. Then, they can pass laws against conservative speech because free speech does not protect incitement to violence. The ACLU will lead the charge, saying this hate speech must stop because it is infringing on the rights of gays, women, and minorities. Obama will silence the opposition and institute his Marxist dictatorship.

[pallis]

Politics are politics and the vile left is somewhat taken back by the discovery that the American right can raise a voice too. As for the whole storm trooper thing, that can only come from the powers that be, and those are Obamao’s thugs. We are the resistance.

[a fool in paradise]

Barack Obama SUPPORTED Sheperd Fairey's vandalism of stop signs with anti-bush slogans. He even hired him for the hopey-changey pop-art posters in his 2008 campaign and sent him a personal thank you letter:

"Dear Shepard, I would like to thank you for using your talent in support of my campaign. The political messages involved in your work have encouraged Americans to believe they can help change the status quo.

Your images have a profound effect on people, whether seen in a gallery or on a stop sign. I am privileged to be a part of your artwork and proud to have your support...

The writer is engaging in Stalinst revisionist history by pretending that NO president ever went through this, least of all the previous one. And OBAMA SUPPORTED THE TACTICS.

[mrsmel]

Amen. If you love America, there’s no choice but to despise this infiltrator. Just as I would hate a murderous thug threatening my family. What’s so complex about that?

[a fool in paradise]

But White Male voters are afraid of Sarah Palin. That’s the talking point. We were afraid of strong women like Hillary Clinton and Nancy Pelosi, it’s not about their agenda at all.

[WayneS]

...and don’t forget the Southern Poverty Law Center, those unbiased identifiers of “hate groups”.

[DuncanWaring]

Remember also how they screamed about the evils of the Patriot Act when it was passed - if they really didn’t like, they would have repealed it by now.

Instead, I’ve got a vague recollection of hearing about an extension a week or two ago.

[mrsmel]

I agree, there is a common thread running through article after disingenuous article this weekend and today which serves no purpose except to lay the groundwork for a coming crackdown, with the trumped-up “threat” from the right being the fuse. There’s no way almost every outlet is reporting on this same subject in the same way without it having been orchestrated, and it wasn’t orchestrated for nothing.

[WayneS]

Wouldn’t you know it!

www.fearbush.com doesn’t seem to be “up” any more...

[EternalVigilance]

[SJSAMPLE]

So what.
Every single stop sign in Ann Arbor, Michigan has “BUSH” spray-painted underneath “STOP”.

Nothing new, but the MSM would have you believe this is orginal.

[myself6]

No, its all about F U Mr. Mike lupica of Running brook Ln, New Canaan Connecticut 41.11550700, -73.51958500

No, really.... F U

[a fool in paradise]

As always, you wonder where this patriotism and righteousness and Tea Party activism was during Bush-Cheney. You wonder if all the people who want to take to the streets - and to the television cameras now - decided they weren't needed for eight years because they thought the country was going so good.

Since 2003, Hannity has hosted country music-themed "Freedom Concerts" billed to help benefit the Freedom Alliance Scholarship Fund, a charity created by Oliver North to provide college scholarships to children with a parent severely disabled or killed in military action.

There were rallies to support our troops and our president at a time that Communists were funding riots in the streets in solidarity with Al Qaeda's "freedom fighters" (Michael Moore's term for terrorist insurgents).

[Hardastarboard]

This isn't the kind of honest debate on which our system of government has been built. It is vile, back-alley fighting, getting worse by the day, with no end in sight.

A point by point dissection of this Mr. Lupica's ignorance would take a 3,000 word essay. I'll just keep it to the one point above.

If you read this and didn't know that he was a smart ass liberal, you would agree, because it's exactly what the Democrats are doing right now. The irony is entirely lost on this ranting fool.

[a fool in paradise]

It is not an honorable old hero of the civil rights movement like Rep. John Lewis hearing the kind of racial insults he heard nearly 50 years ago in America.

Must've run into Senator Robert Byrd (D-KKK) in the Congressional commissary.

[presidio9]

[Oldexpat]

You all should know that only the left is allowed to use curses, riots, bombs, vanalism, terrorism, and threats.
They invented that style of politics. I’m sorry to see that we on the right need to resort to those tactics,but if it works..great.

[mrsmel]

It doesn’t seem to matter how much proof we can offer that the left has done the same and worse, the MSM is making sure that the desired meme of “violent right-wing threat” is the one getting play. Our frustration at their duplicity likely makes them all the more smug and sneering. The left is EVIL, truly evil. What they are preparing to unleash upon this nation is EVIL.

[presidio9]

He’s you guys champion New York Post.

Please translate this sentence into English.

[GeronL]

from the people who made movies about killing Bush