Recently a number of people have been claiming that the Tea Party membership consists mainly of middle and upper-middle class people who want to keep taxes down so that they can have more “stuff.” I find this a ridiculous idea on the face of it. Middle and upper-middle class people do not get generally down and dirty in mass movements. First of all, it’s beneath their pay grade. Second, they are too damned busy maintaining their hustle to get out in the street and protest. And third…well, third is simply an unprejudiced look at the many, many available images of Tea Party-style meeting and demonstrations.
I include three quite representative exmples of the genre below.
Not much more needs to be said to those of us who actually venture out into the white, working class heartland of America on foot and unescorted by the National Guard.
Ignore and/or insult these people at your peril.
To some degree they share similar characteristics to those of the black working class that propelled the Civil Rights movement in his country.
That is…they believe that they do not have very much left to lose. That makes them fairly…committed…at the very least. And dangerous in the pre-WWII German sense at the very worst.
Word.
They are out there; they are feeling their power now and they like Sarah Palin and Glenn Beck.
A lot.
Watch.
AG
P.S. I first heard Glenn Beck on a long, lonely car trip from Ohio to NYC some 6 years ago. Scanning the dial looking for anything to pass the flatland time, I heard his rap…not particularly political then…and thought to myself “UH oh!!! Some kind of radio genius!!!”
He flowed. Better than Don Imus at the game, better than Howard Stern. Much better.
Watch him.
He’s bad news.
Why?
Because he has real talent; because he is off his rocker and because his instability flexes towards the far right.
A dangerous combination.
Bet on it.
AG
