Tax Day Tea Party

Tax Day Tea Party

Tax Day Tea Parties, the earliest manifestation of the Tea Party Movement (from an acronym for Taxed Enough Already), were a nationwide, locally organized multi-event that protested the generational theft of public tax dollars by the Federal Government on April 15, 2009. In the spirit of the founding fathers Boston Tea Party, the local organizers, Top Conservatives on Twitter, and just ordinary citizens who use various social media sites, created a massive grassroots movement which held protests in all fifty states on April 15th 2009 and another scheduled for the July 4th Independence Day Tea Party.

The largest Tea Party held to date was the Dallas Tea Party, held July 4, 2009 at Southfork Ranch in Plano, Texas, which drew 37,000 attendees.

Founding

One of their website states: "The Tea Party protests, in their current form, began in early 2009 when Rick Santelli, the On Air Editor for CNBC, set out on a rant to expose the bankrupt liberal agenda of the White House Administration and Congress. Specifically, the flawed “Stimulus Bill” and pork filled budget."

Mainstream Media

The broadcast networks evening newscasts on April 15, 2009 provided limited coverage of the Tea Party rallies across the nation with time for the views of participants, but they tried to discredit the protests as a front for "corporate interests" or a "fistful of rightward leaning Web sites" -- a concern for motives and hidden agendas the same programs lacked when championing the 2006 pro-illegal immigrant marches. CNN and MSNBC anchors went as far as to make sexual innuendos about the tea parties by using the word "teabagging" in a questionable context.

Neil Cavuto commented on the Tea Parties:

“

Taxed, but not spent. Not by a long shot. Here's the deal: Let's stick with the deal. The rallies. The protests. Apparently what happens at a tea party doesn't end at that party. Word now, these guys who fumed, are now...on fire. And far from cooling off, indications now they're just heating up. Philadelphia this weekend. A huge new push for a proposition in California this week. And that's just for starters. The rage dismissed as a Republican rant by much of the media this week... Barreling on by a lot more than just Republicans these next few weeks, and months -- and to hear their most rabid supporters tell it, years if need be. Supporters who are rich, and not so rich, and not at all rich. They're Republicans and Democrats, conservatives and liberals. Average folks. Ticked-off folks. Folks Washington might dismiss as kooks... but would be kooky even thinking that. Because remember this. Populist rages start like this. Always have. Always will. It's the stuff of history. And as you'll soon see, about to make history.

”

Liberal Infiltrators

ACORN, Huffington Post and other Barack Obama supporters criticized the tax day tea parties, calling them a 'gripe fest by bunch of conservatives'.

Links To Events

2009 Tea Parties

A Google mashup project lists tax day tea parties.

Planned Events

The American Family Association has established a clearing house of Independence Day TEA Party events. In addition, a group seeking repeal of the Sixteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States has built a "National TEA Party Hub" to remind people where Independence Day TEA Parties will be held, and how to contact their organizers.

In a related form of protest, a group calling itself "Tea Party Nation" is planning a general strike of conservative individuals, to take place July 30, 2009. They make specific reference to John Galt, the chief anti-villain of Ayn Rand's novel, Atlas Shrugged.

External Links

• ONLINE HQ FOR THE NATIONWIDE TAX DAY TEA PARTY
• Top Conservatives On Twitter
• Smart Girl Politics
• Operation Tea
• Don't Go Movement
• Independence Day Tea Parties