Matt Taibbi has a new piece out in Rolling Stone. As Taibbi is a must-read...

[WilliamPitt]

...I suggest you get to reading. ;)



Tea & Crackers
How corporate interests and Republican insiders built the Tea Party monster

By Matt Taibbi
Rolling Stone

It's taken three trips to Kentucky, but I'm finally getting my Tea Party epiphany exactly where you'd expect: at a Sarah Palin rally. The red-hot mama of American exceptionalism has flown in to speak at something called the National Quartet Convention in Louisville, a gospel-music hoedown in a giant convention center filled with thousands of elderly white Southerners. Palin — who earlier this morning held a closed-door fundraiser for Rand Paul, the Tea Party champion running for the U.S. Senate — is railing against a GOP establishment that has just seen Tea Partiers oust entrenched Republican hacks in Delaware and New York. The dingbat revolution, it seems, is nigh.

"We're shaking up the good ol' boys," Palin chortles, to the best applause her aging crowd can muster. She then issues an oft-repeated warning (her speeches are usually a tired succession of half-coherent one-liners dumped on ravenous audiences like chum to sharks) to Republican insiders who underestimated the power of the Tea Party Death Star. "Buck up," she says, "or stay in the truck."

Stay in what truck? I wonder. What the hell does that even mean?

Scanning the thousands of hopped-up faces in the crowd, I am immediately struck by two things. One is that there isn't a single black person here. The other is the truly awesome quantity of medical hardware: Seemingly every third person in the place is sucking oxygen from a tank or propping their giant atrophied glutes on motorized wheelchair-scooters. As Palin launches into her Ronald Reagan impression — "Government's not the solution! Government's the problem!" — the person sitting next to me leans over and explains.

The rest: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/17390/210904

[BumRushDaShow]

1. Holy COW!

The illustration alone essentially writes the article (except it forgot to include a holstered gun on one side)! :rofl:

[Subdivisions]

2. K&R. n/t

[SpiralHawk]

3. "Smirk." - RepubliCronies, Inc.

http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_Gs6OjFG7dZY/TExUzd3iUzI/AAAAAAAACyk/pIS5dW5dipU/s1600/GOP+Logo.jpg

[Scurrilous]

4. K & R

:thumbsup:

[BurtWorm]

5. I've concluded that the whole miserable narrative boils down to one stark fact: They're full of shit

"Let me get this straight," I say to David. "You've been picking up a check from the government for decades, as a tax assessor, and your wife is on Medicare. How can you complain about the welfare state?"

"Well," he says, "there's a lot of people on welfare who don't deserve it. Too many people are living off the government."

"But," I protest, "you live off the government. And have been your whole life!"

"Yeah," he says, "but I don't make very much." Vast forests have already been sacrificed to the public debate about the Tea Party: what it is, what it means, where it's going. But after lengthy study of the phenomenon, I've concluded that the whole miserable narrative boils down to one stark fact: They're full of shit. All of them. At the voter level, the Tea Party is a movement that purports to be furious about government spending — only the reality is that the vast majority of its members are former Bush supporters who yawned through two terms of record deficits and spent the past two electoral cycles frothing not about spending but about John Kerry's medals and Barack Obama's Sixties associations. The average Tea Partier is sincerely against government spending — with the exception of the money spent on them. In fact, their lack of embarrassment when it comes to collecting government largesse is key to understanding what this movement is all about — and nowhere do we see that dynamic as clearly as here in Kentucky, where Rand Paul is barreling toward the Senate with the aid of conservative icons like Palin.

(All Taibbi's words, not mine. But I share the sentiment!)

[bullwinkle428]

8. Translation : "Entitlements are TEH AWESOME for me, but NOT for

those dirty brown people!!1!"

[BurtWorm]

10. Baggers: '...most of them have a few things in common.'

"The individuals in the Tea Party may come from very different walks of life, but most of them have a few things in common. After nearly a year of talking with Tea Party members from Nevada to New Jersey, I can count on one hand the key elements I expect to hear in nearly every interview. One: Every single one of them was that exceptional Republican who did protest the spending in the Bush years, and not one of them is the hypocrite who only took to the streets when a black Democratic president launched an emergency stimulus program. ("Not me — I was protesting!" is a common exclamation.) Two: Each and every one of them is the only person in America who has ever read the Constitution or watched Schoolhouse Rock. (Here they have guidance from Armey, who explains that the problem with "people who do not cherish America the way we do" is that "they did not read the Federalist Papers.") Three: They are all furious at the implication that race is a factor in their political views — despite the fact that they blame the financial crisis on poor black homeowners, spend months on end engrossed by reports about how the New Black Panthers want to kill "cracker babies," support politicians who think the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was an overreach of government power, tried to enact South African-style immigration laws in Arizona and obsess over Charlie Rangel, ACORN and Barack Obama's birth certificate. Four: In fact, some of their best friends are black! (Reporters in Kentucky invented a game called "White Male Liberty Patriot Bingo," checking off a box every time a Tea Partier mentions a black friend.) And five: Everyone who disagrees with them is a radical leftist who hates America."

[booley]

11. That reminds me of something

When David Duke tried to run on the GOP ticket,a reporter was talkign to a supporter as to why she wanted him in office.

"Because he'll get rid of welfare!"
Reporter-"But aren't' you also on welfare?"
Supporter-"Yeah but the blacks get more"

This is anecdotal and I may have gotten details wrong. But it's weird how this same theme keeps popping up.

[BrklynLiberal]

41. Superbly eloquent and right on point. They are all hypocrites...and too stupid to even understand

why they are hypocrites.

[AtomicKitten]

6. I heart me some Matt Taibbi. nt

[misanthrope]

7. Jon Stewart needs to read this**nm

**

[AlinPA]

9. Great. Thanks for that link.

[mmonk]

12. Thanks. Looks interesting.

[thereismore]

13. I can't even finish it. Two pages and I can't go on. nt

[madmax]

K & R

[madmax]

14. K & R

[DiverDave]

15. Taibbi Rocks

He hit it again.
One of the best writers alive now.

[Scurrilous]

16. Kick

:kick:

[tanyev]

17. I don't know how he can stand to spend so much time with them.

That's why he's the investigative reporter and not me.

[DinahMoeHum]

18. I read it earlier this afternoon, and it made my day. . .

IMO, Taibbi kncks it out of the ball park here: (bolding and italics emphases are mine)

"It would be inaccurate to say the Tea Partiers are racists. What they are, in truth, are narcissists. They're completely blind to how offensive the very nature of their rhetoric is to the rest of the country: I'm an ordinary middle-aged guy who pays taxes and lives in the suburbs with his wife and dog — and I'm a radical communist? I don't love my country? I'm a redcoat? Fuck you!
These are the kinds of thoughts that go through your head as you listen to Tea Partiers expound at awesome length upon their cultural victimhood, surrounded as they are by America-haters like you and me or, in the case of foreign-born president Barack Obama, people who are literally not Americans in the way they are.

It's not like the Tea Partiers hate black people. It's just that they're shockingly willing to believe the appalling horseshit fantasy about how white people in the age of Obama are some kind of oppressed minority. That may not be racism, but it is incredibly, earth-shatteringly stupid..."

-------------------
Methinks fellow gonzo writer Joe Bageant would agree with Matt Taibbi completely.

"foreign born president Barack Obama"?? Yeah, if you think the state (formerly US territory) of Hawaii is a foreign country. But I guess it might as well be foreign for those dumb fucks.

:evilfrown:

[Overseas]

19. K&R! //nt

[underpants]

20. LOVE Taibbi - best writer going easily

no wonder you never see him on the TV... or Frank Rich.. or Rudepundit

Sitting back for the read now. Thanks.

[ooglymoogly]

21. Wow...excellent analysis....shedding so much light on the

booby hatch that is the GOP it is dizzying. It matches and validates everything about these folks I have personally witnessed in my 73 years.

[underpants]

22. I'm an intellectual, but I'm also a narrow-minded prick" look made famous by George Will

:rofl:

This is a GREAT read

[ooglymoogly]

23. KR for the excellent post. nt

[Martin Eden]

24. "dumped on ravenous audiences like chum to sharks"

Just had to say I loved that line :thumbsup:

[hay rick]

25. from the article...

It's not like the Tea Partiers hate black people. It's just that they're shockingly willing to believe the appalling horseshit fantasy about how white people in the age of Obama are some kind of oppressed minority. That may not be racism, but it is incredibly, earth-shatteringly stupid. I hear this theme over and over —

[riderinthestorm]

26. This is a great article. I hope everyone reads it. Another excerpt:

"At a Paul fundraiser in northern Kentucky, I strike up a conversation with one Lloyd Rogers, a retired judge in his 70s who is introducing the candidate at the event. The old man is dressed in a baseball cap and shirtsleeves. Personalitywise, he's what you might call a pistol; one of the first things he says to me is that people are always telling him to keep his mouth shut, but he just can't. I ask him what he thinks about Paul's position on the Civil Rights Act.

"Well, hell, if it's your restaurant, you're putting up the money, you should be able to do what you want," says Rogers. "I tell you, every time he says something like that, in Kentucky he goes up 20 points in the polls. With Kentucky voters, it's not a problem."

In Lexington, I pose the same question to Mica Sims, a local Tea Party organizer. "You as a private-property owner have the right to refuse service for whatever reason you feel will better your business," she says, comparing the Civil Rights Act to onerous anti-smoking laws. "If you're for small government, you're for small government."

You look into the eyes of these people when you talk to them and they genuinely don't see what the problem is. It's no use explaining that while nobody likes the idea of having to get the government to tell restaurant owners how to act, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was the tool Americans were forced to use to end a monstrous system of apartheid that for 100 years was the shame of the entire Western world. But all that history is not real to Tea Partiers; what's real to them is the implication in your question that they're racists, and to them that is the outrage, and it's an outrage that binds them together. They want desperately to believe in the one-size-fits-all, no-government theology of Rand Paul because it's so easy to understand. At times, their desire to withdraw from the brutally complex global economic system that is an irrevocable fact of our modern life and get back to a simpler world that no longer exists is so intense, it breaks your heart."

[Swamp Rat]

27. Shake, rattle and roll

Palin does the good ol' boys.

[stevedeshazer]

36. Swampy, don't ever stop.

:rofl:

[BrklynLiberal]

43. Another classic. I hope the opportunity presents itself for you to have some sort of

showing of all your fantastic work..

Maybe a book?

If so please let me know.

[depakid]

28. "The scooters are because of Medicare," he whispers helpfully."

"They have these commercials down here: 'You won't even have to pay for your scooter! Medicare will pay!' Practically everyone in Kentucky has one."

:rofl:

[depakid]

33. Speaking of teabaggers in scooters...

http://il.youtube.com/watch?v=Hb8gWLJVUs8&feature=watch_response_rev

:rofl:

[BrklynLiberal]

44. A sure bet that she is a repuke/tbagger..and medicaid pays for that wheelchair that she can get up

out of and walk.

[stevedeshazer]

29. Required reading, sent to every right-winger I know.

And all my rational family and friends.

+1

[jgraz]

30. "Tea & Crackers" That's funny right there.

Nicely done. :thumbsup:

[donheld]

31. I make it a point never to miss Matt Taibbi

We need 100 more like him.

[kentuck]

32. Interesting excerpt

<snip>
"Let me get this straight," I say to David. "You've been picking up a check from the government for decades, as a tax assessor, and your wife is on Medicare. How can you complain about the welfare state?"

"Well," he says, "there's a lot of people on welfare who don't deserve it. Too many people are living off the government."

"But," I protest, "you live off the government. And have been your whole life!"

"Yeah," he says, "but I don't make very much." Vast forests have already been sacrificed to the public debate about the Tea Party: what it is, what it means, where it's going. But after lengthy study of the phenomenon, I've concluded that the whole miserable narrative boils down to one stark fact: They're full of shit. All of them. At the voter level, the Tea Party is a movement that purports to be furious about government spending — only the reality is that the vast majority of its members are former Bush supporters who yawned through two terms of record deficits and spent the past two electoral cycles frothing not about spending but about John Kerry's medals and Barack Obama's Sixties associations. The average Tea Partier is sincerely against government spending — with the exception of the money spent on them. In fact, their lack of embarrassment when it comes to collecting government largesse is key to understanding what this movement is all about — and nowhere do we see that dynamic as clearly as here in Kentucky, where Rand Paul is barreling toward the Senate with the aid of conservative icons like Palin.

[democracy1st]

34. K & R

[watstearns]

35. I'm Tepid on this Taibbi

I actually wasn't that impressed by Taibbi's Tea Party
article. Much of the energy in the Tea Party is a big fuck you
to liberals who constantly refer to them as idiots, as this
article does, so maybe we shouldn't do that. After all, people
that uneducated and inarticulate are more likely to express
themselves in violence..... and to support the policy of
violence and violation, like what the GOP offers. I think
Taibbi got closest to the mark when he talked about the
longing of the average Tea Partier for an idealized simpler
past. The Big Data web culture tends to act as a magnifier and
to make already exaggerated, falsified and/or fabricated
threats seem all the worse, precipitating amplified reactions.
 I don't think sarcasm and disdain are the right medicine for
this.

[Ikonoklast]

46. Welcome to DU.

No one cares what you think, but nice try.

[Electric Monk]

37. k&r nt

[krispos42]

38. Wow, that's a hell of a good article.

Of course, the fact that we're even sitting here two years after Bush talking about a GOP comeback is a profound testament to two things: One, the American voter's unmatched ability to forget what happened to him 10 seconds ago, and two, the Republican Party's incredible recuperative skill and bureaucratic ingenuity. This is a party that in 2008 was not just beaten but obliterated, with nearly every one of its recognizable leaders reduced to historical-footnote status and pinned with blame for some ghastly political catastrophe. There were literally no healthy bodies left on the bench, but the Republicans managed to get back in the game anyway by plucking an assortment of nativist freaks, village idiots and Internet Hitlers out of thin air and training them into a giant ball of incoherent resentment just in time for the 2010 midterms. They returned to prominence by outdoing Barack Obama at his own game: turning out masses of energized and disciplined supporters on the streets and overwhelming the ballot box with sheer enthusiasm.



Yikes!

[Demeter]

39. Thanks Will

Gonna crosspost to SMW

[Vinnie From Indy]

40. What is most astounding to me about these Teabagger articles is

the fact that most every one of them fails to attach the proper significance to the role of Rush Limbaugh and the vast right wing hate machine.

[BrklynLiberal]

42. O'Lielly Hannity, dug the hole in soil, Limpballs dropped the seeds in..Beck pee'd on it to water

it and make it grow. Now everyone is gathering around picking the putrid fruit and claiming it as their own.

[ThomWV]

45. Outstanding article.

[me b zola]

47. Taibbi nailed it

:thumbsup: