Not Your Grandma's Tea Party

So apparently, republicans hate taxes or something. Who knew? Anyway, I just learned that there is this big movement (though how big can it really be if no one's heard of it?) to protest high taxes and government spending by having "tea parties" across the nation. And by across the nation, I mean towns that no one really cares about or has ever heard of that all happen to be in red states. Conservatives started by mailing teabags to their congresspeople back in February, and today, well, they're going to drink tea and hold up posters or something, like true American badasses. I'm getting the impression this is a little tip of the hat to the spirit of our forefathers who were protesting taxation without representation, and this is... nothing like that.

I'm all about the art of well-formed protest, and far be it for me to critique your political tactics, but I'm not quite sure if this is the best way to convey your feelings about high taxes...


If you haven't yet soiled yourself or fallen out of your chair, take a gander on Facebook at all the Teabagging groups and events going on today. My personal favorite is "In The Interest of Teabagging Congress". If there is one thing our pristinely moral congress needs, I'm sure a good Teabagging is at the top of the list.

The conservatives have proved one thing, though: they always claim to be more moral than democrats, and judging by the fact that democrats find this hilarious and the involved parties don't seem to fully understand what they're saying, I'm going to have to say they won the morality battle fair and square. Rachel Maddow can't even keep a straight face:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OLsKt4O4Yw8&feature=player_embedded

I can't believe that the phrase "harnessing the power of mass organized public teabagging" was just uttered on MSNBC.

Our forefathers are embarrassed right now. Your watered-down diet caffeine-free perversion-laced homage to their famous stand is making them roll in their graves. They dumped tons and tons of tea into the ocean as a big F.U. to British people, knowing full well they'd probably get shot for it. You, on the other hand, bought a 100 pack of Red Rose teabags, paid tax on it depending on your state, and then mailed a couple for 42 cents postage, also prettymuch a tax. On top of all that, not one of you thought to check Urban Dictionary or Wikipedia, or even watch any movie made in the past 20 years, to see if the verb Teabagging already meant something else. I'm sure the kid in the photo with the shit-eating grin sort of has an idea what he's saying, but the suits on Fox News absolutely do not, and given their gracious, tolerant attitudes toward the gays, they'd probably nix all the Teabagging talk if they had any idea.

If you're going to make a statement, make a statement. Remember the days when protests were like, scary and riotous? For god's sake, there was a bigger scene on a cold Monday night in 2003 when Syracuse won the national basketball championship. Marshall Street was about as crowded as Calcutta. People were climbing trees and setting fires and rocking cars. Where is that sense of chaos? Mailing teabags = not so persuasive, and you're not doing your campaign any favors by publicly announcing how you're gonna Teabag congress into submission. That's about as effective as protesting immigration reform and calling your demonstrations Dirty Sanchez parties.

Here are some more pictures of Republicans being really smart for your viewing pleasure:













There is a mortgage crisis on that man's poster. As for the "crisis of competnce", remind me again what the definition of irony is?

The most important question in all of this: which congressperson would you like to teabag?

P.S. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teabagging