A couple of interesting quotes...
Oldgringo wrote:Alright! That's the image we want the world to see. We really want the media to report that some dude showed up with an "assault weapon". Right?
Folk, we're trying to win the "hearts and minds" of the populace, not convince them that the liberal anti-2A media is right about misdirected and illiterate gunowners.
Is it just me?
frazzled wrote:I have the right to wear a bikini and an aluminum hat to, but I wouldn't do that to a poltiical rally where I wanted anyone to take me seriously.
Carrying an AK to a protest makes you look:
1. Stupid
2. Militia like (read terrorist)
3. Redneck crazy.
It maybe your right but it just makes you and your cause look asinine and an absolute joke. Until you stop such antics any pretense you have of being a worthwhile long term party will not hold.
Oldgringo and Frazzled are giving voice to a legitimate concern, namely that nothing the Tea Party or its members do occurs in a vacuum. Practically everything that Tea Party activism does is newsworthy, and the media covering these things are overwhelmingly hostile to that activism. In Oregon,
a local teacher is in the news because he has started an organization with the goal of breaking the back of the Tea Party. His chosen method is to infiltrate the movement, and act just a little bit more radical than the actual Tea Partiers, to draw media attention to himself so that the movement will be portrayed as dangerously radical and crazy.
IF this story had not gained traction, he would have succeeded; the media
would have focused on him and not the real members; and they
would have willingly used that to try and destroy the movement.
Here is a fact: the predominantly liberal leftist media hates the Tea Party movement, dismisses them as illiterate crazies, and will gladly destroy them if they can. Why on
earth should we give them the ammunition with which to do that, and make their jobs easier? Remember the famous "racist with an assault rifle on his back" photo at the early gatherings? When the un-cropped version of the photo was made public, the individual in question was a black guy.
THIS is the media that is covering Tea Party events!!! STOP giving them ammunition to be used against you.
There is nothing immoral nor wrong about open carrying an AK47 or AR15, loaded or not, to a Tea Party event; but, it
IS stupid, for exactly the reasons that frazzled numbered.
Bennies wrote:The Tea Party is turning into a circus anyways and has lost it's original following I believe.
After going to the one in Houston tonight i agree. It just didn't seem like the same type of grass roots event of the one last year i went to. I can't explain it but it was not the same.
I think there are two factors at play here which lead you to that impression:
1) The newness and spontaneity has worn off. This was bound to happen, regardless of whether the message is legitimate or not. As the fight drags on, only those who are really, really committed continue to show up, and to work behind the scenes to put these events on, while those who were motivated by temporary revolutionary zeal but not really committed to the cause start to fall away and do other things with their time. But the negative is that some of the fun has drained away, because now it is work.
2) The local grass roots has become a national movement. This involves out of state, non-local citizens in the process, and it becomes more "organized." At the original events here in Texas, the speakers were, perhaps with the exception of Glen Beck in San Antonio, Texas citizens and politicians.
Now you have speakers with national reputations as activists showing up to speak at these things, and so yes, it is different.
If you believe in the cause, then you have to accept that it is no longer a local phenomenon and be happy that it has become such a national movement that it will have tremendous implications this year and in 2012. But that also means that you have to accept less spontaneous fun and more political
work. If you believe in the cause.
If you don't, then do like the media has done: ignore it, ridicule it, fight it; and then like Ghandi said, lose to it.
“Hard times create strong men. Strong men create good times. Good times create weak men. And, weak men create hard times.”
― G. Michael Hopf, "Those Who Remain"
#TINVOWOOT
