1
1
1
Down on Daley Plaza in Chicago, around one thousand people gathered for the Tea Party Tax Day Protest at noon. Groups like Americans for Prosperity, Campaign for Liberty, and the Illinois Policy Institute had individuals at the Tax Day protest. There also were a handful of people from gun's rights groups, the military, and from white nationalist groups.
The focus of the rally was November 2nd. Much of the crowd talked about and held signs indicating they couldn't wait for the midterm elections. In fact, the Tea Party Chicago protest slogan was "Repeal it. Replace Congress."
A good contingent of progressives, liberals, and leftists showed up with signs promoting LGBT liberation, immigrant rights, an end to U.S. wars, and cuts in military spending. The groups directly challenged the fact that the Tea Party hates taxes but yet more than fifty-percent of an American's taxes go toward the military.
The ethnic and racial makeup of the Tea Party rally was predominantly white. Many of the people were middle-aged. There were a few hundred people dressed in work clothes who presumably work for small businesses or downtown firms in Chicago, a group of twenty Log Cabin Republicans with rainbow colored flags, and around thirty or forty people in camouflage carrying flags that read "Don't Tread on Me."
There was at least a handful that showed up in American revolutionary costumes. And, there was a guy in a Bolshevik costume and an older woman in a Wonder Woman costume.
The rally featured signs that said "Marxism, Yes He Can!",
"Barry Nobama Hates the USA and He Hates YOU Too", "Robbin' Hood", "Re-Load and
Repeal", "Tyranny Elimination Army", and one claiming Obama's favorite White
Sox player was "Marx Berkeley."
The rally at noon was actually one of two Tea Party events. It was the official event. At 3 pm, according to a thread on Free Republic, a rogue event took place with "Chicago Tea Patriots" that were once part of the Illinois Tea Party Patriots. This faction was "excommunicated for (very bad) behavior." They were also behind the ugliness on display at a town hall meeting by Rep. Dan Lipinski (D-Ill.) on Nov. 14, 2009, when "a mob of teabaggers, blinded by hate and anger laughed at and heckled a grieving couple [that] lost both their daughter-in-law and unborn grandchild."
http://209.157.64.200/focus/news/2493592/posts?page=31
I spoke to a middle-aged white male in an Uncle Sam hat who addressed the idea that the Tea Party was dividing America, "We are dividing it. We're trying to get all the free people together and throw all the people who want us to be Marxists out of here. So, yeah, we're dividing the country. We're dividing it to put it back the way our forefathers wanted it where everybody's free. He's free. We're all free."
This male was convinced that the SEIU and other liberal groups had planted people in the rally to disrupt the protest and make people look like people they weren't. In fact, throughout the course of the protest many of the Tea Partiers were suspicious of the motives of anyone with a camera who was filming or conducting interviews.
Police kept a close watch on progressives, liberals, and leftists who were on the plaza with Tea Partiers. A few individuals from World Can't Wait which had an "End U.S. Illegal Wars Stop Biggest Government Spending" sign were moved to the edge of the plaza. Officers consistently halted exchanges between left-wing and right-wing individuals.
Now, what does the presence of a thousand people at this rally really mean? What does the existence of a Tea Party in America mean for the future of America? How can one contextualize the Tax Day protest in Chicago (and in other parts of the country) and gain something more than just cheap entertainment?
Start with polling data from a recent New York Times/CBS News Poll.
In terms of gender, the poll showed 59% of the Tea Party was male, 89% was White (with 8% being non-white), 46% was 45-64 and 29% was older than 64, which mean the majority of respondents who declared themselves to be Tea Party members are people who would have been in their twenties or thirties under Reagan.
