The Tea Partiers have more in common with Progessives than they realize. Their common "enemy" is the wealthy, elite--the mega-corporations which are destroying and impoverishing the middle class.

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Tea Parties and One Party

Jon Larsen

I have to admire the Tea Party folks. They're pissed off with the United States Government and they're letting us all know. They've got energy. They have leaders to follow. They have Michael Johns and Sharon Angle. They have Sarah Palin. They have Tom Tancredo. They get the front pages in big daily newspapers and in small weekly papers.

However, there are two things that they don't have.

The first thing that they don't have is us. Where are the liberals, the highly educated, the used-to-be- working middle class, the working poor and the poor? Where are the protestors of the continual wars of aggression and of the high-jacking of Democracy and of the U.S. Government by the psychopathically greedy mega-corporations? We're not there. We're not vocal. We're not organized. We're not marching in the streets.

It's as if we don't exist.

The second thing the Tea Party folks don't have is a clear 2010 view of what is really wrong with the U.S. Government. Republicans have historically been against Big Government. What they don't seem to realize is that Big Government has beentaken overby the enemy we know as the international mega-corporations and banks. The mega-corporationsare the enemies of the Tea Partiers and the non-involved liberals, "We, The People."

I suggest that Tea Partiers' perception of reality is colored by the lack of truth in the media. For years the press has been called "the liberal press" but it hasn't deserved to be called that since before the days of Ronald Reagan. Independent newspapers went into decline and the corporate voice was given to the newspapers and to TV "news" as well. Now it is "the corporate press." Tea Partiers haven't caught on and the corporate "news" cancer doesn't want any of "We, The People" to know the truth. The truth isn't put out for us to view because the mega-rich don't want us to know the truth. They choose to put out entertainment and trivia and to call it "news." Does the private life of Tiger Woods, for example, really qualify as being news? While our country goes down the toilet we hear about the clothes and hair styles of Sarah Palin and Michelle Obama.

Does this tell us anything?

It tells me that lies and trivia are tools of the mega-corporations which they use to distract us, confuse us and enslave us.Us. That includes both conservatives and liberals.

"Liberal" means believing in 1) freedom for individuals 2) a government of, by and for the people 3) being generous and caring about others and 4) having a belief in all of the civil rights guaranteed by the Bill of Rights in our U.S. Constitution. Admittedly, there are some who are called "liberals" who don't believe in all of our civil rights.Anti-gun people such as Obama and Hillary Clinton never have seemed to grasp the validity of the 2^nd Amendment and other rights of "We, The People."

Tea Party leaders talk about returning to the goals of the U.S. Constitution. The Preamble says," We the People of the United States, in order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America." So, we're supposed to have equal justice when we go to court even if we might be poor. We're supposed to have armies to defend us, not armies of aggression and conquest for the benefit of the rich. Our government is charged with the task of helping us with health, education and retirement and care for our poor. It is also charged with keeping us free.

These benefits are supposed to be ours. We've already paid for them. We aren't supposed to be expected to have to purchase these from the very wealthiest in this country at a price which they determine by the extent of their greed.

It has been said that Tea Partiers support the mega-rich because mega-rich is what they'd like to be, too. Don't count on getting filthy rich, folks. The mega-rich don't want anyone else to berich because theirvoracious greed won't allow it. Their goal is always more money, more, more, more and more.

"Whoever loves money never has money enough: whoever loves wealth is never satisfied with his income"....." (Ecc. 5:10)

I prefer to think that Tea Partiers are not racist, greedy and un-American. Their comments may sound that way because they just don't understand.

Tom Tancredo has said, "Senators and Congressmen should not be allowed to vote."

Does Tancredo believe in representative democracy? Apparently not. He does seem to believe in supporting the wealthy. He supported and continues to support the mega-corporations at every opportunity.

Closer to home, one prominent Sonoita businessman was reported by Robert E. Kimball in the Bulletin to have said that he attended the Sonoita Tea Party event because he was frustrated with the high business taxes he had to pay. Considering that the average total state and federal corporate taxes back in the 1950's was 90% and businesses were thriving makes the 39% of today seem rather insignificant.

Some Tea Party folks have a big concern about a non-problem....the idea of income re-distribution. I have sympathy for their fears which were fueled by the corporation/bank world's lies. But,Tea Partiersdon't have enough money to worry about this lie. The mega-rich who are running the government and steal from us aren't going to take money from you and give it to me. They take money from you and they take money from me.

We all must face the fact that there is no Democratic Party. There is no Republican Party. There is only "The One Party", the party of GREED whichcarries out the will of the mega-corporations and banks and will soon rule the world.

We all must face the fact that it is not the poor who causedthe recession. The greedypsychopathic rich caused the recession. We can't save our country and ourselves from ruin by blaming the poor for being poor. We can't blame theundocumented aliens for being hungry, homeless and poor.Their problems wereintentionally caused by the greedy rich through NAFTA.The North American Free Trade Agreement of 1994 which was conceived and promoted by the rich elites destroyed the family farms in Mexico and put an additional 3.5 million (3,500,000) farmers into poverty and roughly 20 million undocumented aliens heading north toward our border.

There are no Brownie Points from the mega-rich for any of the ordinary Tea Partiers who support them. There are no Brownie Points from the mega-rich for the uninvolved and silent liberals.

The mega-rich elites don't care about any of us.

They don't share.

They think that wealth and power is their right because they think that they are superior.

By our misguided Tea Parties and by our inaction are we proving them right?

Authors Bio:
Jon Larsen is a retired educational psychologist and carpenter/contractor who lives in a small town in southern Arizona. He enjoys nature and being an amateur primatologist, playing tennis,golf and writing. He volunteers at the Food Bank, the community center and the school district. He is a passionate advocate for the poor and the shrinking middle class. He experienced being homeless for fifteen months before moving to Arizona.