Follow the Tea Party Money, and it will lead you to the Neoconservative GOP Establishment.

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Tea Party? Or "Tea-O-Cons"?

On July 4th 2009 I went to my first Tea Party rally in Huntington New York. Petitions were passed around to audit the Federal Reserve, we chanted "Stop Printing Money", and a host of things which seemed to be a condemnation not only of the Obama Administration and the 111th Congress, but of how things were going overall. That rally was organized by Campaign for Liberty.

A number of different groups came together at numerous events to form what could be collectively known as the "Tea Party Movement" here in Suffolk County, NY. In the beginning we were all united with the message of "Hands off Health Care" and "No Cap & Trade", we talked about the Constitution, an overall out of control government, and how both parties had been selling us down the river for years, but as time went on, telling differences became evident and divisions occured.

Cause for Concern

For example, when NY State Health Commissioner Richard Daines ordered that all health care workers be vaccinated for H1N1 or risk losing their jobs, a non-partisan issue strictly about human rights. Campaign for Liberty, The Libertarian Party, and the Constitution Party protested all over the state, but despite numerous attempts to reach out to the 9/12 Project and Conservative Society for Action, our tea party brethren were nowhere to be found.

When the Republican and Democratic parties, along with their parasite party allies, all cross endorsed the same incumbent candidates for Sheriff, District Attorney, and Treasurer. The Libertarian Party ran candidates against them, no help from our tea party brethren there, and no outrage when our votes were not counted.

When Scott Brown, gun control advocate and architect of Romney Care ran for Senate in Massachusetts, that was pretty much the last straw. The Liberty groups support of Libertarian Joe Kennedy was drowned out by the outpouring of support for Scott Brown from the other groups at the direction of their leadership, and it became obvious the goals of those organizations had nothing to do with Freedom, only the Republican Party, and maybe lower taxes.

Attacks had always been coming from the left, and like so many others, I ignored it as just that, leftist attacks. But after the above mentioned cases and some other things, I decided to do some research, and what I found out was rather disturbing.

In The Beginning

The idea for tea parties started in 2007 with the Ron Paul for President Campaign, which I today wish I had been more aware of back then. Supporters in some areas wrote things like Federal Reserve, Iraq War, War on Drugs, and IRS on boxes and threw them or crushed them in protest, while raising $6 Million for the Champion of the Constitution to run for President in 2008. It was Libertarian in nature, it stood for a non-interventionist foreign policy, it stood for individual liberty, and a whole lot of other things that I will sum up to say "It meant something". (Source click here)

Things were quiet for awhile, before the Libertarian Party of Indiana decided to organize their 2009 Chicago Tax Day Tea party in December of 2008, and created a Facebook group for it on Feb. 10, 2009. Nine days later, CNBC's Rick Santelli, broadcasting from the floor of the Chicago stock exchange, popularized the concept. (Source click here)

So the movement was begun and the Republican Establishment got to work taking it over, immediately, and quite possibly, before. There are at least three major national groups that are controlled by the Republican Establishment, at least two of them sponsor splinter organizations to make them appear decentralized.

Follow the Money

Tea Party Express is run by a PAC called Our Country Deserves Better, incorporated in August of 2008 it has gotten the most attention from Fox News, which shouldn't be surprising since they gave Fox Business more than a quarter of a million dollars. They have raised more than $2,000,000, and among other irresponsible uses of donor money, spent $1,597.29 on dinner last summer for 6 members.

Sources
http://www.teapartyexpress.org/about/
click here=0
http://www.opensecrets.org/pacs/expend.php?cmte=C00454074&cycle=2010
http://www.opensecrets.org/pacs/lookup2.php?cycle=2010&strID=C00454074
click here

The officers of the Our Country Deserves Better PAC overlap extensively with current and former leaders of the pro-war organization Move America Forward (MAF) which ran PR campaigns and bus tours in support of the Iraq War during the Bush administration. These include MAF co-founder and former chair Howard Kaloogian, who chairs the PAC, and also served as Assistant Republican Leader in the California State Assembly; PR executive Sal Russo, who serves as chief strategist for both MAF and the PAC, and got his start in politics by working as a Special Assistant to Ronald Reagan. Mr. Russo has spent over 30 years in the field of political consulting and public affairs. He has been a senior adviser to several Republican presidential campaigns; Russo Marsh & Rogers principal Joe Wierzbicki, who serves as grassroots coordinator for MAF and coordinates the PAC, has worked for dozens of Republican campaigns; and Marine mom Deborah Johns, who is MAF's director of military relations and the PAC's spokesperson.

Sources
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Our_Country_Deserves_Better
click here
http://ipsnews.net/news.asp?idnews=29735

Tea Party Patriots and Tea Party Express have been clashing for months over which group truly represents the movement. A flashpoint came this fall when a member of the Tea Party Patriots' board, Amy Kremer, switched sides and joined Tea Party Express, allegedly taking the Patriots' extensive email database with her and locking the rest of the board out of the TPP website. In November, this led the Patriots to go to court to get an injunction against her to reclaim ownership of the group's electronic resources.

Source click here

Tea Party Nation, a for profit organization, recently had the "Tea Party Convention" in Nashville, where they charged more than $500 per person, and the keynote speaker, Sarah Palin, was paid $100,000. She started it off by praising it as a grass roots conservative movement not involved in the establishment, ignoring her establishment status and that of socialist Scott Brown who she also cheered on. She ignored the fact that the modern portion of this was born in part out of anger over the bailouts which she supported. Considering that this movement started with the Ron Paul campaign, it was rather disturbing to see her spend the majority of her time discussing interventionist foreign policy.

Source
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7gVp3diPbI

I could go on for hours about how horrible this woman is but I'll leave that to you.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NrzXLYA_e6E

A number of different groups, including Tea Party Patriots, and American Liberty Alliance boycotted the convention, fearing it would expose them as GOP Loyalist Pro-War groups, and Campaign for Liberty (Anti-War, Pro Liberty) did not attend, though despite rumors it was barred, was actually invited to participate.

Some former Tea Party Nation leaders have recently spoken out against the organization's founder Judson Phillips, a former assistant district attorney now in private practice, specializing in driving-under-the-influence and personal-injury cases, who says he has run for office as a Republican before. Insiders say that long-time Republican donor Bill Hemrick [he gave $1000 to the NRCC in late 2009 and to the Fred Thompson and Marsha Blackburn campaigns among others], owner of Upper Deck Trading cards, gave Judson Philips at least $50,000 and maybe the whole $125,000 to cover Tea Party Nation's Sarah Palin speaker's fee. Tami Killmarx, who was banned from TPN for voicing concerns over financial funny business, such as funneling funds for the group through a personal paypal account, said she heard him say numerous times "I want to make a million from this movement." Also saying ""At every step of the way Judson is trying to poison the waters. He has ruined this for us. This is not "the movement" in Tennessee. People are fighting hard for our country. We are worn out. We have wanted to come out for months [to expose Phillips]. We are trying to salvage this movement. Sarah Palin, Michelle Bachman need to know what this is. It's a ruse. Let everyone come and hear Sarah Palin. Un uh, they wanted to make money. They wanted get in bed with the GOP".

Sources
click here
click here

Tea Party Patriots was organized by and is part of FreedomWorks. FreedomWorks is run by Dick Armey. Dick Armey is a registered lobbyist for the Pharmaceutical Industry, and former Republican House Majority Leader. Armey's lobbying firm DLA Piper received, it's largest sum, the better $1.79 Million, from Medicines Co. last year.

The ownership information of the website for Tea Party Patriots (teapartypatriots.org) is masked by ProtectPrivacy, located in the Netherlands, and gets free hosting from ning.com. There is no "about", "staff", "directors" or other information identifying any individual as responsible for any part of the website, listed as a 501(c)(4) organization on the homepage.

Tea Party Patriots does not officially endorse candidates, but through it's network of PAC's and 527's and the sort, does so all the time. The other organizations are technically unaffiliated, on paper, but are publicly listed as fronts for the organization on their website. Two such Organizations prominently listed are from right here in Long Island, the Conservative Society for Action, and the Suffolk County 9/12 Project.

Sources
http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Tea_Party_Patriots
http://www.teapartypatriots.org/Groups.aspx
click here
click here
http://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/firmsum.php?lname=DLA+Piper&year=2009
http://www.opensecrets.org/lobby/firmlbs.php?lname=DLA+Piper&year=2009
http://www.freedomworks.org/about/about-freedomworks

FreedomWorks has issued a "Hit List" of sorts, to Tea Party Patriots and other groups, targetting Democrats all over the country, Including my opponent, Tim Bishop.
click here

Bob MacGuffe, a Tea Party Patriots Member, issued the "Rock the Town Hall Memo" largely credited for outbursts in the town hall meetings which says quote

Be Disruptive Early And Often: "You need to rock-the-boat early in the Rep's presentation, Watch for an opportunity to yell out and challenge the Rep's statements early."

Try To "Rattle Him," Not Have An Intelligent Debate: "The goal is to rattle him, get him off his prepared script and agenda. If he says something outrageous, stand up and shout out and sit right back down. Look for these opportunities before he even takes questions."

Was 9/12 An Inside Job?

If you are wondering how I got through the 3 main tea party groups without making any major mention of the 9/12 Project, it is because while I wouldn't call it "grass roots", they are at least decentralized in large part. Individual chapters do what they want to, some work with Tea Party Patriots such as the Suffolk County 9/12 Project which banned Libertarians and Campaign for Liberty members for discussing what they perceived to be "Liberal" subjects like corruption in the Food and Drug Administration and the Iraq War, perhaps others work with Tea Party Nation, I know one 9/12 Coordinator from outside Long Island who is a registered Democrat and Campaign for Liberty member, and is truly Liberty minded and anti-war. The organization itself does not appear to be under any central form of control, and on nationwide 9/12 forums there are neocons and there are libertarians, it all depends on who is running the local chapter.

The domain for the official 912 project website, the912project.com, was registered on February 7, 2009, indicating it wasn't quite as spontaneous as Glenn Beck would have people believe, and having 5 hours a week on Fox News and a nationally syndicated radio show to promote something is hardly "Grass Roots". Many chapters are basically politically active Glenn Beck fan Clubs. Glenn Beck often tries to refer to himself as Libertarian and talk about the constitution and about economics the way Libertarians do, but he also pursues Neocon foreign policy, supported the bailouts, and the patriot act. There are independent leaders of The 9/12 Project, but the Suffolk and Nassau County chapters get their news from Glenn Beck, and their Marching orders from GOP Controlled Tea Party Patriots.

Nobody is Perfect

Campaign for Liberty, of which I am a Proud and Active member, has made it's own terrible decisions. Campaign for Liberty was born out the of the Ron Paul campaign, just like the tea parties, and is very decentralized, but it's mission statement includes a non-interventionist foreign policy. Campaign for Liberty is technically a non-partisan organization, but is of course started by anti-establishment Republican, Ron Paul. Some Campaign for Liberty chapters have become Tea Party Patriots chapters (or vice versa). Recently Campaign for Liberty of Colorado offered to shell out $350,000 on a TV advertisement for pro-war candidate Ken Buck. The difference between Campaign for Liberty and the other groups? CFL Members from across the country came down on the Colorado chapter and forced them to revoke the ad, we self police.

You Can't Hijack That Which Is Yours

Much of the Tea Party movement has been hijacked, or at least lead astray from it's original intentions. Seeing as to how many of these organizations were formed with the specific intention of bringing the GOP back to power, perhaps hijacked is not the right word. Anybody in the know has to realize this. Ron Paul says "When one gets in bed with government, one must expect the diseases it spreads.", and though he has appeared to keep himself clean, most politicians do not. Any political movement is going to gain the attention of politicians and this is simply to be expected. The only question is how strong are the convictions of the people in the lead, and what are their principles?

But They Backed an Independent!

Some would say that the NY23 election, involving 3rd Party Conservative Candidate Doug Hoffman was proof the Tea Party movement was real. And this gave me some hope as well, but if you understand New York Politics, it wasn't as big a deal as it seemed to be. New York State's "Conservative Party" exists only due to the election laws here. You see, to have permanent (4 year) ballot access in New York State, the party's candidate has to get 50,000 votes in the previous governors race, but that's hard work! But there is an easy way to do that, using a little gag we know as Cross Endorsement. Cross Endorsement is the practice where more than one party has the same candidate, for example, I mentioned earlier in the article, here in Suffolk County, the Republican, Democrat, Conservative, Independence, and Working Families Party, all cross endorsed the same incumbent candidates for at least 3 positions. So the voter walks into the voting booth, and if he or she isn't paying attention says "Wow, isn't Democracy Great? I have all these choices!" But upon closer inspection, there is only 1 choice, with 5 levers to pull for them. The Conservative Party, though it occasionally runs its own candidates, or cross endorses Democrats when the payoffs are worth it, lives only because of the Republican Establishment. Without cross endorsement, and GOP cooperation, there would be no Conservative Party in New York. The Conservative Party, therefor, is beholden to the GOP, and exists as little more as a mirage to give the voter the fale impression of choice.

And besides that, there was nothing to lose by backing Hoffman. As they all to often are, the Republican and the Democrat were exactly the same, lacking even the fake differences they normally try to portray, so much so that when the Republican dropped out of the race, she actually backed the Democrat. Hoffman on the other hand was the proverbial poster child of the Neocon GOP Establishment, a pro war, anti-gay, Neocon, who spoke of cutting spending without any specifics.

The Massachusetts election was much more telling. "This is it, this is our chance to stop Obamacare!", leaders proclaimed, and endorsements and support and donations rang out from leaders all over the country, knowing full well that even if Scott Brown did want to stop Health Care Reform, he had no such power to do so. Knowing full well, that Scott Brown has consistently voted for more spending and regulation in Massachusetts, including being one of the primary architects of that state's government run Health Care, commonly known as Romney Care.Knowing full well that Scott Brown was in favor of the unconstitutional "War on Terror" , and with little to no mention of his announcement on CSPAN the next day that "Now that we are past campaign mode"... "I think it's important for everybody to have some sort of basic plan".

Meanwhile, a true small government candidate, with real world business qualifications, existed in Libertarian Joe Kennedy. Multipartisan support rang out from all over the country for Joe Kennedy, and "The Boston Tea Party", where it all started, endorsed Joe Kennedy. But all of that was drowned out by Fox News, and establishment controlled "Tea Party" groups.

And In The End...

As long as the establishment has nothing to fear, then the establishment shall remain in power and nothing will change. The "Tea Party" as it began, was meant to provide that much needed opposition. Organizations like Tea Party Express, Tea Party Nation, Tea Party Patriots, and their splinter front organizations, took the wind out of the sails of that opposition, restoring the power to the two party establishment duopoly. And unless the American People, and the membership of these organizations rise up and demand independence, then Establishment Demopublicans will be replaced with Establishment Republicrats, nothing will change, the movement will die out and lose all credibility, and all the efforts of those members will have been for not.

I seek not to end the "Tea Party Movement", quite the contrary, I seek to restore it, to breath new life into it. I seek to do so, in order to force a true change in American Politics. For these reasons and others, I'm asking people all over the country to take to the streets on February 28th 2010, and take the Tea Party back from the establishment powers with a LiberTea Party, with the Rallying Cry of "Sarah Palin is NOT our Spokesperson! NO SOCIALISM! NO WAR! NO PATRIOT ACT!"

Authors Website: www.voteforcantwell.com

Authors Bio:
Chris Cantwell is a Libertarian Candidate for the US House of Representatives in the First District of New York, he is also Director of Outreach for his local Libertarian Chapter, an At Large Committeeman for the NY Libertarian Party, a Campaign for Liberty Member, and an independent IT Consultant.