Tea Bag "Patriots"

T.E.A. P.A.R.T.Y.  "Total Economic Amnesia Permits Additional Republican Trickle-down, Y'all."
-- John Fugelsang, comedian, political commentator, FOtB (Friend of the Blog)

Back in April of 2008, the corporate lobbying group "FreedomWorks" in cooperation with Fox "News" began a social experiment they called "The T.E.A. Party."

Their original mission: Convince middle class voters, via a coordinated distribution of misinformation, that the Federal Government was robbing them blind at the very same time that their taxes were being reduced to a 60 year low.

And, by God, it worked!

Never mind that the original Boston Tea Party was a protest against corporate tax breaks by the British government that gave a single company (The East India Trading Company) a decided business advantage over small business in The Colonies.


Let's not confuse the current party of "Taxed Enough Already" with historical facts.

Several months later, the phony grassroots (aka: astroturf) movement, put their real agenda to work... Setting the same low information group of people against any sort of healthcare reform.

Back then, a group of T.E.A. Partiers began staging protests on the corner of Hawthorne Blvd. and Torrance Ave. here in The Blog's Los Angeles South Bay.

In the beginning, there were about two dozen protesters. Most of them, clearly of the age to be receiving Social Security benefits and some of them sitting on their Medicare provided "mobility scooters."

About four years later, the protests continue.

                                                  This photo was taken this afternoon.

As you can see, the crowd has grown smaller. (I was going to say that the crowd has thinned. But, take a good look at the three "patriots" waving their "Don't Tread On Me" flags. Nothing thin about them! The Blog is betting that there are a few pre-existing conditions here, i.e.: Type 2 diabetes and/or congestive heart failure.)

The Medicare and Social Security recipients are staying home. Maybe they got wise. Or maybe they now reside in Medicaid funded nursing homes. I don't know.

The protest is now down to three individuals and three very young children (not pictured) passing out flyers. Because eight-year-olds know their shit when it comes to politics.

Truth be told, The Blog took this photo on the fly for the sole purpose of posting it on the internet and making fun of the ill-informed yahoos in their cowboy hats, happily advertising their ignorance and their willingness to advocate against their own best interests.

But, when The Blog opened the photo on his computing machine, and took the time to take a closer look, he realized that the photo contained a great big, heaping helping of tea bagging IRONY!

                                                             "If a person who indulges in gluttony is a glutton, 
                                                               and a person who commits a felony is a felon, 
                                                               then God is an iron." --Spider Robinson

Think about it. Because, they won't.