Co-founder weathers rigorous grilling from reporters regarding GOP alliancesDeclaring the Tea Party a “principled movement,” the board of the local sipping society refused to endorse individual candidates.
Tea Party activists have no ties to the GOP, according to the board of the Waco Tea Party.
“We often hear or read references to candidates as 'Tea Party Candidates;' (though) those remarks are misleading the public and often confuse voters, we are not a political party; we are a principled movement,” reads a prepared statement.
"I wouldn't call them Republican values," said Mike Simon, a co-founder. "They are the principles upon which this nation was founded."
Appearing on the lawn of Waco City Hall in crystalline shirt-sleeve weather, co-founder Michael Simon withstood detailed questions from television and print media reporters about the movement's preferences for conservative over liberal politicians and causes.
Many Tea Party-affiliated challengers have gained nomination over more traditional and incumbent Republican candidates during the primary season. Now it's time for the general election on November 2.
This presented a mixed signal that differed from an announcement of the 1 p.m. Thursday conference announced by the group's Treasurer, Carol Waddell.
“With the elections less than five weeks away, it is time to release our endorsements for the 2010 elections,” Ms. Waddell announced earlier in the week by e-mail and on the Tea Party's website.
He was at pains to explain that the limited government, strict construction and free market movement confines itself to endorsing or opposing only causes and conditions, not the personalities peripheral to them.
Mister Simon and his colleagues claimed no particular preference for Republican candidates, a reversal of and announcement by The McLennan County Blue Collar Republican Club, which shares an interlocking directorate with the Waco Tea Party made two weeks ago that instead of endorsing the Republican candidates, they would encourage voters to pull a straight ticket and just skip voting in races in which they disapprove of the Repubican candidate. This way, political experts can look at the races block by block, zip code by zip code and precinct by precinct and see where certain candidates are held in disfavor.
“This is a meeting of the Waco Tea Party,” Mr. Simon reminded the throng of about 50 people attending the photo op and news conference.
“Because the tea party movement was formed in America's grassroots and is guided and directed by the people in our local community, the Waco Tea Party endorses you, the voter, in 2010,” according to an information sheet handed to reporters.
He announced that all of the races and candidates that will appear on the Nov. 2 ballot are detailed on a voters guide available at www.WacoTeaParty.com There is nothing in the literature that indicates preference for one candidate over another, according to Mr. Simon.
He similarly announced:
A Saturday training seminar focusing on activist training and hosted by the Tea Party, American Majority and Americans for Prosperity will include a get-out-the-vote phone drive.
* A block walk to remind people to vote
* Ad campaign reminding folks of election day
* Heart of Texas Conservative Coalition Get Out the Vote Family picnic and BBQ.
Today the Waco Tea Party made itself irrelevant.
ReplyDeletePower that is not used, makes the wielder powerless. Though power should not be used just to demonstrate one has power, power should be used judiciously when the occasion rises. To fail to make endorsements and to strike a pose of being above such things, sends a message to politicians that the Tea Party can be ignored-- it does not have the will to reward or punish politicians. Tonight I am sure Chet Edwards breathes a sigh of relief just as others realize that time spent at other than Tea Party events may be more productive for their ends. Of course, the Waco Tea Party consists of really only five members. Every one else is just a supporter. The question is from today forward, what practical results can be obtained from even being a Tea Party supporter? Very little that I can see. I am sad to see the end of the Tea Party in Waco, because today we witnessed its suicide.
One may find a political message in this evolution by this same clique by reading this posting.
ReplyDeletehttp://downdirtyword.blogspot.com/2010/09/mclennan-blue-collar-republicans-eschew.html
As disingenuous as it may seem, this same committee of club officers alleged that operatives of the Chet Edwards and Barack Obama camps might be watching, plotting to cause them to have to pay a $10,000 fine for making endorsements, though the Blue Collar Republican Club is not chartered as a non-profit or not-for-profit entity precluded from such activity. As a 501(c)4 organization, the Waco Tea Party is perfectly free to endorse anything from pay toilets in the Alpha Centauri archipelago to all left-handed vegetarian breast-feeding lesbian mothers against nukes who are candidates in the coming elections without fear of retaliation.
It is a harsh and enigmatic world view, to say the least, when you begin to imagine that you will be penalized for your political speech and you see campaign financing law as some form of "prior restraint" to such speech.
Besides, I have not heard of the Tea Parties or the Blue Collar Republican Club raising money to funnel into campaigns as non-profit or not-for-profit corporate entities. The truth is that corporations chartered under the election to take advantage Section 501(c)4 of the Federal Tax Code are free to endorse, cajole, rave, speechify and otherwise cause talk and suspicion in an effort to stimulate some action, either before or after midnight - with apologies to the very formidable singing duo, Delaney and Bonnie, who became so very famous in the previous century peddling that good time gospel sound and inspired our Mr. Eric Clapton to go into slow hand mode and get down to what it's really all about.
What it is - all about - is this and nothing less.
I'm going to go out on a limb here, Xenophon, and quote someone of whom I am sure you may have heard, Hizzoner, Mayor Richard Daley of Chicago.
"If you can't do something for your friends and family, then what the hell can you do?"
We gon' shake, chug-a-lug and shout, amigo. Here's how you do it.
Watch this, now. Watch this.
The Legendary