Protesters gather and hold signs during the Tea Party Express rally on September 12, 2009 in Washington, DC. (Getty Images)
The Tea Party movement has become catch all for anti-Obama and anti-big government ire. But organizers of the first ever Tea Party Convention are finding that not all Tea Partiers want to be under one umbrella, and they certainly don't want to take marching orders from the Republican Party.
Jim Tomilsik joins us. He is a local organizer with the Mid South Tea Party in Tennessee. Even though he's active and passionate about his libertarian leaning values, he's sitting out this convention because he sees it as "a Republican Party fundraiser." Instead his Tea Party and 33 others in Tennessee have begun coordinating how to take their organizing to the next step without the Tea Party Nation group behind the highly publicized convention.
Professor Tom De Luca of Fordham University will put this all in historical perspectives. He says he sees parallels between this surge of political activity and other movements in the past, including the populist party of the 1890s.
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Comments [1]
Tea partierJim Tomilsik complained that he wants to "bite the hand that feeds him" when he explains how his wife will be ripped off on her "cadillac" GOVERNMENT SUPPLIED health care plan by being asked to pay for it with some of her GOVERNMENT SUPPLIED pension.
Didn't you guys report earlier today that health care costs are up again and that in 2 years, over 50% of all health care costs will be covered by government?
Given that, I think we can safely say that socialized medicine is quite alive and well in our country. So, why not go the whole way to Single Payer and save us all a little money.
A society relies on the private sector to fund it's government expenses. If we continually lose private sector jobs we can no longer afford public sector employees and their guaranteed (and sometimes 'cadillac') benefits.
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