I just finished reading Frank Rich’s column in the New York Times.
I don’t know why I read his weekly rants against conservatism in the Sunday Times. I mean, I often wonder why liberals who don’t like my radio show, or me keep listening and calling and writing and complaining. Don’t get me wrong, I’m glad they do. I want to attract as many people as I can to listen to my show and I don’t expect everyone to always agree with me. But if I’m making these misguided libs so angry and upset, why don’t they just turn the dial?
And here I go, reading a GOP-bashing guy like Frank Rich, sending my blood pressure soaring and inevitably causing me to yell at an inanimate object -- a newspaper sitting on my kitchen table.
Maybe I’m just as bad as my critics who hound me. I’ve caught myself watching MSNBC more and more, simply amazed at the nightly hate-fest against millions of Americans who don’t see the world through the granny glasses of Keith Olbermann or any of the other radical liberals who host shows there.
I guess many of us are just prone to see what the other side is up to, maybe to reinforce our own worldviews and feel confident that our ideology is right and theirs is wrong.
In any event, today’s Frank Rich diatribe featured his mortification that a state governor made some proclamation that honored the Confederacy. Rich went on to attempt to connect the dots that the Civil War was all about slavery, that Republicans always try to pretend that slavery had nothing to do with the War Between the States, that the Tea Party Movement features mainly conservatives, and there are very few Blacks participating in the Tea Party Movement. Ah ha! Us Tea Partiers are just a bunch of ignorant, Confederate Battle Flag-loving, gun-toting, Black-hating mouth breathers. That seems to be the conclusion reached by Frank Rich. One just has to put it all together as only a brilliant lib like him can do.
Another Sunday morning ruined by reading Frank Rich.
But as the Tea Party continues to grow and build and gain momentum, it seems inevitable that the Left will become more shrill and volatile and desperate in their counter-attacks. They must not see the thousands of Americans who are peaceably gathering in parks and on city hall steps and in baseball stadiums: men, women and children of all races, from all walks of life, so frustrated with the direction our country is going that they are willing to stand up and rally. People who are so anguished by the march towards socialism and higher taxes and decaying freedom that they are carrying their American flags and their signs and singing patriotic songs and listening to speakers talk about steering our country back to a time when less government meant more liberty; when national sovereignty still mattered; when the small business owner and the farmer was heralded and supported, not taxed into oblivion; when doctors were allowed to make health care choices for their patients; and when Americans were united in the understanding that there are evil forces around the world and in our country who want to kill us, and we have to fight back -- hard.
The Tea Party is simply a thing of beauty. Never have I seen such an outpouring of patriotism and good cheer and optimism all in one place as the Tea Party rallies that I’ve been honored to attend.
Last week, I spoke at two Tea Party events, the first, on the steps of the Orlando, Florida City Hall and then later in the week at a minor league baseball stadium in Grand Prairie, Texas. Smiles were everywhere. People were kind and happy and passionate. They were knowledgeable and well informed. Most of all, they were proud to see this quintessential grassroots movement take shape.
At the Quick Trip Park in Grand Prairie, organizers estimated that a crowd of 18,000 people showed up on a rainy Thursday night in North Texas. Certain that critics would dispute that figure, I asked a couple of police officers on duty what they thought. They figured there were at least between 10 and 15 thousand folks in attendance.
At one point, the skies opened and the rains came. Very few people left. The sight of thousands of people holding their ground, braving the rain, and standing tall to proclaim their love of country and support of the Tea Party Movement almost brought tears to my eyes.
This is a view of the Tea Party that Frank Rich doesn’t want to acknowledge. The Left will be drawn to the most extreme posters and the inescapable occasional angry sound bite on the evening news to make their case that we’re all just a bunch of angry crazies.
And they will do their best to do what Rich did in the New York Times and try to play their ultimate trump card: that the Tea Party doesn’t like black people.
They are obsessed with the notion that criticism of President Obama just stems from bigots who can’t get over the fact that a black man is in the Oval Office.
Let’s face it: it’s all they’ve got. It’s the best they can do. They cannot dispute the numbers crunched by the Congressional Budget Office. They can’t pretend to ignore the legion of medical doctors who are angry and frightened and disgusted by what Obama Care will do to their practices. They know that government cannot possibly expect to rack up obscene spending and hope for a decreasing deficit.
The Democrats are trying to run from what the Obama Administration is doing to this country, but they cannot refute the truth. They cannot ignore the Tea Party freight train roaring down the track, headed for a November 2nd midterm election climax. They can’t avoid seeing the faces of the wonderful Tea Party participants in their morning papers. Heck, there are so many of them, even the mainstream media can’t avoid showing them.
So they do what many do when one is losing the argument: lie, deceive, distort and raise your voice even more. Try to fool as many of the people as possible into thinking that what they’re seeing isn’t so. Attempt to make people feel foolish and small for loving their country and marching and rallying on America’s behalf.
Liberals enjoy demonizing our side. For Frank Rich, MSNBC, and much of the mainstream media, that’s just business as usual.
This time, it’s not going to work. The Tea Party is here to stay. Sure, there will be quibbles and arguing and challenges as this movement continues to grow. Ask any Mom, giving birth is hardly a cakewalk.
But Americans are prepared to fight for their country, a fight that will be waged with words and ideas and signs and songs and elections. Democrats are panicked, liberals everywhere are nervous.
Because they are starting to realize what we’ve known all along: there’s a lot more of us...than there are of them.