Lately, I’ve been hearing a lot from members of the Tea Party. I get a talking points memo every day from someone on the E-mail List from Hell. My personal Troll used to post links to Andrew Breitbart’s website, but seems to have found other sources lately. And I can count on a Tea Party response from “American Patriot” when I post a comment to a Sentinel story.

What I’ve found in all of these communications is that liberals actually have some commonality with the Tea Party, but the members of the Tea Party have been steeped in a tea of hatred that is so strong that they miss anything that isn’t fed to them by their addiction to outlandish tales.

Let’s start with the story of Andrew Breitbart and Shirley Sherrod. Yes, it is old news. The short version is Breitbart posted a doctored video at his website alleging that Sherrod was a racist. (She’s African American, he was trying to prove that she discriminated against white people.) The Obama administration reacted with a knee jerk and fired Sherrod over the phone while she was driving her car. The Obama administration apologized and offered her employment in her old job. She refused. Now she has been hired, in another capacity at the USDA. Obama must have charmed her into working for him again.

I’m ashamed of the way the Obama administration reacted, but I’m aghast at the way that conservative pundits like Breitbart play so loosely with truth. To be fair, Breitbart may have been duped, as well, by James O’Keefe who calls himself an investigative journalist. But I doubt it. They were both steeped in the poisonous tea of hatred.

They didn’t know the first thing about ACORN, but set out to destroy it. Unfortunately the so-called liberal media didn’t report the whole story until ACORN was dead. Then O’Keefe set out to destroy the main stream media in a porn/sex toy sting operation. It failed.  O’Keefe broke into a Senator’s office, which got him arrested. And then there was the attack on NPR.

So far all the right wing pundits ignore the lack of journalistic standards in both Breitbart and O’Keefe because it is inconvenient to acknowledge that they are being duped by a couple of con-men. E-mail List from Hell, Kevin King and American Patriot, I’ll take you seriously when you stop drinking poison tea, and start searching for truth.

May I suggest Chammomile? It grows well in the Grand Valley, and has a calming effect.

Homework

Shirley Sherrod Got Her Groove Back

O'Keefe Channels Michael Jackson?

Indict Breitbart

Liberals have theorized for a long time that Republicans just want America to be stupid so that they will blindly follow their corporate puppet masters. I’ve been willing to give conservatives and Republicans the benefit of the doubt on that topic. But now I’m beginning to wonder if there is some truth to the rumor.

The latest organization to come under attack from the right is National Public Radio and the Public Broadcasting System. Both were formed to ensure that there was a source of independent information available to the public. They originated with colleges and universities and sought to inform the public about new developments in a wide range of topics.

Just as Criminal film maker James O’Keefe did the dirty work of the far right in stings against Mary Landrieu--a Democratic Senator from Louisiana, ACORN, and CBS, he’s at it again. This time he pretended to represent a contributor and managed to get the NPR fundraiser to say on tape a lot of things that a lot of liberals have been saying about the Tea Party. So far the fundraiser has been fired and the head of NPR has resigned. And congress is talking about defunding NPR and PBS.

From my vantage point that’s beginning to look a lot like censorship by one political party which thrives on voters who can’t think past the nose on the end of their collective face. Keep them stupid, they’ll never figure out that corporations are depriving them of a living wage so that those at the very top can live lives of luxury in the last unpolluted corners of the planet. And for good measure throw out some line about liberals coming to take their guns, or hating them because they are Christians, or killing babies, or turning their kids into Gays, or supporting those pesky unions who keep clamoring for fair wages, decent benefits and decent working conditions for workers. If they are focused on emotional issues like guns, gays, abortions, school prayer, they won’t notice that the middle class is sliding into oblivion and with it the nation.

Homework

History of NPR

PBS Website

O'Keefe v NPR