Larry Keller at Southern Poverty Law Center’s Hatewatch blog has this to say about the “tea parties” that will be going on April 15.
Some people and organizations with more than a tax reform agenda are hoping to exploit the tax protestors’ anger and win them over to their causes. At the white supremacist website, Stormfront, for example, people have posted comments urging their fellow racists to attend tea parties and try to recruit new members to their cause.
“Don’t go there [Tea Parties] with flags and uniforms, and don’t try to preach the truth,” advised one Stormfront writer. “Go in civil, meet people with whom we might do things later, and try to get into the organising [sic] circles.” Another writer said in response that white supremacists shouldn’t “fail to push to envelope” but cautioned them to “dress inconspicuously.”
Meanwhile, the Council of Conservative Citizens (CCC) is urging its members to attend tea parties. The CCC is the successor to the White Citizens Councils that opposed desegregation in the South in the 1950s and 1960s. It is a white supremacist group that opposes non-white immigration and affirmative action, while supporting the display of the Confederate battle flag.
The nativist movement also has a presence at the tea parties. William Gheen, the founder of Americans for Legal Immigration PAC, or ALIPAC, E-mailed “allied leaders” urging them to join a coalition of his and other anti-immigration groups in attending tea parties. “The vast majority of attendees to these events are with us on immigration enforcement,” he wrote. Among the other groups that Gheen identified as being in the coalition are the San Diego Minutemen, the hate group Save Our State, and Voice of the People USA.
All this anti-tax fervor has, predictably, spawned merchandise such as “Party Like It’s 1773” T-shirts and “Where’s My Bailout?” coffee mugs. Yet one more way that it differs from the Boston Tea Party.
So, yeah, while the Texas Republican Party does it’s anti-Mexican rant comparing their little show to the defeat (and hostage-taking) of Santa Anna by illegal aliens who violated Mexican immigration law, these little shows are being utilized by the worse they have to offer.
The funny part about these teabaggings and references to the Boston Tea Party is that the two are no way similar.
The Boston Tea Party was a protest against “corporate welfare” and not against taxation w/o representation or the raising of taxes. It was a protest over how a company with ties to the crown of England was exempt from paying a tax.