Tea Party Traitors, or, How Judson Phillips Poisoned Our Tea

Judson Phillips, CEO of the Tea Party Nation, has thoroughly co-opted a grassroots movement against bailouts and corporate welfare . . . for fun and profit.

The Tea Party movement started in late 2008, as American taxpayers took to the streets to express their frustration over George W. Bush’s bailout of Wall Street firms. Back then, they were a disorganized, grassroots bunch, a fringe movement of disorganized independent thinkers, including Republicans, Democrats, liberals, and conservatives. They counted Libertarians and many, many Independents among their ranks. Some were pro-life, some were pro-choice. Some espoused Biblical values, some thought that group sodomy is a wonderful thing among truckers or football teams. They were of all races, coming from all walks of life.

All this motley crew had in common was opposition to massive bailouts of failing corporations and banks, funded by American taxpayers — and disenchantment with both George W. Bush (may his Administration rest in peace) and Obama bin Laden. They were just plain sick of partisan politics, and ready to head off in a whole new direction.

We couldn’t have that!

Enter Glenn Beck, Sarah Palin, and Judson Phillips.

Beck had perhaps the most challenging role of all: Talking out of both sides of his mouth without getting caught. Prison Planet put together a great summary, aptly titled, “Glenn Beck for Dummies“.

Glenn Beck is being characterized by the establishment as the leader of the freedom movement and yet a closer analysis of his ideology reveals that Beck is nothing more than a fake revolutionary who has supported and is pushing policies that are diametrically opposed to those embraced by true constitutionalists.

. . . leading conservatives and libertarians down a meaningless partisan rabbit hole in a clear attempt to neutralize genuine opposition to the big government agenda of the Obama administration.

Authors Paul Joseph Watkins and Alex Jones point out the inconsistencies in Beck’s supposed “libertarian” stance . . . Things like his support for the USA Patriot Act and Bush’s Banker Bailout of 2008; his December 4, 2009 appearance on Bill O’Reilly’s show to promote a new 2% VAT tax; and the 9/12 project, which eschews the liberty America was founded upon in favor of the false security of a police state.

They conclude:

Glenn Beck is a fake revolutionary whose job it is to lead conservatives and libertarians away from uniting behind the real issues, while absorbing the successes of the patriot movement and in turn discrediting it by way of his clownish antics and easily derided mannerisms. He is part of a wider approach on behalf of Fox News to become a beacon for freedom movement and then act as a steam valve for its issues, deluding people into thinking their interests are being represented when in reality they are merely being sucked up and spewed out as something entirely misrepresentative.

Palin . . . To be honest, I’m not sure if she really thought she was cleverly co-opting the “common folk”, who think that a woman who gets paid $100,000 to give a speech is “just one of them”, or if she is just enjoying the ride. Having watched portions of her Tea Party convention speech, I’m not sure she knows what she thinks. I’m going to give her a pass on conspiratorial efforts and assume she’s simply demonstrating her blind (and witless) ambition and taking advantage of the situation.

While Glenn Beck made the “teabaggers” a laughingstock, Judson Phillips made them a business, and a fundraising arm of the right wing.

He began by copyrighting “Tea Party Nation” and starting a members-only password-protected website. On that site, it is declared that you can and will be banned for “being a liberal” — or so I’m told, the FAQ is Members Only — making it crystal clear that the grassroots days of long-ago 2008 are long gone.

The members-only Tea Party Nation website pretty much demonstrates the openness and transparency of this movement:

• Want to read the Blogs and find out what this Tea Party Nation is all about? Sorry, Members Only.
• Look over the Forum, see what the rank-and-file talk about? Members Only.
• See if there’s a Group in your area, maybe meet a few folks? Nope, gotta be a Member.
• FAQ? Resources? Events? Only for Members’ Eyes.
• Buy Tea Party Nation merchandise? Anybody can do that!!

Phillips reached what could be the climax of his Party last week, charging over $500 per person to attend his for-profit convention (plus over $300 to watch Sister Sarah Palin test out her patented “PalmPrompter”)!

Phillips made what was a true movement of the people into a narrow, bigoted, whites-only, extreme Christian conservative coalition and fundraising mechanism for Republican candidates! As a result, he — with the help of rodeo clown Glenn Beck and airhead Sarah Palin — have ensured that the American two-party system will remain intact. The most recent threat was swiftly and easily co-opted into the Christian conservative movement.

Congratulations, Judson Phillips, Tea Party Traitor!

I signed up on the Tea Party Nation site today. It asked for my email address, full name, birth date, gender, and also website and twitter name. I was then informed that my membership would be approved after an administrator reviewed it, and was given the chance to “withdraw [my] application”! If I’m approved, I’ll report from “inside the belly of the beast”.

Related articles:

1. Glenn Beck’s Tea Party Personality: A Lot More Ron Paul Than Sarah Palin
2. Phillips: Obama Didn’t Want To Kill Bin Laden
3. Phillips: Hearings On Oil Company Subsidies Just Like Soviet Show Trials
4. Tea Party Nation Accuses Occupy Wall Street Of Nazi Ties
5. Humanists call for EHRC Chair Trevor Phillips to apologise, following ‘sectarian and divisive’ statements

Dr. Tom

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