How the tea party is rewriting the rule book for political organizing

[cowcommander]

Source: AP

And, as was apparent in Delaware on Tuesday, the movement is gaining power. Christine O’Donnell’s upset victory in the Republican primary for the U.S. Senate, coming on the heels of insurgent candidates backed by the tea party winning in GOP Senate primaries in Alaska, Kentucky, Nevada and Utah, has made the tea party movement a force.

The question now is whether a grassroots movement that is, by design, leaderless can sustain itself after this election cycle.

In American politics, radical decentralization has never been tried on so large a scale. Tea party activists believe that their hivelike structure is their signal innovation and secret weapon, the key to outlasting and outmaneuvering traditional political organizations and interest groups. They intend to rewrite the rule book for political organizing, turning decades of established practice upside down. If they succeed, or even half succeed, the tea party's most important legacy may be organizational, not political.


Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ynews_excl/ynews_excl_pl3653

[MyUncle]

1. The "hive" is DU.

Time to go out and do some stinging.

[arbusto_baboso]

2. Uh, wasn't this an accomplishment of Howard DEAN?

What bullshit. Even the organizational stuff gets credited to the nutballs.

[NYC Liberal]

8. Teabaggers aren't even "grass roots" ...

their rallies get free promotion by Fox and lately now the rest of the MSM for weeks.

I'd like to know of one anti-war rally that has ever received the kind of promotion by the MSM as teabagger rallies have.

[HughBeaumont]

14. Not to mention funded and bussed around by billionaires like the Koch brothers.

Yeah, those glossy busses they use just SCREAM "Grassroots"!

[Binka]

25. Exactly! And Who is Paying For The Gas for These Behemoths?

Of course we know who, yet the idiots who pander to these obscenely wealthy fucks have no clue how they are being used. As if the Koch brothers really care about ANYTHING other than stealing money from the treasury and protecting their ill gotten gains.

The tea-klanners are such ignorant wanna-bees. The stupid just farking BURNS. These uber-rich fucks leading the charge for "taking the country back to the ROBBER BARON age" need a Marie Antoinette moment.

[Roland99]

10. +infinity

These nutballs are simply taking advantage of the willfull ignorance of the 29 Percenters as well as general animosity amongst many voters against anyone who's an incumbent.

The only thing they're rewriting are dictionaries and history books (and not for the better!!)

[janet118]

11. Only with the Dean meet-ups . . .

we had to meet in super noisy bars or super quiet bookstores. There were no corporate-supported venues. We had no free buses taking us to events. The Dean grassroots had little to no money and most of us had day jobs, not retirement benefits. We had no mainstream media coverage (Dr. Who?) until the surprise Internet fundraising news bubbled up.

The teabaggers, on the other hand, are part of a loosely structured, pseudo-grassroots movement created by very wealthy, very corporate supporters to get middle class people to act against their own interests by appealing to fear, racism, ignorance, homophobia, nationalism, machiso, and their need for attention.

The teabaggers are not leaderless. Their leaders are just faceless.

[county worker]

3. It is not grass roots. All their money comes from corporations that are using them.

The MSM is writing the story of this election as if it were a fiction. First the Dems are going to lose big now the "grass roots" tea party is rewriting political organization.

I think the reality is that the Dems will hold on to both Houses. The will lose some seats but pick up some repub seats and in the end nothing will change much. Of course all depends on our turnout. I also think the tea party will turn off a lot of moderate repubs who will stay home.

From a working class repub point of view, who is the leader of the party? Do you really want to cut social security and medicare? Do you really want to give back the stimulus money? Do you really want to deregulate Wall Street? The tea party is too far right for many repubs.

[RKP5637]

4. The only ones that could pass a test for sanity anymore are the democrats. The

republicans/teabaggers are a bunch of lame losers.

[opihimoimoi]

15. Yup, they cannot pass spelling test either

[24601]

21. Go ahead - just remember the results of underestimating Bush n/y

[Andy823]

5. What is apparent to me is...

The crazy teabaggers are motivated, but the average republican is not! Sure the teabaggers got out the vote for their "crazy" candidate, in Delaware and the mainstream republicans seemed to have taken it for granted that their guy was a sure thing, so they didn't get out and vote, much like what happened in Alaska, but will those who usually vote republican that are not very happy with the tea party candidates who are not running on the republican ticket actually vote in November for the "nuts" that won? A whole lot of republicans didn't vote for McCain because they didn't like him, and a whole lot more didn't vote because he picked Palin, another nut job!

Now if the only voters that are motivated are the tea party crowds, one has to also ask if they will vote for the "mainstream incumbent" or write in a tea party candidate instead! Seems like from what I am seeing the tea party is standing up to the republicans who created them, and they are not following their marching orders like good little sheep! I have always said that the right created a monster to do their dirty work with all the protesting and that sooner or later that "monster" was going to turn on them, and it looks like that is happening right now!

[perdita9]

6. Tea Party Positions

Gay-baiting and Race baiting encouraged.

Masterbating not allowed.

Christine O'Donnell is Sarah Palin's gift to Democrats. If she is elected as Delaware's new Senator, the country has officially gone crazy.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

12. well, the country has officially gone crazy

When American Idle and Faux news are so important, where more people know the name of Paris Hilton's latest coke friend, than the 9 supremes on the USSC, where a missing besotted, blond bimbette is more important than 7% of America living below poverty levels, where Dick Durbin is attacked for calling torture unamerican, while Hucksterbee says, "TOO BAD" for people with pre-existing conditions - yes, I think the jury is back. We ARE officially crazy.

[OHdem10]

7. I understand they researched Sol Alinski. They are getting good

at "agitating".

[madrchsod]

13. it`s easy to agitate when there`s tens millions at their disposal

[Dogmudgeon]

20. If you're looking for his book, it's "Saul Alinsky"

The book is http://www.amazon.com/Rules-Radicals-Saul-Alinsky/dp/0679721134">Rules For Radicals. An excellent book, by the way.

Yes, the teabaggers are using Alinsky's methods. There's nothing novel about them; all Alinsky did was observe what worked, compiled a list, and wrote about his experiences.

--d!

[cadmium]

23. George Lincoln Rockwell

of the Amer Nazi Party advocated similar decentralized disruptive approach.

[Francesca9]

9. It didn't have to be the teaparty - C H A N G E is their issue

The voters want C H A N G E.

The teaparty just happened to be there when change was promised and there was no change. So many voters said NEXT...

The teaparty will soon fade, the real issue is where they next go. 4 of 10 are independents and democrats who sometimes vote for democrats. Where will they go next to get C H A N G E?

Will we insult them and make sure that they go republican?

[PSPS]

17. Not really

First, the "Tea Party" is a media creation. They created it out of whole cloth after Obama was elected and have been dutifully bestowing unlimited coverage of everything it does because, well, it's really their "show" now.

Second, all the issues the 'baggers are complaining about were there three years ago. The only difference is that, now, we have a black president. That's what is motivating 'baggers. Republicans wishing to curry favor with them intentionally mine this racism because they know that's all that matters to them. Their other "issues" are mere window dressing because they all existed before Obama.

Third, the 'baggers essentially have an unlimited budget to portray themselves as something legitimate. Murdoch will give them unlimited coverage in his media holdings. And other billiionaires like the Koch brothers will spend any sum necessary to achieve their plutocratic utopia, and this "media show" is their best bet right now.

[rocktivity]

16. "Source: AP..."

:boring:
rocktivity

[rug]

18. How is stupidity an organizing tool?

[No Elephants]

19. Koch Bros financing helps.

[PfcHammer]

22. Puhlease. The teabags are rewriting the rule book just like the

swiftboaters did.
:eyes:

[lunatica]

24. Sorry to differ, but they have Palin, Limbaugh, and Beck to lead them

With the total participation of FOX news with Sean Hannity. This is why Sarah Palin has asked FOX news to help Republicans win in this election. They're finally pulling the rest of the veil away from their true job.