The Tea Party

No, really.

A Florida conservative has registered an official "Tea Party" with the office of the Secretary of State, and is promising to run candidates against Republicans and Democrats in state and national races.

"The current system has become mired in the sludge of special interest money that seeks to control the leadership of both parties. It’s time for real change,” says Orlando lawyer Frederic O’Neal, the new party's chairman, who couldn't be reached immediately by phone, in a press release. [...]

O'Neal compared his party's role to that of the Conservative Party in New York's 23rd District. Florida, however, lacks the "fusion" rules that has allowed third parties in New York to amass influence by offering their ballot line to acceptable major-party candidates.

It's really about time the Republican base revolted. What has the GOP ever really done for pro-lifers and against gay marriage? The 2000 and 2004 presidential campaigns were all about those issues, but where was the pro-life amendment to the constitution? Bush used these issues to get the Republican base out to vote for him in 2004, but what was the only thing he spent his political capital on after re-election? Getting rid of Social Security.

The bottom line is that most Republicans aren't that rich; they just enable the party to give tax cuts to people making over $10,000,000 a year. The Bush dividend tax cut, for example, was only targeted at this group, not people making over, say, $250,000 a year, which is still way more than most Republicans' annual income.

Most Republicans just want lower taxes. They also want a lot of government spending that's targeted on them... really, on anyone except African Americans and Hispanics. They want fewer civil rights for nonwhites who after all, only counted as three-fifths of a person till the 1860's; surely three-fifths of the civil rights is good enough? They want to go back to the days when gays were in the closet and only rich people got abortions.

Yet they are continually betrayed by their party, as much as Democrats are betrayed by corporatist Blue Dogs and the likes of Lieberman and Lincoln. And secretly, they know it: the GOP caters primarily to banks, insurance companies, and multinational corporations, many of whose shareholders don't even live in the United States. That even when they controlled all three branches of the U.S. government or nearly eight years, nothing changed for them.

That's why populist theocratic politicians like Sarah Palin and Mike Huckabee are leading polls among Republicans right now. Republicans know that when the chips are down, their most likely nominees, Mitt Romney and Tim Pawlenty will betray them at the drop of a hat. And they're tired of it. Their world view may be misinformed and irrational, but at least some Republicans are clear eyed enough to know that their own party has stabbed them in the back. Tea Party, the floor is yours.