(01-30-2010 03:34 AM)RobertN Wrote: (01-29-2010 11:01 AM)georgia_tech_swagger Wrote: The establishment trying to co-opt and then mislead and defuse fiscal insurgents ... just like they did after Perot.
I'm not fooled. The real tea party -- and the first person to hold one, which was 100% grassroots driven -- is Ron Paul.
F*** all the imposters.
I can respect the Ron Paul tea party. THe others, not so much. THey are mainly just lobbyists and not real grassroots.
Robert you couldn't be more wrong. The left wants to believe that people don't care and that all of this is being generated by huge evil corporations.
It is grass roots,
Tea Partiers aim to remake local GOP
http://news.cincinnati.com/article/20100...+local+GOP
A year ago, when the Tea Party movement first stirred to life, it had to shout to be noticed, with big public rallies that drew thousands of conservatives to places like Fountain Square and VOA Park in West Chester - citizens angry about government bailouts, billions of tax dollars for economic stimulus and political parties that didn't seem to be listening.
Now, though, the speech-making over loudspeakers to angry throngs seems to have given way to a much quieter form of protest - one in which Tea Party activists, here and across the country, are trying to either take over or gain a foothold in the political parties from the ground up.
They are doing it here by the hundreds by filing as candidates in the May 4 primary election for the office of precinct executive, the lowest rung of the political party structure.
"It's the place where you can have the most impact,'' said Mike Wilson, the founder of the Cincinnati Tea Party. "It's one thing to talk to the party leaders about change. It's another thing to actually be the party leadership and make the change from within."
It is a strategy that has worked elsewhere - Tea Party activists essentially took over the Nevada Republican Party earlier this month; and, in Florida, they were successful in forcing out a state party chairman who was seen as too centrist.
A Tea Party takeover of a county party organization would, no doubt, result in a far more conservative party organization that would likely field candidates who are hard-liners on taxes and spending.
Wilson and other Tea Party leaders - working with a loose affiliation of conservative groups like Ohio Liberty Council and the Cincinnati 9/12 project - have traveled around Southwest Ohio over the past few months holding meetings where they give Tea Party activists a PowerPoint crash course on how to run for precinct executives.
Leaders of the suburban county Republican Parties agree they've noticed a surge of interest from those with Tea Party affiliations.
Wilson said he alone has talked to at least 5,000 people over the past few months; and said he knows of at least 300 Tea Party activists who plan to run for precinct executive positions in southwest Ohio. The number is likely to grow considerably before the Feb. 18 candidate filing deadline, he said.
"We're asking people to run, regardless of which party they choose,'' Wilson said. "Both parties need reforming."
But Wilson and other Tea Party organizers concede that the vast majority of them will run as Republicans, just because that is the party that most closely represents their anti-tax, anti-government spending philosophy.
"Precinct executive" is political shorthand for a member of a political party's central committee, the body which elects the party leadership and has a hand in filling vacancies in elected offices and setting policy for the party. It is an unpaid, volunteer position.
In Ohio, precinct executives are elected by Democrats in primary elections every two years. Republicans elect theirs every four years - and this is the year.
Both parties will elect a new set of precinct executives in all of Ohio's 88 counties in the May 4 primary election.
Precinct executive spots often go unfilled, because the county parties have a hard time recruiting candidates in areas where the party is not strong. In Hamilton County, for example, the Republican Party usually fills about two-thirds of its precinct executive spots. The Hamilton County Democratic Party, in the last election, had only about one-third of the precincts covered.
Here, Tea Party organizers say they are not trying to take the political parties by coup, but are trying to become an influential force.
"If we would win 50 seats on a party's central committee, we would have a voice,'' Wilson said. "That's all we want."
Anderson Township, though, is one part of Hamilton County where they might have more than just a voice.
Tim Kappers, who heads the Anderson Tea Party, said that his group has 32 of the township's 33 precincts covered with candidates for precinct executive.
About one-third of them, Kappers said, are incumbents "are with us on the issues." The rest, he said, are relative newcomers to the political process. Two of them, Kappers said, are challenging incumbents, mainly because they are closely tied to Jean Schmidt, the Republican congresswoman who represents Anderson.
"We don't think she shares our values,'' Kappers said.
Most of the Tea Party precinct executive candidates are, as in Anderson, people who have never been involved in party politics before.
"Our people are just learning how the parties work,'' said Gena Bell, who heads the Eastern Hills Tea Party in the Madeira-Kenwood area. "Until we started organizing this, I had never heard of a precinct executive. Not a clue."
Bell, like other Tea Party leaders, say they are encouraging members to run in both party primaries, but said most will end up choosing the Republican primary.
The Hamilton County Democratic Party, though, has been using the threat of a Tea Party takeover as a recruiting tool to fill precinct executive spots.
"All I have to do is talk to Democrats about the possibility of Tea Party people taking over, and people start signing up to run,'' said Caleb Faux, executive director of the Hamilton County Democratic Party.
Faux said he thinks he will end up with about 60 percent of the 681 precinct executive slots - an unheard of number for the Democrats here.
Republican leaders in some parts of the country are more than a little distressed over the possibility of a "Tea-publicans" taking over the party structure, but, in Hamilton County, chairman Alex Triantafilou has been encouraging them to run - although he said he hopes they focus on running for slots that are not already filled.
"When we saw this movement emerge, we felt like it was one that was aligned with our beliefs,'' Triantafillou said. "We want their energy in our party. We welcome it."
In Butler County, GOP Chairman Tom Ellis said he's heard Tea Party members are interested, but couldn't say exactly how many have filed for the few central committee vacancies there. "Unless they come forward and say they're Tea Party members we have no way of knowing," he said.
Butler County welcomes more involvement from Tea Party members or anyone else, Ellis said, as long as they're solid Republicans and "I think the vast majority (of Tea Party members) are aligned with the Republican Party," he said.
He plans to speak to the local Tea Party group in the next week or so - at the group's request - about the executive committee spots.
Clermont County GOP Chairman Tim Rudd said his central party's committee is already pretty conservative and about a dozen or so sitting committee members identify themselves with the Tea Party movement.
Rudd knows more are interested in running. He's met with Clermont Tea Party groups to answer their questions about running for more spots. He doesn't think an influx of Tea Party candidates would change the party's viewpoint.
"I think one of their (Tea Party members) complaints is the belief the Republican Party has lost its conservative roots," said Rudd. "I don't think that's happened with the Clermont Republican Party. If the intentions are to reinforce our conservative roots, 90 to 95 percent of us are already there."
Jessica Brown contributed
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Two GOP Lawmakers Drop Out of Tea Party Convention
You guys crack me up. Complaining that it is for-profit and that Caribou Barbie is using this to make money? Isn't this EXACTLY what you guys stand for?
