What is the Tea Party?

The Tea Party movement consists of a network of loosely affiliated groups that may or may not fall under the umbrella of one of six national Tea Party organizations. These national groups are the Tea Party Nation, Americans for Prosperity, Tea Party Patriots, Tea Party Express, FreedomWorks, and National Tea Party Federation. The movement started mainly as a protest of the Troubled Asset Relief Program (Wall Street bailout), American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (the Stimulus), and health care reform.

While claiming independence from the Republican Party, polls show that the majority of Tea Party members are staunchly conservative, older, Christian (47% identify themselves as part of the religious right), and white. They often feel as though whites in America are now oppressed and state that they are opposed to deficits even though they supported George W. Bush and the Republican congress - they are only now speaking out against it, because the Obama administration pushed them to the brink. (I wonder if any of them realize that Obama passed the largest middle class tax cut in the history of the United States as part of the Stimulus bill?)

By and large, the Tea Party candidates resemble past radical right wing candidates, only this time, they have the endorsement of the Tea Party. In fact, many Tea Party candidates are career Republicans, such as Sharon Angle and Christine O'Donnell (who lost to Joe Biden as the GOP candidate in 2008).

Many of the Tea Party candidates hold similar beliefs, such as privatizing social security, ending Medicaid, abolishing the Department of Education, ending federal student loans, banning abortion even in the cases of rape or incest, denying climate change is occurring, lowering or abandoning minimum wage, and other radical ideas. Some of the other extreme stances that individual Tea Party candidates hold include banning IUDs and birth control pills, criticizing the Civil Rights Act of 1964, making air quotes when saying the word autism, opposing masturbation, defending BP, and believing Muslim law is taking over U.S. communities.

So, just who is behind these national Tea Party organizations? Well, in many cases, it is the same people who have been doing behind the scenes work for right wing causes for many years. Americans for Prosperity was founded by the billionaire petroleum and chemical baron, Charles Koch. His company, Koch Industries, was recently named one of the top ten air polluters by University of Massachusetts at Amherst's Political Economy Research Institute. Charles and his brother David have long campaigned for libertarian, free market, and other right wing causes. They have used the Tea Party movement to advance their support for decreased corporate taxes, minimal social services, and decreased regulatory oversight (especially environmental regs).

FreedomWorks is chaired by former Republican House majority leader Dick Armey. Prior to the Tea Party movement, FreedomWorks accepted money from Verizon to oppose telecommunications regulation and accepted money from Phillip Morris to oppose smoke free workplace laws and tobacco taxes. It is now mainly focused on opposing health care reform, climate legislation, and taxes.

Much of the Tea Party platform has been supported and publicized by Fox News Channel. Fox News personalities have repeatedly voiced support for the Tea Party and promoted Tea Party events. Fox even labeled the tax day Tea Party rallies as the "FNC Tax Day Tea Parties." And let's not forget that Sarah Palin, who is a paid contributor to Fox, has become one of the public faces of the Tea Party movement, attending rallies and endorsing candidates.

Essentially, the Tea Party is a concentrated version of the Republican Party, with an extra dose of right wing libertarianism. It includes many of the same participants who have been involved in right wing politics for more than a decade, pushing their extreme agendas. If this is what the Republican Party is becoming, I am quite alarmed.