The Roots Of Tea Party's Discontent

 

The Roots Of Tea Party's Discontent

By Junious Ricardo Stanton

jrswriter@comcast.net

From The Ramparts

Around the April 15th tax filing deadline the country witnessed an upsurge of anti-government, anti-tax demonstrations across the nation all part of the so called “Tea Party Movement”. The corporate mind control apparatus lumped the protesters together and painted them as a monolithic collection of anti-government, extreme right wing racists. Over and over the media pointed out the dearth of people of color at the rallies and demonstrations, as proof the movement was thoroughly racist. To further demonize the participants, the well paid media shills for the status quo even dubbed the demonstrators domestic terrorists! Most of the talking heads with the exception of Glen Beck, who has his own agenda, were defending their corporate class bosses so they deliberately engaged in a blatant campaign of disinformation, obfuscation and defamation.

The media talking heads and pundits are so brainwashed and out of touch with what is going on n the lives of ordinary people, it never occurred to them people have very legitimate reasons to be upset with the government and angry about what is going on. In fact the media shills are so concerned with toeing the line for their owners and maintaining the status quo they ignore the slew of polls and surveys showing Americans no longer have confidence in the government to resolve the economic crisis that more and more people believe the government has sided with Wall Street against Main Street.

“In addition to this, the Pew study reports that ‘23 percent of the nearly 15 million Americans who are unemployed have been jobless for a year or more.’ This translates to 3.4 million people, ‘roughly equivalent,’ the study points out, ‘to the population of the state of Connecticut.’ These alarming numbers should be considered along with findings in another recent Pew research study entitled The People and Their Government, released April 18. This report finds that ‘by almost every conceivable measure Americans are less positive and more critical of government these days. Only 22 percent of Americans say their government can be trusted, according to the new survey. The report puts this among the lowest measures of trust in the government in half a century. The study also shows across-the-board declines in approval ratings for numerous federal agencies, including the Department of Education, the Food and Drug Administration, the Social Security Administration, the Environmental Protection Agency, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Forty-three percent say the government has a negative effect on their daily life, up from 31 percent in 1997. While approval ratings for the government are remarkably low, with 65 percent saying the federal government and congress have a negative impact ‘on the way things are going in the country,’ the approval ratings for other major institutions are as low or lower. Sixty-nine percent of those surveyed say banks and other financial institutions have a negative impact on the way things are going in the country, while 64 percent say ‘large corporations’ have a negative impact. Some 57 percent say the national news media has a negative impact, while 49 percent say labor unions have such an impact.” Collapse of the Standard of Living in the USA Studies Reveal Declining Living Standards and Increasing Anger by Hiram Lee http://globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=18829

People are upset and anxious about the loss of their savings, their pensions, their jobs and they are worried about their family's survival. This is why they are upset and angry. This is why they are demonstrating. Are the demonstrators racists? Of course many are racists, they can’t help not being racists. We live in a thoroughly racist, color caste and class structured society. None of us are exempt from this systemic brainwashing and conditioning.

Why aren’t more black people actively involved in the demonstrations and the Tea Party movement? Black folks aren't prominent in the movement for a number of reasons. Not to many working class black folks can afford to take off from work to go to a rally. We’ve learned lessons from past experiences. We’ve seen repeatedly how whites take a paternalistic attitude towards us when we try to join their movements or they sell us out by going for the elites’ color and class based divide and rule tactics. Blacks aren’t flocking to the Tea Party movement because some of us know the genuinely spontaneous anger and frustration people are feeling is being cunningly manipulated and channeled into a separate political agenda by people like Dick Armey and his Freedom Works organization, or Glen Beck and Sarah Palin for the Republican Party.

Black folks have languished on the bottom of the socio-economic order so long that for far too many of us, it seems natural ! Back in the ‘60' 70's and ‘80's the FBI’s CONTELPRO counterinsurgency campaign undermined or wiped out most of our really radical and militant leadership, which is why you don’t see massive demonstrations, “poor people’s marches”, rallies or riots in our community.

White folks on the other hand now feel betrayed by their government. They are genuinely upset and the government knows it. Obama tries to act like he’s not concerned about the grass roots angst and unrest, but he is. The government is now planning for martial law, civil lock down and interment camps. If you don’t believe me go to: http://www.army.mil/usapa/epubs/pdf/r210_35.pdf and http://www.apfn.org/apfn/camps.htm and read for yourself the documentation that proves it is real. Don’t be surprised if the government doesn’t instigate a provocation just to bring on the lock down sooner. Remember COINTELPRO is still alive and well. Keep your head up, stay smart and don’t fall for the politicians’ okey-doke or media’s the flim-flam. Be wise,think for yourself and act accordingly.

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