Hogsgeteaten, thanks for the response.
I think there is a lot of overlap in our beliefs at a high level. The problem, however, is two-fold. First is that the Tea Partiers often start with the assumption that the current administration is the problem, and the second is that they believe someone like Sarah Palin - who repeats the same talking points they hear from the conservative propaganda engines - somehow has the right answers.
It doesn't help that many Tea Party activists end up being targets of the corporate-funded rhetoric that is so pervasive among the conservative media propaganda engines. It's not a coincidence that they profess the same things that you might hear from Rush Limbaugh's show, or something from Hannity or Beck on Fox News.
The idea that the Tea Partiers have a "movement" is an illusion. The real truth is that the organization behind their events is funded by the very same thing they are objectioning to - Washington lobbies that are hired by large corporations to represent special interests.
You may be right that some Tea Party activists are against the sleazy politicians, but if they are looking for decent, honest, patriotic leadership, they are looking in all the wrong places. In fact, if they should succeed in tearing down Obama's re-election and replacing it with someone like Sarah Palin, they will be handing the reign of the country to the same lobbyists that they claim to be against.
Personally, I'm not against the idea of a grass-roots movement. But for one as mis-guided as the Tea Party, who has everything back-assward in terms of who to blame and how to help, they have the potential to do more harm to this country than any other following before them.
And so I think that anyone in their right mind should get educated about both the current administration, as well as the criticisms made by the opponents, before picking up the torches and pitchforks and heading to Washington. The reason why no one trusts politicians is because politics is so hard to distill into sound-bites unless someone is willing to over-generalize or omit important details. So until people get informed, they won't know if they are electing the right guy or gal, or if they're voting on behalf of the best sound-bite - and meanwhile inviting in all the lobbying power that funded that sound-bite to be so pleasing.
Hopefully, the 2012 election does have voters making informed decisions, because the last thing we need is someone like Sarah Palin is who naive enough to run a country based on the talking points I've seen from her so far - talking points which have no doubt been influenced by the corporate lobbies who have masqueraded from the start as her "advisors". Too bad Sarah has been too naive to see them as such.
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