Awfully dark “light”

In his "Shedding a little light on the Tea Party movement", Mr. Hughes proves the adage, "a little knowledge is a dangerous thing." He read a poll that shows, despite prior leftist rants that Tea Partiers ("tea bagging" is something that leftists do, not conservatives) are ignorant gutter trash, they are actually better educated than average and make average-to-good wages. Now he rails that they must be elitists.

He thinks that since most of them are conservatives (they used to be "all Republicans"), they must be racists. Never mind that half of the protesters are Independents and many are Democrats. Forget that Republican Lincoln and a million and a half Yankee casualties freed the slaves; while Southern Democrats opposed "all men are created equal" in the Declaration and prevented abolition in the Constitution, fought black suffrage, and Democrat Wallace barred black school-kids with troops.

Hughes might at least look to his own publication for the main focus of the protesters, in "San Bernardino County gets smaller cut of Stimulus money". You see, there are lots of reasons that conservatives and Independents oppose the reckless, Socialist takeover, but the unfair "redistribution of wealth" by government is one they all agree on.

Mr. Hughes says that Tea Partiers are "afraid", so he feels sorry for them. That's not fear (except, perhaps, fear of the damage to our kids' and grand-kids' country). Neither is it hate. One sign I saw over the weekend sums it up: "We'll stop being angry when YOU stop lying at us." Maybe Progressives have read the polls, like only 22% trust the government, almost 1/3 say they feel government is a present threat to their families' welfare, and 3/4 say they are frustrated or angry (Pew Research). More than twice as many now claim "conservative" as "liberal", and Independents have swung away from leftist candidates. Their own fear would explain the pitiful and growing smear attempts by Progressives.

Anyone who really does want to "do research" can learn something (I picked up a nugget or two) from some black Tea Partiers. They shed actual light (rather than sling mud) on why they protest.