Thank you for your thoughtful reply and research. You are right, in that there are many more conventional “Republicans” at the tea parties than conventional “Democrats”, which is rational, given the current make up of the legislature. However, the movement is largely attended and driven by those whose oppose both of the traditional Republican and Democratic policies (many of us consider them two sides of the same coin.

You are also correct about us not making our larger message more clear (as you mentioned..the “about us” page). Perhaps, this needs to be revisited by our team. In our defense, to get a better understanding of our objections, please see the widget on the right side of the website “What Are Tea Parties?) which links to: http://www.reteaparty.com/2009/04/17/what-tea-parties-are-and-are-not/ which may also address some of your questions at the end of your original article regarding freedom.

I understand that our “About” page is not controversial, as the point of the site in general is to get as many people of different viewpoints communicating among one another, rather than segregating ourselves to a social circle we are comfortable with…where everyone pats themselves on the back.

Thank you for both your input, addressing my post professionally and for your compliments on the site, which is completely done in house. If you are interested, I invite you to contribute a guest blog on our site, which will be posted unedited (aside from a short comment about who you are, which I will ask you to approve first).

I’m not sure whether you were referring to me or James, but I will assume it was to me since mine was the original post.

First, I don’t believe I labeled the right wing as anything. I merely pointed out the inconsistencies in the thinking of many, who on one day, seek the prohibition or censorship of certain activities (porn, drugs, Sunday alcohol sales, etc…), which demonstrates a notion of larger government intervention, and on the next day, seek relaxing gun control laws and lower taxes, which demonstrates smaller government intervention. If that hasn’t, for the last two decades or more, described the Republican Party, beginning with the evangelical movement, what does? I suppose there are Republicans who don’t focus on the fringe sociophobic issues, but they are and have been in the minority. In fact, I would argue that for the Republican Party to continue to exist, it must redefine itself and throw off policies and ideals grounded in religion and get back to sound fiscal policy, which is its breadwinning platform in the first place. Perhaps that’s the direction you would like the party head. If so, all the better.

I did hone in on the anti-tax issue, correct, but I prefaced my comments by saying the tea party organizing was “in light of the recent large stimulus package and corporate bailouts.” So I’m not mistaken.

Again, I didn’t label anyone anything resembling, “hate-filled uneducated liberal bashers.” Those are your words, not mine. On your point about the left/right thing, I agree with you, the two-party system needs an overhauling. I would like to see third-parties get a bigger foothold in the country. That would be good for Democracy. Democrats and Independents may indeed support the teabagging efforts, but evidenced by the rallies and by your organization’s own statements, it’s awful hard to see. After all, right now, we have a Democratic White House and Congress. So quite literally, yes, the teabaggers are predominantly arguing from the right.

To finish, a word about your Web site. The organization has some good ideas, I think, about keeping bills shorter and citing specific articles in the Constitution to justify certain parts of acts, but if you want the confusion about what the tea party movement is all about, why don’t you make it more explicit on your Web site. The “About Us” page is quite vague on where you stand. Thus:

Our team is a small group of young individuals who see the future as an opportunity to reinvigorate our faith in voluntary action, non-partisanship, and free thought. We recognize that many of our chosen leaders have good intentions. There are good Republicans. There are wise Democrats. Libertarians and third parties deserve more respect; but, the independent mind should always be championed. RE Declare Your Independence.

I would surmise that few people wouldn’t sign on to most of what you say here, but that’s clearly not all that the organization is about is it? It would be helpful if you cite specifically on the Web site what you feel is wrong about the bailouts, increases taxes, etc. etc. and not bury the thoughts in numerous blog posts, making folks only conjecture what you clearly feel is wrong.

On a completely unrelated topic, for whoever is responsible, kudos on a well-designed Web site.

Stop making this a game of left vs/ right. If you would stop labeling everyone who favors self-responsibility as a hate-filled uneducated liberal bashers, maybe we could have honest conversation and realize that we actually agree with each other a lot more than we don’t.

Or, you can continue to attack the Republican party and the relatively small number of crazies that supposedly represent every single one of us on the “right”, whatever that means anyways.

By the way…the original tea party was about the political favoritism of the English Parliment giving tax breaks to the East India Company. If you turned off your TV and read most of the stuff from the real people (grassroots) behind the tea parties, and not the talking heads like Sean Hannity and Bill O’LieLy, you’d know that most the Tea Partiers are not rebelling against “taxes” per se, its the political favoritism, the mortgaging of our labor to bail out big business, and the destruction of our inalienable civil liberties under the pretense of security.

And yes, I bashed Bush even more than I bash Obama, because at least Obama doesn’t pretend to respect limited government and free markets. My problem, Bush and Obama are a lot alike.

He also believed in a large inheritance taxes (what modern conservatives have managed to denegrate as “the death tax”), because like other people who truly believe in freedom he didn’t believe in royalty or pseudo-royalty like that created by unearned, handed-down wealth.

Paine also favored various kinds of so-called “welfare,” including (but not limited to) public works, maternity benefits, free public elementary education, old-age pensions, and aid to poor people.

In short, as you suggested, it would do these folks some good to consult “The Age of Reason”–and perhaps an online dictionary, so they can see why so many people have trouble keeping a straight face when they hear all these conservatives talking about “tea bagging.”