In Reply: The Danger of the Tea Party, and Circular Firing Squads, too

In reply to: The Tea Party Is Dangerous: Dispelling 7 Myths That Help Us Avoid Reality About the New Right-Wing Politics - AlterNet, and also to several folks making comments for/against the Democrats and against/for the Green Party. (A reply to piss everyone off, I suspect.)
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I'm pretty sure that teabagger anger is more dangerous than I'd like to think it is, but I still find at least some of these myths persuasive, despite the author's attempts to take them away. I just can't believe that intelligent people could be persuaded to subscribe to that kinda foolishness in numbers great enough to make a significant difference. I just can't believe it could happen here...

One thing I'm pretty sure of though is that progressives won't get much of anywhere fighting amongst themselves. Attacking the Greens or the Democrats amongst us (whichever you ain't) amounts to a circular firing squad. Obama never was God (that was always a right-wing talking point, wasn't it?), and Nader ain't, either. It's one thing to hold a politician's feet to the fire when it comes to promises made and policies (not) enacted, but it's quite another to advocate chucking the whole system and pretending that "that guy" (whoever he is, or whatever "pure" party he represents) can and will invent a rounder wheel. The wheel prolly doesn't need reinvention, but even if it did, we need to roll now, as well as in the 20-30 years it'll take to make THAT rounder wheel a viable, going, rolling concern.

Party politics sucks --and not just the two major parties, but all of 'em, large and small... (I've been a registered Green for years, and yeah, I voted for Nader and/or Greens in pretty much every election in which one was running since the early 90s--in NY, where my vote sends my message without hurting the relatively more liberal Dem who eventually wins the election, at least locally. These days, I wouldn't risk letting a Con in, if I had any question that my 3rd party, Green/Liberal/??? vote might be the one that allows a rightwinger into office...-- but I can't and won't swear loyalty to them, politically-speaking, either...) --but party politics is the name of the game here in the US, and it's short-sighted to pretend otherwise. "Sending a message" and "voting your heart" is useless if it results in the greater of the two evils getting elected, and unfortunately, either the greater or the lesser of the two evils is almost always going to be elected. "Being right" while walking in the political wilderness is a pretty thin broth.

Better we fire our rhetorical guns outward at the teabaggers, rather than at each other... even if some of us is starry-eyed idealists who'll never get anyone elected, and others is go-along corporatists... We need to work together, where we can, anyway...

I wonder whether the author (or anyone else) has any suggested solutions for building a response to these hatriots that'll be effective in nipping 'em in the bud?
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Posted 7/1/10, 11:17 AM