Posted under Constitution Party & TEA Parties
This is an outrage! There has long been a debate about whether the TEA Party movement is really an independent non-partisan affair or if it is simply an adjunct of the Republican Party. This is a complicated matter due to the spontaneous and decentralize nature of the phenomenon. In some communities it is more the former, and in some it is more the latter.
I think the trend has been toward the movement being co-opted by Republican centric (although not necessarily Establishment oriented) forces. And I think this largely has to do with those groups having the funding to provide higher level organizational structure to the local level.
This episode tends to confirm this trend although the message is decidedly mixed. Libertarian Alex Snitker is being allowed to speak, for example. Glenn Lord, who seems to be speaking for the group, is clearly imposing his own personal beliefs about the utility of third parties on the TEA Party as a whole. His e-mails attempting to justify the exclusion of DeCastro strike me as unprofessional. If there was a legit reason to deny him a speaking slot due to time, (Which I highly doubt. If they wanted to make time they could.) that would be one thing, but on what grounds is he also being denied a table? There isn’t room for one more table? The reason from Lord’s e-mails is clear. Lord doesn’t want him to have one because Lord doesn’t think third parties are useful.
Via IPR
Brock Townsend on 22 Sep 2010 at 8:14 pm #
I agree.
Tacitus on 22 Sep 2010 at 9:03 pm #
It’s far more useful for the Tea Party to bring the GOP to the right than it is for it to bring the CP to legitimacy, which is impossible. I don’t understand your quixotic quest to promote third parties. While the country becomes more polarized, and more people express dislike with both parties, third parties have, paradoxically, performed even WORSE! Look at the voting record. The “wasted vote”‘argument is, and will be, definitive.
Patroon on 22 Sep 2010 at 9:23 pm #
The “People’s Tea Party? You’ve got to be kidding me?! Who’s the one who need’s legitimacy?
RedPhillips on 22 Sep 2010 at 10:08 pm #
Tacitus, I am not on a “quest” to do anything. I have what I think is a very nuanced and balanced view of the role of third parties in our current system as I outline here.
http://conservativetimes.org/?p=5703
Briefly, the role of third parties in our current system is not to win but to punish unfaithful members of the major party closest to your view. But you can’t cast a protest vote for a third party candidate to punish a major party candidate if the third parties don’t exist. So someone has to do the thankless job of maintaining the third party, recruiting candidates, getting them on the ballot, etc. One could believe that reforming one of the major parties and working “within the system” is the long term strategy more likely to be effective and still understand the utility of third parties. By denouncing third parties outright you are taking away one of the potential vehicles for promoting reform from within.
Also, it is not a “wasted vote” if it is cast thoughtfully and strategically to bring about a desired end, such as punishing one of the major party nominees for their deviations.
RedPhillips on 22 Sep 2010 at 10:13 pm #
Besides, my main point was that Glenn Lord was excluding the CP candidate because HE thinks third parties are a bad idea. Well good for him if he does, but what Glenn Lord personally thinks shouldn’t be definitive for the TEA Party as a whole which he supposedly represents.