MoveOn, SteppedOn

By now, everyone has seen this video of MoveOn member Lauren Valle being taken down by Rand Paul supporters.



What you probably haven't seen is the event leading up to it:


So Lauren shoved her sign into the window of a moving car, and in response, Rand Paul supporters were keeping tabs on her.
That's why in the first video you can literally hear Rand Paul supporters calling for the police as they take down Lauren.

There are a few issues that I want to address with this. The first one being the assertion that Lauren's head was stomped on. That's just not true.
I have still frames from the video to prove it.

In the middle image, I copied the shape and size of her head from the 3rd frame, and overlapped it with center image. That's why it appears white.
So point #1 was that she had rushed his car earlier, trying to put a sign through it.
Point #2 is that she wasn't 'stomped' on the head. As this series of images show, he was stepping on her shoulder when she rotated her shoulder forward. His foot stays on her shoulder, but doesn't hit her head.

Reports from news outlets say that she received a concussion from this. I'm not sure how. But I digress.

My final point is about how members of the left have said that this is 'typical' of Tea Party behavior, and how the Tea Party is made of thugs.
Which pisses me off, considering the make up of these videos.

This one is from the Town Hall meetings on health care. You remember those? The ones where democrats felt that if you disagreed, you should be ejected from the 'open' meetings, and slapped around.
As in this case:




Then there was the guy who cold cocked a Tea Party protestor...


But by far, my worst example of violence against the Tea Party movement is this one. Please watch.


Kenneth Gladney was supposed to get his day in court with his attackers on October 27th. I can't find any news of it, anywhere... but I'll keep looking.

In the meantime, Lauren is being supported by everyone from Media Matters to Think Progress as a useless victim who just happened to be wandering through a crowd of thugs when she was attacked.
I beg of you, for the sake of context, to share the video of Lauren pushing her sign through the window of that moving car.
She's an idiot. Not a victim.

Tea Party members with Nazi signs

Okay. Its not actually Tea Party members.
Its democratic operatives making fun of Palin and Beck

Via the Gateway Pundit...

Obama calls Tea party members Teabaggers. Gibbs demures.

From Real Clear Politics:

REPORTER: Are you able to get an answer on Fred's question about the teabagger quote, if the President is aware that people are offended?
GIBBS: Again, I have not seen the book. I can't imagine I'm going to ask the President that, but I will -- I will entertain it. I will check.

No word yet on if the reporter ever got his answer. I'm going with 'yeah... the president said it, all while denouncing the incivility of others'

Tea Party Activists, and race

I was at the Tea Party in Chicago.

One of the more fascinating things to me was walking around and listening to what the press was asking Tea Party members. One lady was interviewing a couple when she tried to get them to 'admit' that race was a factor in the protests. She started out by asking them if they thought that race was a factor. They shook their head 'no' and looked confused. The reporter pointed to the crowd around them, and said "look around, you don't think that there is a racial aspect at work here?"

Sidenote: I took journalism classes in college. I know the difference between finding the story and creating one. Finding the story is when you ask the right questions and get to the heart of the matter. Creating a story is when you ask leading questions to get the answer you want, that will match your storyline.
When you create a story, you'll use phrases like "Don't you think..." or "Wouldn't you agree..."
Finding a story involves open ended questions like "What do you think?", or even "Do you agree or disagree with the following statement?"

Anyway, with all of this in mind, I saw this story in Reason, and I had to link to it. Its about the Tea Party and race.

A round up of polls on Health Care and the Tea Party

According to CBS news, most Americans are still against the health care bill:

More Americans now disapprove of the legislation, and many expect their costs to rise and the quality of their care to worsen; few expect the reforms to help them.

I guess when you shove a bill through, it makes people skeptical.

Fifty-three percent of Americans say they disapprove of the new reforms, including 39 percent who say they disapprove strongly. In the days before the bill passed the House, 37 percent said they approved and 48 percent disapproved.

I think this is great. It means that people are paying attention. Now we need to get more people to pay attention.
Most important to me about the poll:

Even though the president and Democratic leaders have repeatedly pointed out that the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office called the reform package a deficit-reducer, six in 10 Americans still think the new health care reforms will increase the budget deficit. Just 13 percent think the reforms will decrease the deficit and another 15 percent expect no effect.

I believe that means that pretty much the only people who don't believe that the health care bill will add to the deficit are democrats.
Which would explain this poll by Rasmussen:

Following the passage of the health care bill, 53% now say they trust Republicans on the issue of health care. Thirty-seven percent (37%) place their trust in Democrats.

Again... that just might have something to do with the democrats pushing the bill through so hard. It might also explain why in a generic poll, Republicans have gained considerably:

A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 47% would vote for their district's Republican congressional candidate, up from 46% last week, while 38% would opt for his or her Democratic opponent, down a point from the previous survey.

The news gets even better.
Gallup recently did a profile to find out who Tea Party members were. They found out that they were more likely to be male, and slightly less likely to be lower income. But then the real news comes out:

In several other respects, however -- their age, educational background, employment status, and race -- Tea Partiers are quite representative of the public at large.

Please go to the Gallup site for their breakdown. Its worth reading if you want to see who Tea Party members are. The most interesting fact for me is that while 40% of the general population has an unfavorable view of Tea Party members, 63% of liberals have an unfavorable opinion.

Finally, the one poll that puts it all in perspective. The best poll, ever, from Rasmussen:

On major issues, 48% of voters say that the average Tea Party member is closer to their views than President Barack Obama. The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey found that 44% hold the opposite view and believe the president’s views are closer to their own.

Not surprisingly, Republicans overwhelmingly feel closer to the Tea Party and most Democrats say that their views are more like Obama’s. Among voters not affiliated with either major political party, 50% say they’re closer to the Tea Party while 38% side with the President.

This isn't the way that the president thought it would be, I'm certain.

Quotes and full quotes

There's nothing that annoys me more then when something is pulled out of context to make it sound more inflammatory then what it already is. Particularly when someone says something controversial in the first place.
Here's an example.

You probably found this quote somewhere recently:

"And I believe 2010 is it. All right? And we can do it with our vote. And we can get new faces in, whether it's my face or not, I pray to God that I see new faces. And if we don't see new faces, I'm cleaning my guns and getting ready for the big show. And I'm serious about that, and I bet you are, too."

Sounds pretty nasty, right?

Someone linked me to that quote. Then I read the full thing:

"That's the beauty of this, folks. We can do it before it gets to guns," said Behney, in praise of the electoral process. "All right, our founders brought out the guns. When they showed up at Lexington and Concord, regular folks, farm boys, doctors, merchant men, and they said you ain't taking our stuff. They stood up to the most powerful army in the world, and they bought our freedom, literally with their blood. And we don't have to do that yet.

"I believe personally, we're at a crossroads. We have one last opportunity. And I believe 2010 is it. All right? And we can do it with our vote. And we can get new faces in, whether it's my face or not, I pray to God that I see new faces. And if we don't see new faces, I'm cleaning my guns and getting ready for the big show. And I'm serious about that, and I bet you are, too. But I know none of us want to go that far yet, and we can do it with our vote."

It reads a little differently that way, doesn't it? I mean, his whole focus is on the vote.

Look, I understand that its still a little inflammatory. But given that, why wasn't it quoted in full? Well, I think that the answer is obvious. The left has no interest in portraying Tea Party members accurately. Not when they've already drawn their cartoons.

"That's the beauty of this, folks. We can do it before it gets to guns," said Behney, in praise of the electoral process. "All right, our founders brought out the guns. When they showed up at Lexington and Concord, regular folks, farm boys, doctors, merchant men, and they said you ain't taking our stuff. They stood up to the most powerful army in the world, and they bought our freedom, literally with their blood. And we don't have to do that yet.

"I believe personally, we're at a crossroads. We have one last opportunity. And I believe 2010 is it. All right? And we can do it with our vote. And we can get new faces in, whether it's my face or not, I pray to God that I see new faces. And if we don't see new faces, I'm cleaning my guns and getting ready for the big show. And I'm serious about that, and I bet you are, too. But I know none of us want to go that far yet, and we can do it with our vote."

AP Considers Tea Party

According to the AP article:

No doubt this is democracy at work, a quintessential part of America.

Whew!
Finally... someone gets it!
Thanks AP.