TEA parties; Richardson election blog

The Nightly Build

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Chit-Chat at the Tea Party

In the last couple days, there's been lots of discussion about the "TEA Parties" (Taxed Enough Already, clever, no?) held across the country on April 15 (Tax Day, get it?) OK, not lots. Manufactured media events tend to flare and die quickly. So, before this one is history (is it already too late?), let's recap how a few of DFW's writers covered it.

Steve Blow, who is usually best advised to stay away from substantive issues and did just that on this one (he covered it from his office window at The Dallas Morning News), nevertheless made this snarky observation on The Dallas Morning News Metro blog:

"The view out my window now are periodic clumps of sign-carrying folks headed to the tea party tax protest at Dallas City Hall. They're all coming from the DART and Trinity Railway Express stop at Union Station. These folks do not like taxes but apparently they do like tax-funded transportation."

Jim Mitchell, with a little more investigative digging than Steve Blow (he asked readers for help), made this salient point:

"I'm willing to bet that the federal tax burden, i.e., income tax, is a shrinking percentage of all taxes paid. So instead of tea party folks railing against the federal government, they might be better served to rail against state and local governments for new taxes, higher taxes or fees as this NYTimes story shows. Gee, If you're going to declare war on taxes, it might help to have the right enemy."

Daniel Daugherty, on Unfair Park, reports that the event at Dallas City Hall agitated every right-wing cause there is:

"Folks were told to show up and protest President Obama and the budget and the stimulus plan and federal taxes, only they brought signs and shirts invoking everything from welfare spending ... to their opposition to national health care and gun control. And plentiful among the crowd were signs invoking Jesus and demanding the U.S.'s withdrawal from the United Nations."

Unfair Park reader "jason" noted something about the crowd itself:

"I was shocked and proud of the diversity of the crowd. It was all over the map, from
Over the hill white people with blonde hair to
Over the hill white people with brown hair to
Over the hill white people with gray hair to
Over the hill white people with no hair"

I guess angry white people need a place and time to vent, too. Trey Garrison did some major league venting, from promoting the protests on his blog (including that cute icon of the black man holding a gun to the head of a blue man holding a bag of money, captioned "Socialism"), to live blogging and twittering the protest in Plano, to encouraging everyone to bring their cameras and send their photos and videos to him. Good luck with trying to use that material to nurse that anger and expand the protests.

By the way, Gov. Rick Perry's pro-secession comments at one TEA Party have generated a life of their own. Funny how it's the spontaneous utterances that catch fire while the scripted events are quickly forgotten. Apologists for Perry just extend the embarrassment. Rush Limbaugh, thinking he's helping his cause, says Perry is not a "fringe kook." The majority of DFW media commentary seems to see Perry as the gift that keeps on giving.

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Another Perspective on the Richardson Races

Hey, there's another blog covering the Richardson City Council elections, and the person behind it said he she was inspired by yours truly to serve his her community. He She doesn't explain why he she chose to blog.

The blogger behind "Conserve and Protect -- A Conservative's Take on Richardson Politics", gives his her endorsements for the seven positions on the council and, no surprise probably, he she and I agree on only two. One is the place where the incumbent is running unopposed, but hey, at least we agree that Steve Mitchell deserves another term. The other is that frustrating Place 7, where we both have reservations about both candidates. Dennis Stewart is running an ill-advised negative campaign and Amir Omar is pandering to senior citizens. This is one race where I wish there were a third option. In any case, even though we disagree more than we agree, I welcome Conserve and Protect to the blogosphere. More news is good news.

Bonus points for whoever first tells me the significance of "565".