Daughter Of John Birchers Explain Why Tea Party Idiocy Is No Laughing Matter

[babylonsister]

Watch Daughter Of John Birchers Explain Why Tea Party Idiocy Is No Laughing Matter
posted by Omar Rivero
September 10, 2013


While it’s easy to laughingly dismiss Tea Party fools with their silly hats and misspelled signs, this knowledgeable daughter of some of the founding members of the John Birch Society knows that their mega astro-turf movement is dangerous, growing, well-funded, powerful, and to blame for Washington’s corporatist gridlock.

This brave progressive’s name is Claire Conner, and she’s written a book called “Wrapped In The Flag” that the Koch Brothers and the Tea Party definitely do not want you to read.

From her website:

“Claire was twelve years old when her parents dove into the world of paranoid politics, a world dominated by the John Birch Society, an anti-Communist, anti-federal government movement. ‘We’re taking back the country’ was the Birch mantra.”

Claire’s parents were the first two Birch members in the entire city of Chicago. Her father, Stillwell J. Conner, became a National Council member and remained in top leadership for thirty-two years. Her mother was a partner in all things Birch.”

In her book, Conner rings the alarm about how the Republican Party has been thoroughly hijacked by a dangerous coalition of Tea Partiers, libertarians, corporate interests, gun-nuts, the religious far right; interests that, she argues, constitute a newly revamped John Birch Society.

Though her family were ultra-conservative John Birchers, Claire followed her conscience and found progressive politics and activism. We highly recommend her new book for those looking for insight on the radical rightward lurch of the modern day Republican party.

Please watch her timely “first-hand” warning (BELOW) and share it on social media forums so that it can be heeded by every liberal/progressive.

Video at link~

http://www.occupydemocrats.com/watch-daughter-of-john-birchers-explain-why-tea-party-idiocy-is-no-laughing-matter-2/

[Snake Plissken]

1. She is so right, I find myself focusing on the stupidity of their sheep myself

when I should be focused on their cult's leaders.

[Buns_of_Fire]

2. Claire Conner's website:

http://claireconner.com/

[pampango]

3. Unfortunately, the Birchers (and their predecessors) have always been with us. We ignore them

at our peril. Thanks for finding this, babylonsister.

[nxylas]

7. Yes, but previously, they'd been on the fringes

The stuff that Glenn Beck is saying now would once have been confined to a crackly AM station broadcasting in the dead of night, and the thought of Birchers taking over the Republican party would have been the stuff of fantasy.

[dmr]

4. Thanks for the heads up on the book.

I just ordered it.

So many people have shut me down when I call these sneaky assholes Birchers.

I'm willing to bet that many of their followers (tea-baggers) don't even know or have ever heard of the JBS. Their ignorance is at their peril, and our nation, as well.

They are dead serious, and have very, very deep pockets to finance everything and anything. It frightens the hell out of me.

Thanks again for the heads up on the book.

[babylonsister]

5. You're very welcome; let us know

what she has to say.

[Laelth]

6. k&r for exposure. n/t

-Laelth

[grammiepammie]

8. Daughter of John Bircher

Please, read this book if you get a chance. It is a real eye opener and scary. The John Birch Society is no joke. Look at what happened to our country in the 50's and it is happening again.

[grammiepammie]

9. Daughter of John Bircher

One thing to keep in mind also, is the fact that one of the founding members of the John Birch Society was none other than the father of the Koch Brothers.

[Control-Z]

17. I'm the daughter of a John Bircher.

And the horrible things my father used to say in the privacy of our home are now the things we hear from republican leaders. It is shocking to me. And it is frightening.

I was too young at the time to be involved with the Birchers other than to stay quietly in the bedroom of one of the nasty leaders and watch TV while they had their meetings. But I knew, at the age of 7, that it was wrong, wrong, wrong.

[no_hypocrisy]

10. Weimar Germans initially laughed at the Nationalist Socialist Workers' Party.

The Nazis were incrementally elected to the Reichstag and their mission was to shut down the government. And they succeeded with each vote. It got to the point where the entire section of their party turned its collective backs on the Reichstag. This was before Hitler was appointed as Chancellor by President Hindenberg.

[mwb970]

11. I'm not sure that Tea Partiers and "corporate interests" are in lockstep.

Many recent news articles have described the degree to which the TP has now alienated the business community, with several business groups forming specifically to defeat TPers in primaries. Having already thoroughly alienated woman, gays, blacks, immigrants, students, and seniors, TPers have finally thrown Wall Street and the business community, the last major group supporting them, under the bus with the rest of us.

Claire says that the TP is "growing, well-funded, and powerful". Yet current news reports clearly tell us the opposite. What gives?

[Divernan]

12. Corroborating comment from the author's sister

I found this comment following the Amazon.com review of the book:

I was there!, July 18, 2013
By
Janet Conner
This review is from: Wrapped in the Flag: A Personal History of America's Radical Right (Hardcover)
Claire Conner is my big sister by three years. We shared twin beds in our Chicago home and I can attest to all her stories. I was there. At just 13, Claire was roped into the world of the John Birch Society. If she wasn't at school, she was stuffing envelopes and attending meetings. I was assigned to help with dinner and then go upstairs and keep my younger brother and baby sister quiet during the meetings. That's why Claire is on the full page Life Magazine spread and I am not. I was probably changing a diaper.

Dinner at our house was unlike dinner at any home I've been in then or since. The only topics worthy of discussion were politics and religion. I've never met anyone else whose dinner conversation included how the Communist Chinese tortured women. It was tough to swallow your meatloaf but you better be quiet. Those who tried to change the subject or introduce another way of thinking paid a high price.

If Claire's book was only a memoir about "What it was like to grow up in a cult," it would be interesting and important. But it is so much more. For a couple of years now, we've called one another and said, "Sheesh, did you hear what so-n-so in the right said NOW?" We recognized all of it. It is all old JBS stuff. We know. We had the bumper stickers and pamphlets to prove it.

I've heard so many people wonder aloud, "Where DID these people come from?" Well, Claire answers that question in Wrapped in the Flag. It would be nice to think that the old John Birch Society faded away, but it hasn't. It's larger and stronger than it ever was. And it is influencing our political thinking and language whether we know it or not. I am so grateful that Claire asked herself a lot of hard questions about what we were told, and generously shares her very open and often painful story of learning how to think and speak for herself.

I hope this book makes you think and speak for yourself. It certainly has made me remember.

[Control-Z]

18. Wow. I just posted up thread

about the same kind of experience - being in another room, as a child, expected to be perfectly quiet while they had their meetings. This woman's account brings back my childhood like it was yesterday.

By the age of 7 I was embarrassed by what my father was.

[The Wizard]

13. Ku Klux Klan

without the hoods. The new costume is a tricornered hat festooned with teabags. Caution: They're heavily armed and mentally deranged, believing they're doing God's will. Fortunately, attrition will take its toll in short order. The younger ones should be military conscripts forced to serve far away from normal people.

[Fantastic Anarchist]

15. I so much love the word "festooned" ...

But, yes, what you say is true.

I hate saying this, but I can't wait until they die off.

[Fantastic Anarchist]

14. Happily reccing ...

These people are dangerous.

I'm sick of them and I will do what I can to stop them from fucking up this country.

[LibertyLover]

16. I cannot recommend Wrapped in the Flag enough

I got it from my library 2 months ago and did not want to put it down until I reached the end. Reading Ms. Conner's account of what life was like with 2 fanatics as parents was incredibly disheartening, but equally fascinating was the story of her realization that their world view was warped and twisted. It was brought about, oddly enough, by her parents' insistence that she attend college, their refusal to pay for it, their refusal to permit her to accept a scholarship to attend a state college and their demand that she attend the college they had chosen for her. In order to do all that, Ms. Conner got a job at a bus depot in Chicago and came into contact with all the "undesirables" her parents didn't want her to meet. They helped open her mind and heart to the world. And she is entirely correct with her excoriation of the Kochs and the Tea Party. Few have the insight into Republican fanaticism that Claire Conner does.

[samplegirl]

19. I am reading it now

astounding all the talking points that are used today by the radical right. It is an excellent read.

[babylonsister]

21. I'm glad you're reading it! And

how have you been?

[samplegirl]

20. I really wish that

she was doing guest appearances. Her insight is incredible. I feel this book should be on the best seller list!