Glenn Beck and the Tea Party phenomenon. Questions.

[TygrBright]

I have an intelligent, if slightly naive, friend who honestly believes that the whole Tea Party thing is a genuine, "spontaneous, grass-roots movement" that has nothing to do with Beck or Fox News or the wingnut media machine, except that Fox is the only media source "covering it."

I'm trying to figure out how to explain the whole relationship between astroturf organizations, movements, and actions; and the wingnut thinktank/media axis. She is very impressed by evidence and not by assertions, and I'm trying to put together a timeline, with links, that will demonstrate the relationship.

The Tea Party phenomenon appears to be a very suitable test case for such an exposition.

Anyone game to answer some questions, provide some links, and help me out?

Did Glenn Beck originate this nonsense? Was it on his 3/13 "We surround them" broadcast or at another time/place?

Did he actually CALL it "Tea Party?" Or just "tax protest?"

What, precisely, did he target as the object of the protest? Any specific action taken or announced as to be taken, on the part of the Obama Administration?

Was it focused on the "Let the tax breaks for the wealthy expire?" strategy? Or on the "tax breaks for the middle class" strategy? Or on the "raise taxes for the wealthiest" strategy? Did he mention any of those specifically?

If he didn't use the term "Tea Party," where did that creep into the mix?



appealingly,
Bright

[rucky]

1. Santelli had a website registered for this 8 months ago.

The astroturfing operation was exposed right here on the DU, IIRC.

[geek_sabre]

2. as

far as I can tell, was not started by Beck at all. it started as a result of the stimulus package, back in Feb, after a rant by Rick Santelli on Feb. 19

http://www.cnbc.com/id/29283701

[YOY]

6. Well before that mate.

See the post above yours. They were ready for this.

[rvablue]

11. It didn't start as a result of the stimulus package

It began before Obama had even won the election.

The freepers and their ilk, funded by the same RW smear machine that went after the Clintons, were going to tea-bag no matter what Obama did.

It's called a smear tactic. It's the only thing the Repubs have left being that they are devoid of ideas or solutions.

[L. Coyote]

13. TP is an Arkansas Project Redux, already in action before McCain lost.

They saw Obama win well in advance. The New American Tea Party (TP) is a coalition ... members include:

The American Spectator,
The Heartland Institute,
FreedomWorks,
Coalition for a Conservative Majority,
Americans for Tax Reform,
the National Taxpayers Union,
Americans for Prosperity,
Smart Girl Politics,
the Institute for Liberty
and the Young Conservatives Coalition.

:rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: The organization asserts on its website that it is not a partisan political movement. :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

[Cirque du So-What]

3. I can sympathize

I've been trying to debunk the notion that these teabag parties are anything other than blatant astroturf in my little town. Here's a link to the letter published in my local paper from the organizer of the event:

http://www.zanesvilletimesrecorder.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2009904070325

My participation doesn't occur until the last page or so, but you can see I've got my work cut out for me. I implore you or anyone so inclined to register and add your two cents. I don't hope to win over any wingnuts, but I hope it'll shed some light on these clowns who are attempting to pass off wingnuttery as populism.

[Faygo Kid]

4. One guarantee: This wasn't a spontaneous response.

Santelli of CNBC involved, but I would guess Faux News is behind this. Maybe more.

Definitely a top down, not a bottom up, event.

[babylonsister]

5. Some links in here

regarding the lobbyists' and the politicians' role in this...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x5430824

As for faux...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=389&topic_id=5430054&mesg_id=5430054

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x5429824

[OHdem10]

7. Since I monitor a lot of Television , here is my best recollection on

the start of this.

Initially, there was a tiny group and I mean tiny who seemed to have
taken to the streets furious over the Bailouts. Bailouts was their
only issue. (One can accurately say that practically all Fox Programming
at that time was 24/7 Bailouts Bad. For some reason the Bailouts
even had Neil Cavuto in a controlled rage.

At this point it appeared that Fox and RW Radio Talkers went into a
fever pitch drive. Invited people from the Bailouts on. Gave the
groups coverage. Naturally this attracted more people out to the
groups. Mob psychology is a wonderful thing if you know how and are
willing to exploit it.

Very slowly and subtly in the beginning, they were able to change the
subject from Bailouts to )"Do not increase my taxes") At this point
Legislators both state and federal jumped into the parade. Further
question. Since Obama only plans to let those taxbreaks for the rich
expire. Tax issue is really the rich"s issue. I do not know any
rich people who would be out in the streets protesting. The Middle
Class have already gotten a Tax Cut by obama. Those Gopers are
expert at exploiting populism when it is too their advantage.

Anyone who can remember knows it was this very technique they employed
to get the AHNOLD govenor of California.

[TygrBright]

8. OK, here's what I've put together:

Well, I've done some research.

The Tea Party thing.

First mentioned (by that name) by Rick Santelli during a rant on CNBC's "Squawk Box" editorial/opinion show on February 9 of this year, during which he also asserted that (presumably pre-Castro) "Cuba used to have mansions, and a relatively decent economy".

Which is a cue to me that Mr. Santelli regards an economy where a very few people are fabulously wealthy and a small 'middle class' lives in prosperous gated communities, while vast numbers toil, illiterate, in serflike conditions with no health care, inadequate housing, horrific infant mortality rates, etc.; as 'relatively decent.'

I tend to differ with him on that.

Nor do I see any connection between pre-Castro Cuba and 2009 America, but hey, it's an opinion show, people make wild stretches of logic on opinion shows.

Anyway, shortly after that, presumably in response to Santelli's "We're thinkin' of having a Chicago Tea Party in July, all you capitalists that wanna show up to Lake Michigan, I'm gonna start organizing," a website called www.chicagoteaparty.com came online.

The really interesting thing about it is that the domain name "chicagoteaparty.com" was actually registered in August of 2008.

That's right. Last August.

Before the election.

Before any stimulus packages.

Before any foreclosure bailout plans.

Someone was planning this last August.

Who? And why?

Apparently, a guy named Zach Christenson, producer for a Chicago radio host named Milt Rosenberg.

Last August, Rosenberg interviewed a guy named Stanley Kurtz, because Kurtz had written about Obama being on a charity board with Bill Ayers, who was a Weather Underground member back when Obama was a toddler. The inescapable conclusion being that Obama is a firm believer in everything the Weather Underground ever stood for, including bomb-throwing and government-overthrowing. Okay. Sure.

So, apparently, after this "expose" hit the airwaves, Milt's producer went out and registered the Internet domain "chicagoteaparty.com."

About a month earlier, in Chicago, an organizing session was held by a group called RightOnline.com, to promote the Sam Adams Alliance, a project to create and link up conservative blogs and bloggers. Maybe Zach was thinking about being part of that.

I personally think it is interesting to note that the Sam Adams Alliance, although its projects include the site SunshineReview.org to promote transparency in government, declines to list any of its donors on its IRS form 990, citing regard for donor privacy.

The Sam Adams Alliance is the brainchild of Eric O'Keefe. Eric is quoted in a July 21st, 2008 Weekly Standard column as saying that there are "seven "capacities" that are required to drive a successful political strategy and keep it on offense: the capacity to generate intellectual ammunition, to pursue investigations, to mobilize for elections, to fight media bias, to pursue strategic litigation, to train new leaders, and to sustain a presence in the new media." Presumably the Sam Adams Alliance and the blogs it is encouraging and linking are focused on one or more of these strategies.

Now, there was also another website that appeared, on February 19th, 2009, called Officialchicagoteaparty.com. That one was registered by a guy named Eric Odom.

Eric Odom is a Republican media consultant, whose specialty is using "new media" like Twitter, to organize imitation-grassroots PR campaigns that, incidentally, support GOP policies and initiatives. Last summer, while Zach and Eric (O'Keefe) and Milt were planning for future Tea Parties in Chicago, Eric (Odom) was organizing a twitter-based campaign called DontGo.com to pressure Congress into passing the Republican-supported offshore oil drilling bill.

(Incidentally, one of the primary beneficiaries of that bill would have been Koch Industries. Koch Industries is owned by David and Charles Koch, who also control the Koch Family Foundation, profiled here: http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Charles_G._Koch_Charitable_Foundation
The Koch Family Foundation's giving focuses on funding conservative and libertarian think tanks, media organizations, and organizing efforts. I'm sure there's no relation between their objective and disinterested belief in pure capitalism and the fortunes of the family's oil and gas company.)

Now, here's the cool thing: Up until February, Eric (Odom) was listed as the "new media coordinator" for... wait for it... The Sam Adams Alliance!

Remember them? The guys Zach (who registered Chicagoteaparty.com last August) was hanging around with last summer?

Now, I, personally, do not think there is anything surprising or, indeed, in the least bit discreditable about this connection. They are presumably folks who share similar beliefs and philosophies and hang out together and bounce ideas off each other and suchlike. Why not?

Why not, indeed. Here's an odd thing. In order to see Eric (Odom)'s connection with The Sam Adams Alliance, you have to go to The Memory Hole online, and view cached pages from the Alliance prior to February. Because after that, the website erased all mention of Eric. Which is a little odd, really. I haven't worked my prior employer for quite a while but you can still find plenty of references to me on their website. Why scrub all mention of the connection?

So, what else might have been scrubbed?

Here's another interesting discrepancy between pre- and post-February versions of The Sam Adams Alliance website: After February 16th, an announcement that students applying for internships to the Alliance could also apply through-- wait for it-- the Charles G. Koch Summer Fellow Program, disappeared. The Summer Fellow Program being funded by the Institute for Humane Studies, which is a Koch Family Foundation funded entity focused on turning out future libertarian, pure-capitalist-type leaders.

Two Alliance board members, by the way, have strong connections with the Koch Foundation: Eric (O'Keefe) who served in the Institute for Humane Studies, and a guy named Joseph Lehman, who was a former VP at the Cato Institute (Koch is the major funder there.)

What I'm seeing here is a confluence-- not necessarily a connection, but certainly an interesting confluence-- of right-wing big money-funded organizing groups, and people who were thinking (long before the first bailout money was handed out, long before Obama won, long before any tax program redesigns were being considered in Congress,) about "Tea Parties."

And I'm also seeing a confluence of right-wing big money-owned media (Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation owns Fox News) and editorial/opinion pundits for those networks giving plugs for the whole "Tea Party" phenomenon. I'm not talking about "news coverage" here. I'm talking about pundits, not news reporters, urging people to attend the Tea Party gatherings. That's not "news coverage." That's a network making a clear effort to advance the success of this particular phenomenon. Here's the link to the "invitations" issued on air, by Glenn Beck: http://mediamatters.org/countyfair/200904060023

So, what I'm seeing here, and I have a hard time escaping the conclusion, is a major media player with a highly biased agenda to get people to these gatherings, in order to promote protests against the current Presidential Administration and its policies. Protests that were planned by people funded by big right-wing money, planned before this President was even elected.

Thanks, I'll pass on Fox.

Whatever Tea Partying may be, it doesn't fit my definition of a real, spontaneous, grassroots outburst against real government misdeeds.

(edited to remove a naughty link)

[Kip Humphrey]

14. With all these connections, I can only conclude that the so-called tea parties are a

highly organized effort on the part of the RNC, its operatives, and its financial backers. If you don't think these people are utterly ruthless, stopping at nothing to achieve their ends, think again.

[Maat]

9. If a friend wants to know about the Rightwing Noise Machine ...

refer them to any book by David Brock, of www.mediamatters.org, particularly The Republican Noise Machine."

It describes the rightwing billionaire backers, the front organizations, etc.

David's an expert in these shennanigans who came over to the Side of Good a few years' back.

[Mari333]

10. all you ever need to know about the powers behind the faux tea parties

How did a minor-league TV figure, whose contract with CNBC is due this summer, get so quickly launched into a nationwide rightwing blog sensation? Why were there so many sites and organizations online and live within minutes or hours after his rant, leading to a nationwide protest just a week after his rant?

What hasn’t been reported until now is evidence linking Santelli’s “tea party” rant with some very familiar names in the Republican rightwing machine, from PR operatives who specialize in imitation-grassroots PR campaigns (called “astroturfing”) to bigwig politicians and notorious billionaire funders. As veteran Russia reporters, both of us spent years watching the Kremlin use fake grassroots movements to influence and control the political landscape. To us, the uncanny speed and direction the movement took and the players involved in promoting it had a strangely forced quality to it. If it seemed scripted, that’s because it was.




http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2009/02/rick-santellis-faux-rant/

http://www.alternet.org/mediaculture/129656/the_rick_santelli_%27tea_party%27_controversy%3A_article_kicks_up_a_media_dust_storm/

santelli denies it, and playboy pulled the original news article. with no retraction. I wonder why.

[Wiley50]

12. Media Matters whole front page tells the story

At least 10 articles there documenting the whole sordid affair

http://mediamatters.org/index