Tea Party Digest is a conservative news and opinion aggregator and a directory of Tea Party and conservative resources on the Internet. Our goal is to find the latest and best conservative blog posts, conservative news, conservative video and conservative resources and present them to you in an organized and easy to use format. We are politically conservative, fiscally conservative and culturally conservative. We support the traditional values of Western Civilization.
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"If there must be trouble, let it be in my day, that my child may have peace." Tom Paine, 1776
Ed Schultz wasn’t kidding about his State of the Union affinities when he asserted on his radio show Tuesday that “I'll be in the Rotunda tonight, listening to the boss , rootin' for him, if you know what I mean.” He did not mean MSNBC boss Phil Griffin. Schultz and CNN’s Paul Begala are participating Wednesday night in a House Democrat “Reignite the American Dream” retreat at the Hyatt Regency Chesapeake Bay Golf Resort, Spa & Marina in Cambridge, Maryland. Chris Ariens at TVNewser reported on Wednesday “We’re told MSNBC executives gave Schultz prior approval to participate. Schultz will also conduct an on-site interview with Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi which will air on his show tomorrow night.” John Stanton of Roll Call reported Wednesday evening's festivities are highlighted by an “American Voices Panel” that includes CNN and Newsweek contributor Paul Begala and “the leaders of several Democratic-leaning interest groups.” Meanwhile, “MSNBC host Ed Schultz will participate in a panel on Minority Whip Steny Hoyer's (Md.) ‘Make it in America’ plan.” Stanton added that the resort's website touts amenities including “pampering spa treatments, golf, sailing, fishing and swimming … [and] delicious meals in our many Cambridge, Maryland hotel resort restaurants.” It's not exactly sleeping in a tent with the rats at Occupy DC. In addition to his “boss” comment about President Obama, Schultz also dropped these nuggets on his Tuesday radio show: — “And what is so bastardly terrible [yes -- "bastardly terrible"] about this is that once they [Republicans] get power, they come up a legislative agenda that attacks the very people that are paying the highest rate — the wage earners.” — “No one is trying to take anything from Mitt Romney or any other wealthy person. We just think here on the left that there is such a thing as earned income and unearned income. Income is income because you can't have income unless you have money.” Earlier: House Democrats Beseech Ed Schultz for Help …
This is one of the NRCC ‘s harsher web ads … if you define ‘harsh’ as ‘true.’ Something to remember, folks: if you think that campaigning on behalf of Republicans who may or may have not done enough is hard, imagine what it must be like for the netroots, who are all kind of glumly aware that they have to campaign on behalf of Democrats who have done quite too much already. Text after the fold: open thread. NARRATOR: What’s become of America since President Obama took full control of Washington? A wrecked economy, with debt and waste beyond imagination. Since then, our gas prices have gone up more than 82 percent. Every single day more than one-thousand five hundred of our jobs have been lost. Every day, another two-thousand seven hundred of us have realized it’s been six months since we last had a job. Every day, more than six thousand of us have begun living below poverty, while thirteen thousand more have been put on food stamps and more than eight hundred have become uninsured. Every day, President Obama has bet, and lost, four hundred and eighty eight thousand on Solyndra. Every day, seven hundred and forty nine million of our tax dollars has been wasted on a failed stimulus. And every single day we have been burdened with four point two billion more in debt. …
One of the Media Research Center's dearest friends and supporters, Mark Levin, has a new book out called “ Ameritopia .” On Tuesday, the esteemed author and radio host spoke to NewsBusters by phone about the book's contents and how the media are assisting powerful utopian forces in America to undermine our Constitutional republic (video follows with complete transcript, don't miss spectacular book signing video at article's conclusion): NEWSBUSTERS : Mark Levin is a lawyer, author, and host of one of the nation’s most popular syndicated radio programs. His book “Liberty and Tyranny” was on the New York Times bestseller list for eight months, three at number one, and was Amazon’s second bestseller in 2009. An expert in Constitutional law, Levin is a loyal supporter and dear friend of the Media Research Center. His new book “ Ameritopia ” takes readers through the various utopian concepts proffered by Plato, Thomas More, Thomas Hobbes, and Karl Marx demonstrating that despite their notorious failings, America has been moving in this direction for almost a century and is dangerously close to never coming back. We are very pleased to have Mark with us at NewsBusters to discuss his compelling new book. Welcome, Mark. MARK LEVIN: Noel, a great pleasure. I appreciate all the work you do, my friend. NEWSBUSTERS : Thank you, sir. You as well. My first question is a bit tongue-in-cheek…
Some are still worried about the Megaupload takedown (including many the Motorola Mobility starts an aggressive patent suit against Apple . Google, trying to aquire MM, says they only use patents defensively. Will they pledge to drop this suit should they take over the firm’s patents? …
Alex Wagner made an eye-popping remark on her MSNBC program on Wednesday, as she hinted that she agreed with former Obama spokesman Bill Burton's assertion that Ronald Reagan would feel out of place in today's GOP. When Burton claimed that ” Reagan wouldn't have a chance in this Republican primary right now ,” Wagner stunningly replied, ” I think he'd be a Democrat probably ” . The anchor, a former employee of the left-leaning Center for American Progress, also touted a quote from Thomas Mann of The Brookings Institution and Norman Ornstein of AEI, who claim in an upcoming book that the Republican Party has become ” an insurgent outlier- ideologically extreme … scornful of compromise … and dismissive of the legitimacy of its political opposition .” After reading the quote, Wagner turned to Ryan Lizza of The New Yorker , who published the excerpt from Mann and Ornstein in a recent article titled ” The Obama Memos: The making of a post-post-partisan Presidency .” Lizza channeled an oft-repeated talking point by liberals that the GOP has moved far to the right: LIZZA: …You start looking at how the two parties have separated- how they've become more homogeneous and ideologically distant. And I've always thought of this as a story of two- happening equally on both sides. It's just not true. One party has moved further to the right than the other party has moved to the left, and I think this is a really difficult concept for reporters to wrap their head around, because it doesn't seem fair to point that out . And I think it's important to note that. …
CNN claims to be the moderate voice of cable news, but it certainly doesn't play the part when it shills for President Obama's tax plan. Obama has called for the Buffett Rule, or higher taxes on millionaires, and CNN helped him make his case in a one-sided segment Wednesday afternoon. Anchor Brooke Baldwin begged for her viewers' attention before she aired Obama's liberal spin on taxes from his State of the Union address. She then highlighted millionaire Mitt Romney's low tax rate, “adding fuel to the fire that the incredibly affluent, the rich folks, pay taxes at a lower rate than the average person,” she hyped. [Video below the break.] Obama has called for the rich to pay their “fair share” of taxes, targeting the disparity in tax rates between the upper and middle classes. Of course, CNN is “adding fuel to the fire” in blaring such a disparity over and over. But then they hosted “economist” Ben Stein to give commentary. Stein agreed with Obama's words as “fair.” Baldwin acted surprised that Stein, a former speechwriter for Presidents Nixon and Ford and a contributor to the conservative magazine The American Spectator, favored Obama's position. To the contrary, Stein has repeatedly called for higher taxes on millionaires to help reduce the deficit. And on Twitter, Baldwin continued to express amazement that a conservative like Stein would agree with Obama. A brief transcript of the segment, which aired on January 25 at 2:28 p.m. EST, is as follows: BROOKE BALDWIN: You say the word “taxes,” and most people's eyes glaze over. …
Go ahead, call it shooting fish in a barrel.? As soon as Ed Schultz mentioned at the top of his MSNBC show this evening that Alan Grayson would be a guest, you knew the former Dem congressman from Florida would say something outrageous. Sure enough, the guy who was roundly defeated last time around—but is giving it another go—delivered, claiming that Newt Gingrich is running “the most overtly racist campaign” since George Wallace.? Grayson also managed to work in a reference to the Ten Commandment's prohibition of adultery.? Video after the jump. Watch in action the man who set a new standard for congressional buffoonery.?? ALAN GRAYSON: I think there's a sort of race between [Newt's] egomania and his racism.? And I think he's running the most overtly racist campaign that I've seen in this country since George Wallace. You're talking about presidential campaigns. So I think that, what he tries to do is to do these dog-whistle things to people he thinks he can connect with to make up for his shortcomings frankly as a human being. And I just can't believe people have so much disrespect for the Seventh Commandment that they would give him any serious consideration at all. …
Following Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker’s reforming his state’s collective bargaining laws and breaking the stranglehold unions held on taxpayers (saving them $476 million so far), union bosses across the country laid siege on the dairy state’s capitol and declared war on Walker and his fellow Republicans. In 2011, union bosses and other outside groups spent tens of millions of dollars in a failed attempt to recall six Republican state senators and are spending millions more now trying to recall Scott Walker. The millions union are now spending—paid for by union members throughout the country—has Democrats getting nervous that the money spent might strain union coffers too much prior to the November elections. According to the Hill : Unions have made ousting Walker a top priority and are poised to spend heavily in Wisconsin. But Democratic strategists and some senior political experts within the labor movement believe the initiative should have been launched before the November presidential election. Labor officials are also looking at investing resources in Indiana, a red-leaning state, to battle controversial right-to-work legislation backed by Gov. Mitch Daniels (R). But the Wisconsin fight will consume far more resources. This is a stomach-churning prospect for Democrats and their allies because the labor expenditures could come just months before the general election , when money will be needed for more important battlegrounds such as Ohio and Florida. As union bosses continue to pour money into Wisconsin, union members nationwide may begin to wonder if, in fact that is money well spent—especially since, Scott Walker’s poll numbers are still ahead of his (potential) Democratic rivals…
Although the media would love to present Barack Obama as seven times brainier than George W. Bush, Byron Tau of Politico reports “President Obama's 2012 State of the Union address again rated at an 8th grade comprehension level on the Flesch-Kincaid readability test — the third lowest score of any State of the Union address since 1934.” Eric Ostermeier of the University of Minnesota's Smart Politics initiative conducted an analysis on the last 70 State of the Union addresses and found that President Obama's three addresses have the lowest grade average of any modern president. (Obama came in 13th out of 13; George W. Bush was at number eight.) Ostermeier reports “each of Obama's three addresses are among only seven of 70 in the modern era that were written shy of a 9th grade level, and among the six that have averaged less than 17 words per sentence. Obama's 2012 and 2010 addresses averaged 16.6 words per sentence with his 2011 address coming in at 16.8.” He said “The Flesch-Kincaid test is designed to assess the readability level of written text, with a formula that translates the score to a U.S. grade level. Longer sentences and sentences utilizing words with more syllables produce higher scores. Shorter sentences and sentences incorporating more monosyllabic words yield lower scores,” Tau added: “Obama's average grade-level score of 8.4 is more than two grades lower than the 10.7 grade average for the other 67 addresses written by his 12 predecessors,” they conclude… Obama's use of simple language? is in part a reflection of his audience: the American voter in an election year. …
Joy Behar, on Wednesday's edition of The View , delivered a rave review for Barack Obama's State of the Union of Speech as she gushed that it was “equivalent to Ronald Reagan's 'Morning in America' speech” and added “Republicans can embrace him” now. Behar then went on to say the President's speech, that was devoted to the kind of class warfare talk The Gipper would have despised, should motivate the Republicans to “start cooperating” and “stop this gridlock because it's not patriotic!” (Video after the jump) Aside from not recognizing that Reagan would not have supported Obama’s call to soak the rich, Behar demonstrated her lack of presidential history by not realizing the famous “Morning in America” line came from a Reagan political ad , not a speech. The following is the full outburst from Behar as it was aired on the January 25, 2012 edition of ABC's The View : JOY BEHAR: His speech was equivalent to Ronald Reagan's “Morning in America” speech,? which was a positive outlook on the world and I think that Republicans can embrace him because of Ronald Reagan. It is very similar to that. It's positive, it's optimistic. He actually believes that they're gonna cooperate with him…From his mouth to God's ears they should start cooperating and get this country going and stop this gridlock because it's not patriotic! …
Far from being a ” hardcore news junkie ,” you sometimes wonder if Chris Matthews even watches his own network. Following the president’s State of the Union Address on Tuesday, Matthews, while appearing as a guest on MSNBC's? ‘The Ed Show,’ claimed that he had never heard of congressional insider trading prior to that night. [ See video below. MP 3 audio here .] However, as Noel Sheppard pointed out, MSNBC’s Dylan Ratigan had in fact covered the very same story Matthews had never heard of in a recent broadcast. What's more, upon further investigation, we found in November of last year, Matthews's colleagues Andrea Mitchell and Tamron Hall both covered congressional insider trading on their respective afternoon programs. In fact, the issue on congressional insider trading was so pertinent it even made it into Jay Leno’s monologue on NBC's Tonight Show.? Once again, Matthews shows how out of touch he is with the world around him.? You would think his own network would educate him. Below is the relevant video from last night as well as relevant transcripts of Matthews’ comments on The Ed Show,? Andrea Mitchell Reports, News Nation with Tamron Hall and The Tonight Show with Jay Leno: ? The Ed Show January 24, 2012 11:03 p.m. CHRIS MATTHEWS, HOST, HARDBALL: Well, there were so many points to this speech, I think you're right about the optimism and call to duty and patriotic cooperation and on a common mission. I thought all that was part of, if you will, the confection of the speech, the structure of it. But, there were very interesting shots in it, I thought…
A noted Christian religious expert is the latest to confirm something careful watchers of the media have known for years: The American media is peddling New Age spirituality to its viewers as a substitute for traditional religion. On January 24, the Christian Post reported that Ravi Zacharias, the founder of Ravi Zacharias International Ministries and a noted Christian apologist , warned that the mass media is trying to push New Age ideas on the general population in his book “Why Jesus? Rediscovering His Truth In an Age of Mass Marketed Spirituality.” In his book, Zacharias writes: “Mystics, spiritual masters all are in the lineup to give the viewer the feeling that she who has become all but deified in their eyes can now make each viewer just like them.” Zacharias specifically cited Oprah and Deepak Chopra as examples of influential media figures peddling New Age nonsense to a large audience. It is difficult to disagree with Zacharias' assessment. For both the figures he cites and other media outlets have supported New Age spirituality, and at the same time have discounted traditional religious belief. Oprah has been heavily involved in the New Age movement – so much so that Washington Post blogger Amarnath Amarsingam called her in May 2011 the “High Priestess of the New Age” In a January 2011 interview with Piers Morgan , Winfrey declared herself to be a spiritual leader: “I am the messenger to deliver the message of redemption, of hope, of forgiveness, of gratitude, of evolving people to the best of themselves.” In her Book Club in 2008, she promoted Eckhart Tolle's ” A New Earth ” whose promotional blurb states: “Tolle describes in detail how our current ego-based state of consciousness operates. Then gently, and in very practical terms, he leads us into this new consciousness. We will come to experience who we truly are-which is something infinitely greater than anything we currently think we are-and learn to live and breathe freely.” New Age spirituality guru Deepak Chopra has been even more avid in his promotion of New Age ideals. His book The Third Jesus is “about the consciousness of Jesus which was in touch with the source of all creation. If you can aspire to be at one with that consciousness, then you too can be in touch with the source of all creation. He has denied traditional Christian teachings, having been cited by major media outlets such as ABC denying the existence of Satan…
There was more tax-hike propaganda from the New York Times on Wednesday’s front page, as reporters Nicholas Confessore and David Kocieniewski matched President Obama’s campaign strategy by taking an obsessively detailed look at Mitt Romney’s recently released tax returns while suggesting the findings bolstered Obama’s argument that the rich are undertaxed: “ For Romneys, Friendly Code Reduces Taxes .” There was even a small photo of the top of Romney’s tax return included in the story, which was tucked under Helene Cooper's pro-Obama lead story on the State of the Union address ?in a manner suggesting the two stories were linked. .Mitt Romney and his wife, Ann, made $27 million in 2010. They held millions of dollars in a Swiss bank account and millions more in partnerships in the Cayman Islands. His family’s trusts sold thousands of shares in Goldman Sachs that were offered to favored clients when the storied investment house first went public. The couple’s effective federal tax rate for the year worked out to 13.9 percent, a rate typical of households earning about $80,000 a year. Yet the hundreds of pages of tax documents released by Mr. Romney’s campaign on Tuesday morning did not readily reveal any elaborate financial legerdemain or exotic tax shelters. What Mr. Romney’s returns illustrated, instead, was the array of perfectly ordinary ways in which the United States tax code confers advantages on the rich, allowing Mr. Romney to amass wealth under rules very different from those faced by most Americans who take home a paycheck. Those differences leapt to the front of the national debate on Tuesday when President Obama — whose family’s income was less than a tenth of Mr…
Last night, a joint force from America’s Tier One special operations command conducted a raid on a pirate camp in Somalia, freeing two hostages – an American and a Dane – and killing their captors before exfiltrating north to Djibouti via helicopter. USA Today ‘s lead paragraph captures the mission well, while also serving as the best recruiting pitch for the Navy’s Sea, Air, and Land teams that I’ve seen a newspaper run: The same U.S. Navy SEAL unit that killed Osama bin Laden parachuted into Somalia under cover of darkness early Wednesday and crept up to an outdoor camp where an American woman and Danish man were being held hostage. Soon, nine kidnappers were dead and both hostages were freed. The hostages, two aid workers who had been kidnapped three months earlier, were victims of an expanding land-based kidnapping enterprise engaged in by Somali pirates in response to the growing difficulty of hijacking ships in the Gulf of Aden. “The same U.S. Navy SEAL unit that killed Osama bin Laden,” of course, refers to the Navy’s Special Warfare Development Group (DEVGRU), also known as SEAL Team Six, though as with all JSOC operations there were almost certainly representatives from other services involved as well (possibly Air Force aircraft, and certainly joint terminal attack controllers and pararescuemen from the Air Force special mission unit organic to JSOC). As with the bin Laden raid, it is worth noting that what sets this mission apart from any other JSOC or DEVGRU operation is not the fact that it took place, but the publicity it is receiving. Hostage rescue is a core component of JSOC’s special mission units’ capabilities, as are counterterrorism, direct action, and strategic reconnaissance. Further, the operational tempo for special operations units as a whole – both “white” and “black” (with JSOC falling in the latter category) – continues to be incredibly high, making this highly publicized mission just another one of hundreds being carried out around the world every month (according to ISAF, for example, 1,879 special operations raids were carried out in Afghanistan alone in the first eight months of 2011). …
In an interview with Mitt Romney following the State of the Union Tuesday night, NBC Nightly News anchor Brian Williams used the tax returns of the former Massachusetts governor as a weapon: “And it's fair to ask tonight, will you be explaining further the story of them, the back story…. the amounts we've learned about today equaling unfathomable wealth for most Americans…” Earlier in the evening, at the top of Nightly News , Williams was equally melodramatic: “…Mitt Romney, chose today to release his tax returns from the year 2010. He did it to help stop the questions about his wealth, but in releasing his taxes, he reveals what most Americans will regard as unimaginable wealth….” Williams signaled the media would not let go of the issue: “The numbers in these returns will likely get talked about for the rest of the way in this campaign.” Williams should be reminded that people in luxury Manhattan apartments shouldn't throw stones. A 2008 Parade magazine profile of the NBC anchor detailed his high-end digs at the top of New York's Bloomberg building, surrounded by famous neighbors: “…gutty Yankees import Johnny Damon and Phillies slugger Bobby Abreu, singer Beyonc? Knowles and, in a corporate Big Love, both former GE chief Jack Welch and current G.E. chief Jeffrey Immelt.” The article goes on to note that apartments in that building at the time ranged from “$2 to $27 million.” In addition, TV Guide's 2011 list of the highest paid people in television placed Williams' salary at $13 million annually . In response to Williams, Romney pointed out: “If you add together my taxes and my charitable contributions, I think in the most recent year it looks like it's over 40%, goes to charity and taxes.” Williams then cited New York's liberal Mayor – and namesake of the anchor's apartment building – Michael Bloomberg as “a fellow wealthy guy” who “pays the highest personal income tax rate, 35%.” Williams continued: “He opposes tax provisions that, as he puts it, 'allows some wealthy individuals to pay a lower rate,' and went on to say that if it were up to him, he would end the concept of so-called 'carried interest.'” Rounding out his grilling of Romney from the left, Williams wondered: “Did it get tougher for you to tell your story and attract your interest in the state [Florida] where you are now?…People are talking about exotic investments in Switzerland and Luxembourg and the Cayman Islands. Did this make it tougher for you?” …
Following my essay on the nature of the Establishment vs Tea Party or Outsider divide on the Right as driven primarily by a divide over whether and how we can roll back the seemingly endless growth of spending and the size of government , a number of people offered criticisms. Some noted that there are longstanding divides between the DC-based professional class (officeholders, staffers, pundits and journalists who have a direct stake in particular people having political power) and those outside. Which is true and a contributing factor (as any student of public choice theory could tell you), but not new, and in any event self-defeating definition: if the people in power are definitionally opposed to those without, then new elections are purposeless exercises. History tells us otherwise: the professional class may restrain and co-opt, but there are always those officeholders (new and experienced) who are willing to stick their necks out for genuine changes in the long-term trajectory of public policy. Others pointed to the cultural divide such as the one that Angelo Codevilla identified in his 2010 essay distinguishing between a Ruling Class and a Country Party . Codevilla’s analysis is certainly a useful part of the debate, and is another longstanding fault line that laid the groundwork for the current schism. But it doesn’t really reflect why now , at this time, conservatives are willing to lock horns with the organs of Republican and conservative leadership that, in the Bush years, commanded a good deal of loyalty from the rank and file – willing enough to line up cheering throngs of responsible citizens behind the most unlikely of 21st century populist champions, Newt Gingrich. The most sustained critique comes from sometime National Review contributor Avik Roy, writing in Forbes . Roy calls Redstate a “bastion of populist conservatism,” which is true even if I’m not exactly anybody’s idea of a populist. He says that Ben Domenech is “one of the best conservative writers on health care issues,” which is certainly true, and faults the rest of us at RedState for not developing “serious proposals for entitlement reform,” in contrast to NR’s columnists – which should be unsurprising to Roy if he thinks about the fact that most of us have day jobs, to say nothing of the fact that RedState’s principal role is activism rather than think-tankery. Roy seems most upset at my references to National Review, which is a shame, because as I said I have nothing against NR, and I agree with Roy that NR as a whole still provides an awful lot of good punditry, analysis and advocacy (and I remain a big fan of many of its long-time writers); I was just trying to explain precisely why so many people on the Right were agitated at it…
