The Tea Parties in Four Minutes

Here’s Slates’ rather contemptuous summary of the brief history of the Tea Parties:

http://www.slatev.com/media/swfs/SlateGroupPlayer.swf

If you check the fact-checkers in the comboxes over at Slate, you notice that the quick and dirty summary is a bit more dirty than quick. But still, it does tend to ratify the impression that this is a grass roots movement that corporate and political interests are laboring to harness and, shall we say?, “shepherd” in order to manipulate well-meaning people back on to the reservation and use them. Of course, Slate has no respect for these sheep without a shepherd. But then, neither does Fox. Jesus is the only one who cares about such people, not Caesar or Mammon.

I was surprised to discover that the whole thing started here in Seattle. We here in the Soviet of Washington have still got the rabble-rousing thing going after all these years.