Tea Party National Convention Wrapup

To paraphrase Sarah Palin, I have seen the future of politics in this country and I am happy to report that it is overwhelming white, Southern, and middle-aged.  I left behind my 3 day stay at the Tea Party National Convention feeling like I was leaving summer camp, but at the same time hopeful for the future.   My fellow tea party patriots and I had an amazing time and the price tag of over $1,000 now seems like a paltry sum to be at the center of a grassroots movement so strong that corporate sponsors like The Heritage Foundation and Freedomworks had no choice, but to sponsor.

Sarah Palin gave the keynote for Saturday night looking resplendent with a new hair style that wouldn’t have been out of place on the drummer for Winger or any other hair metal band of 15 years ago.   She came to speak to the people and she didn’t need a fancy teleprompter.  Sarah Palin was able to connect with her audience the old fashioned way, with spontaneity and a hand full of crib notes.   Her talk was full of passion and inspired the entire room, but what I remember first was when she talked about how she reacted to her ticket losing the Presidential Election.   Rather than dwelling on her defeat, she asked herself what she could do to best help this country moving forward and that’s when she resigned from public office.  Throughout the speech, Sarah never let us forget she was a mom.  This was a woman who was almost the female Joe Biden, but she still managed to throw in references to her children Piper, Yeti, and Trig.

Yesterday, ironically, would have been Ronald Reagan’s 99th birthday.   I believe it’s a nationally tragedy that we will regret for many years to come that we did not cryogenically freeze him when we had the chance.   Ronald Reagan was a national treasure and he is sincerely missed.

Today is the Super Bowl and it’s very easy to get caught up in the excitement of the big game, but let’s remember the real meaning of today–a child was born in humble circumstance so that he could one day save us all.   Let’s not forget to salute Tim Tebow on this day of all days.   My prediction for the game is that the Colts will beat the Saints 38-17.   I just think they are the more God fearing team.

Tea Party National Convention – Day 2

I’m reporting back from the Tea Party National Convention and I have to say, it’s like Disney World for conservatives.   The morning was very promising.  Smart Girl Politics had a breakout session on “How to do Voter Registration Drives and Where to Find Conservative Votes” & “Women in Politics”.   Unfortunately, I accidentally read it as Find Conservative Women, but that’s actually what it turned into.   A lot of them were kind of old, but I was able to give my business card to a lot of girls and I told them to meet me at the hotel lobby tonight after 11PM.  I hope that this pays off.

Young Americans for Freedom also had a breakout session in the morning and it was great.   The topic was how to involve the youth in the conservative movement and I got a loud round of applause when I suggested golf as a great gateway to conservatism.  We agreed to try and reach out to young people in our communities to bring them over to the conservative cause.  The seminar focused on how to find potential tea party members.  It seems a lot of the current movement members were loners in high school.  They had some common hobbies like hunting small animals or watching fires.    It also seems oddly that a lot of tea party members had issues with wetting the bed into their teens.  Now, obviously we won’t be targeting bed wetters to join, but it shows just how open the spirit here is that so many people were willing to admit it.

The third breakout session on Conservative Arts and Crafts was great.  I made an ashtray that is shaped like a gun rack.  I was real proud of it and I can’t wait to see it tomorrow when it dries.  There were a lot of awesome things made here.  You’d be amazed how many things you can make a sock into.

There was so much good stuff tonight.  I’m just getting back from seeing Joseph Farah and Angela McGlowan.  They were as amazing as you could imagine.   Angela was fair and balanced, but Joe was a great rabble rouser.  His main point was how we can overthrow the government which seems a little extreme, but certainly interesting.  The diversity here is amazing.  I looked around the convention center and you could see white people, Caucasians, Anglo-Saxons, WASPS–it was breathtaking.   I’m off to a karaoke party and I want to get there early before somebody else does a Toby Keith song.

Greetings from the Tea Party Convention

I’m excited to be writing to you from the National Tea Party Convention in beautiful Nashville, TN.    This convention counting airfare is running me over $1,000 but it’s worth it to support a worthy grassroots cause like the tea parties.  My day has been very full and enjoyable.  I’ve learned more about NASCAR than I had ever known–being from Chicago and I felt a sense of American pride that I have never felt before outside of a Lee Greenwood concert.

My day was very full.  After flying in this morning, I hit the convention.   Ray Stevens provided the entertainment and I swear The Streak is just as fun as it was when it first hit the charts in the 1970s.  Tom Tancredo provided the keynote for the evening and I got to listen to him with California Congressman Jack Kimble.  There were two breakout sessions and I think I got a lot out of both of them.

The 50 Most Common Demonstration Sign Misspellings and How to Avoid Them was terrific.  It was taught by Dr. E.Y. Hansen who was an English professor at Dartmouth before he was fired for teaching Creationism in his class.  I learned a lot including that Fascism actually has an “s” in the middle.   Dr. Hansen gave everybody a laminated list of frequently misspelled words from Tea Bag rallies so that even a moran would be able to protest without embarrassing themselves.

The second breakout session was taught by a Mindy Carlson who was a former Kansas City Chief cheerleader.  It was discovered after several large tea parties last year that we were terrible at cheering on command.  Several times the Fox anchor would hold the microphone out to hear us and you only hear a smattering of voices.   What we learned wasn’t really cheering or choreography so much as pep–the sort of manly cheering that George Bush did in College.

I’m going with some cool Alabama tea baggers to watch Birth of a Nation.  I like old movies and it seems to be the only DVD anybody has around here.  I’ll keep you posted tomorrow.