tea party / nazi party

[Ziggurat]

Except that was the name of the party they co-opted, and the name had nothing to do with their policies...

Ignore the man behind the curtain!

 

[mhaze]

What a bloody stupid quote. Hitler was (thankfully) rather far from ordinary. He was a charismatic sociopath.

Not so much. Hitler was a believer in authoritarian government. The tea party... is opposed to authoritarian government...

Hitler was a believer in authoritarian Socialist government.

The crowd in and around the white house seem to believe in trying to be authoritarian, and socialist.....

Just saying...

 

[Ladewig]

Hitler was a believer in authoritarian Socialist government.

The crowd in and around the white house seem to believe in trying to be authoritarian, and socialist.....

Just saying...

For a moment, I thought about responding seriously to this post. Then I noticed what thread it is in. Carry on Mhaze, you still have a long way to go before you hit the level of crackpottery outlined in the OP.

 

[Bob Blaylock]

This may be the most “thunderous” thread yet, which is rather amazing when one considers that Thunder didn't start it, and doesn't yet appear to have participated in it.

 

[GreNME]

What's amazing about this thread is how wildly outraged some folks are getting at the mere mention of the Tea Party and Nazis in the same sentence, despite the attempts in the OP to remove the two ideologically as much as possible.

I'd disagree in the comparison between the two groups, but not because both grew in strength on the basis of populist ignorance-- in fact, I think that parallel is strikingly accurate-- but instead because of how the two grew and coalesced into a movement. The Nazis took longer and were built upon a different type of scapegoats, so essentially they're operationally and structurally different. The only real similarity is the populist anger, and that's awfully generalized and vague.

If anything, the operations and structure more resemble the Know Nothing movement. A better thread would be to contrast those two.

 

[Trakar]

"A new Gallup Poll out this morning of 1,033 finds nothing fringe about self-proclaimed Tea Party adherents; they are slightly more likely to be employed, male and definitely more conservative. But otherwise Gallup's Lydia Saad writes, "their age, educational background, employment status, and race -- Tea Partiers are quite representative of the public at large."

and

"According to a New York Times/CBS poll, the 18% of Americans who support the movement are wealthier, more educated, and a lot more pessimistic than average."

First paying lipservice to some nebulous third-party whose only main claim to fame is that they are "none of the above," (ie., those who "support the movement"), is vastly different from agreeing with all of the various and often contradictory positions the sign-carrying advocates and candidates seem to feel represent the core of the party.

wiki's Joe-sixpack seems a good place to look for a typical American, I wonder how the tea party stacks up:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Average_Joe

Most are married without children (28.7%), or single adults living alone (25.5%), with less than a quarter represented by traditional nuclear families.

Median age is 36.8

median income is $28,567

the median education 85.2% have graduated High School, and 53% have "some college" but no degree.

I'd be interested in seeing real tea party demographics, but best I can tell they are the "Angry White Men" of the 90s 20 years on down the road. Sounds like the same group that hijacked the Republican party about the time I quit registering as Republican.

 

[Skeptic]

Yup.

No, no. I am not comparing Obama to Hitler. But certainly the messianic fervor by adulating crowds over a anointed leader who will rescue the country, despite having little political experience and no achievements qualifying him to the job, describes the pro-Obama euphoria far better than it describes the tea party's anger.

Forgot to add another example that's too good to pass up:

"He [Obama] is the voice of reason incarnate" -- George Packer, New Yorker columnist.

"Hitler is simply pure reason incarnate" -- Rudolf Hess.

 

[Skeptic]

By the way, did you notice how Americans so drastically change? When Obama's poll numbers were in the 60s, the country was a great place of home 'n' change, a post-racial heaven of the new rational man. Now that they are in the 40s, the nation has become a hotbed of stupidity and racism.

That 300,000,000 million people drastically changed their worldview from the enlightenment to the dark ages is, after all, SO much more reasonable an explanation of what is going on than that one man not doing too well in a job he clearly didn't have the experience or skills to do.

Of course, all hope is not lost. If Obama's numbers pick up -- if the democrats do well in the midterm elections or the rest of his presidency is successful or both -- then, once again, it will turn out 300,000,000 Americans are sane and post-racial and loving and cool once more.

After all, that, too, would be so much simpler than the alternative explanation: a politician recovering from a slump when experience shows him how to do things better.

 

[Trakar]

...That 300,000,000 million people drastically changed their worldview from the enlightenment to the dark ages is, after all, SO much more reasonable an explanation of what is going on than that one man not doing too well in a job he clearly didn't have the experience or skills to do...

These, certainly are not the only two options. I've no great liking of the president, but this is as at least as much the result of a dedicated and well financed, program of political and personal attack, fear mongering and lies promoted by those seeking to personally gain from the diminishment of the administration, as it has been due to any actual presidential missteps or incompetencies.

 

[NoScotsman]

The "tea party" mentality is also a western-European phenomenon: Complaints about the economy, mixed with a nationalistic backlash to multiculturalism...

Actually, the American variety is pretty bland by comparison. I mean, we've yet to see any actual violence.

Unfortunately, irrational thinking will always accompany bad economic times.