Unlike St. Louis Tea Party, Poplar Bluffs Doesn't Pander to Roy Blunt

As I've mentioned several times, the St. Louis Tea Party leadership is afraid to take on Republican Senate candidate Roy Blunt despite the fact that he ignored their threats and has a career that is at odds with their ideological commitments. So they instead spend their time talking about congressional races on the East Coast. Fortunately for "real conservatives," not all tea parties are as frightened of the local GOP establishment as the leaders of the St. Louis Tea Party. Roy Blunt's name was recently dropped from the list of speakers at a Poplar Bluffs "Patriots Rally" this weekend.

FiredUp has the story.

Ed Martin Misuses SaveAB Email List

There was some great journalism over a FiredUp several weeks ago following up on the AP story about how local wingnut hero Ed Martin misused and email list, and went against his word.

Martin, ever the opportunist, had created a website to "Save Anheuser-Busch" back when the reports first came out that InBev was looking to buy AB out. His group didn't do anything to stop the sale, but he sure did collect a lot of names. I'm sure a lot of the people who signed up did so because the website specifically stated that email addresses would be used, "only for this purpose and not for any other purpose."

But Martin went against the promise of the website he created and sent out a message to over 40,000 people on the list directing them to his congressional campaign website. Given Martin's past record, this kind of behavior is hardly surprising, but it is funny to see just how serious tea party members are about their "ethics."

Shorter Gateway Pundit:

Give Massachusetts Republican Senate candidate Scott Brown all your money because he' only going to lose by 9 percent.

I suppose I should be thanking him...

Oh Noes! STL Tea Party Uses "Horrible Sexual Slur"

The vast majority of what this site covers is pointing out lies, contradictions, and absurdities in the St. Louis Tea Party rhetoric. Since they are incapable of responding with actual arguments, they instead attempt to make personal attacks or discredit the site in any way possible. Generally, these take the form of, "St. Louis Pushes Back does X, so we should ignore everything written there." The "everything" is important, of course, because what they're really trying to do is to prevent their audience from realizing just how dishonest most of the Tea Party commentary really is, and the only way to do that is to keep them from reading sites that systematically examine what they say.

One of the funniest attempts at this strategy is to write that this site should be ignored because it used a "horrible sexual slur": namely, the word "teabagger." Aficionados will be aware, of course, that the term teabagger (along with its connotation) was originally used by right wing activists, and only later picked up by the people laughing at them. Anyway, you'll notice that this site does not actually use the term that much: incessant name-calling is more of a characteristic of right-wing extremists and isn't really Pushback's shtick.

But if "teabag" is really such a horrible sexual slur, then why did Dana Loesch, Americans for Prosperity, and Gateway Pundit all use the term today? Gateway Pundit had the following headline:

(screenshot from Hoft's blog)

Loesch and Carl Bearden took it a step further, tweeting the following:

I guess it's only horribly offensive when critics of the tea party use it. The hypocrisy knows no bounds.

Loesch and Hennessy Cower Before the Missouri GOP

A while back I wrote about how St. Louis Tea Party leaders Dana Loesch and Bill Hennessy specifically addressed MO Senate candidate Roy Blunt as they threatened that they were "coming for" him and "going to vote" him out of office if he didn't endorse independent candidate Doug Hoffman in the NY-23 House race. Roy Blunt completely ignored them despite their warnings and vague threats. At the time, I wrote that it was time for Loesch and Hennessy to, in their own words, "put up or shut up."

I've tried to give them the benefit of the doubt. I even wrote a post when Loesch had Chuck Purgason, the challenger to Blunt in the Republican Primary, on her show. However, at this point it's beyond obvious that Loesch and Hennessy completely lack the courage to follow through on their empty threats. They've shown the world what I've said all along: the St. Louis Tea Party is nothing more than a tool of the Missouri GOP.

Consider the following: Both Loesch and Hennessy are spending their time trying to get local conservatives to donate to the Massachusetts Senate Race. Yet they've spent no time whatsoever writing criticism of Roy Blunt, despite the fact that they specifically threatened Blunt if he didn't endorse Hoffman. In other words, they are completely unwilling to challenge the power structure of the only Republican Party they could actually change, the Missouri Republican Party. So they distract their followers by talking tough about congressional campaigns nearly one thousand miles away in New York and Massachusetts.

This fact is further supported by taking a look at their rallies. When they had the support of THE most astroturf of all astroturf organizations, Americans for Prosperity, they were able to fill up town hall meetings and even Kiener Plaza. However, when they had their little rally challenging Blunt and Akin, about ten people showed up. Nothing could be stronger evidence that movement is nothing without the support of the Republican powers that be. And they know it too. That's why they're too scared to do anything to actually challange the Missouri GOP, even after making unambiguous direct threats. I'm pretty sure there's a word for people who make big-talking threats and then are too scared to act on them.

Meet KTRS's Latest "Political Analyst"

Here is KTRS's latest "political analyist" Gina Loudon engaging in her standard constructive political dialogue:

(screenshot via the St. Louis Tea Party blog)

Everyone knows that the most compelling political analysis always begins with holding signs that depict your political opponents as grotesque caricatures of psychopathic killers (for those who can't tell, Loudon is holding a picture of Senator Claire McCaskill with a "joker face"). Obviously KTRS is committed to producing intelligent discussion points, and not simply hosting a guest on who will spit out self-serving Republican talking points disguised as analysis. Thank you, KTRS. for making such a strong effort to educate your listeners.

Also extremely funny: Bill Hennessy promotes Loudon's "Political A-List" on his website. A few days later: he is listed as a "Political A-Lister" on her blog to which he replies, "I am totally undeserving of this recognition." Awwww, what a humble guy! Stand up and take some credit for your quid pro quo!

More later.

Conservatives of America Decides to Fail Even Harder

Earlier, I wrote that Conservatives of America was a huge failure. Well, now the site isn't even bothering to update it's posts:

Update: yes the site does appear to be failing pretty hard, but I've removed some of my other criticisms because I think it detracts from the site. See other posts for more info.