Early next month, Sarah Palin will be the keynote speaker at a political convention in Nashville, Tennessee. But rather than addressing the Republican National Committee or the mainstream Conservative Political Action Conference, whose invitation she rejected, Palin will be headlining the first annual National Tea Party Convention.
The fact that this event even exists might come as a surprise to many–this disparate group of zealous protesters is trying to form an actual political party? Indeed, the convention will pull together various Tea Party and anti-government organizations from across the country, giving them the opportunity to network and coordinate future activities. With the attendance of Palin and U.S. Reps. Michele Bachmann and Marsha Blackburn, the prospect of this loose-knit coalition of ultraconservatives forging a single, structured party seems increasingly plausible.
Moreover, the Tea Party movement has shown broad appeal beyond the fringe of right-wing extremism. While only 28 percent and 35 percent of Americans have a positive view of the Republican and Democratic Parties, respectively, 41 percent have a positive view of the Tea Party movement. The support does not seem constrained by geography either, with ordinarily moderate states such as Maryland and Florida becoming hotbeds of Tea Party action. In fact, a growing number of Floridians have turned against Senate candidate and popular moderate Republican Governor Charlie Crist in favor of a new conservative named Marco Rubio–the first potential Tea Party senator? Even with the well-documented malcontent over the future of America, only recently has the possibility of going in an entirely new direction become so real.
Naturally, liberals and moderate conservatives have scorned this rise. These sentiments are entirely reasonable given the rancorous hatred Tea Party protestors have engaged in; they have called the president everything from a communist to a Nazi to a terrorist, held posters of him as a caricatured African witch doctor and thrown around the n-word with no heed. There is no doubt that some, even many, of their members openly wish harm upon members of the federal government and anyone who supports them. Some are unabashedly racist and filled to the brim with hate.
Yet, 41 percent of Americans have a positive view of these people. And while much of this might be attributable to many voters’ having only a passing knowledge of the Tea Party’s actual nature, that is certainly enough support to garner attention.
The Editorial Board cautions against simply dismissing the Tea Party as a benign assortment of backwoods bigots; reactionary populism of this kind must be observed with caution and alertness.
How best to confront the issue of these Tea Partiers remains an open question. Perhaps largely ignoring their presence on the national stage will be successful in allowing the enthusiasm to fade. Maybe they can be subdued by, as the Board has suggested before, engaging the moderate right in real bipartisan progress that will give some conservatives a better venue for their beliefs. Any course of action has its benefits and its flaws. But what we absolutely must not do is give this movement what it wants. We, the Stanford population, are the highly educated, largely liberal elite that these people love so much to revile. By scoffing at the Tea Party or disparaging its members, we play into the caricature they have created for us and fuel their fire of anger–which, at the moment, represents their only real foundation.