Free Republic

Scooped by Scooter Van Neuter at Big Hairy News

The Liberty Township Tea Party was one of several Tea Party groups in Ohio who were harassed by the IRS in the lead-up to the 2012 elections. The group recently released the extensive list of the questions sent to them by the IRS. Ohio patriot Carol Greenberg sent in this information. As many of you know, the IRS issued an apology for targeting “tea party� and “patriot� groups. We within the Liberty Township Tea Party are painfully aware of these intrusive actions. Click this link and download a PDF to see the type of questions that were demanded of us...

Steven T. Miller, the acting IRS commissioner who managed the division that has admitted targeting anti-Obama Tea Party groups, was one of several agents who investigated anti-Clinton organizations including Judicial Watch during that Democrat´s administration, according to court documents and interviews. Miller, who headed the IRS Services and Enforcement Division from 2009 until the end of last year, is named in court documents as part of a trio of Internal Revenue Service officials who allegedly characterized the 1998-2001 investigation of Judicial Watch as politically motivated.

U.S. Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine) said Sunday that the IRS´ admission of targeting various conservative groups for extra scrutiny was "absolutely chilling," and she called on President Barack Obama to apologize. "This is truly outrageous and it contributes to the profound distrust that the American people have in government," Collins said on CNN´s "State of the Union." "It is absolutely chilling that the IRS was singling out conservative groups for extra review, and I think it´s very disappointing that the president hasn´t personally condemned this and spoken out." The Alabama Democratic Party:

The Internal Revenue Service admitted Friday to improperly targeting conservative groups for aggressive applications processes for tax exempt status in 2012, using the terms “Tea Party” and “patriot” as flags. Here are some of the things they wanted to know about those groups. 1. We’re gonna need all your direct and indirect communication. “‘Direct and indirect communications’ is profoundly chilling of First Amendment rights, ” said David French, senior counsel for American Center for Law & Justice, which has been representing 27 conservative organizations met with IRS inquisitions. “It’s so vague as to be impossible to comply with.”

This Tea Party Thing I am a Tea Party Patriot. I know what that means to me but I am confused about what it means to others. The point of this post is to learn what being a Tea Party Patriot means to other Tea Party Patriots. I doubt I will learn anything that would alter what I believe but I can’t know until it is learned. Declaring I am a Tea Party Patriot means I favor a constitutional government. No more and no less. I accept the Constitution as the proper amount of government. My believe is that the...

A short clip but the parallels between UKIP & UK Conservatives mimics the GOPe & Tea Party.

Commentators across the board have been hailing the "British Tea Party" for at least a year. Daniel Hannan, the Tory MEP, has even tried to launch one, without much success. The latest to ride on the coat-tails of the popular US movement is Nigel Farage, newly re-elected as UK Independence Party leader. Speaking on Sky News, he said that his party shared the feeling of being "overtaxed, overgoverned, not being listened to". He claimed that this gave the party a "bigger political opportunity than ever before" to recruit Tories dissatisfied with David Cameron's EU-friendly policies. Could Ukip be the British...

First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.

Both drinks have fiercely loyal followings. Which side are you on?

Time to tell Rove -and more importantly his good-money-after-bad donors- that this Prog Lite schtick will not only fail to attain incremental black/hispanic/+? votes, but will have conservatives going third-party in droves... Out there pimping his so-called 'Conservative Victory Project', Rove claimed in a speech to the California Republican Party's spring convention in Sacramento this past weekend that '(Republicans) need to ... have people asking for the vote who are comfortable and look like and sound like the people that we're asking for the vote from.' Yet back in reality, the Obammunists have driven this country to the edge of the abyss economically, socially, and...

Democrats and the media have accuses Tea Party favorite Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) of "McCarthyism" merely for posing tough questions to and about Chuck Hagel during the latter's confirmation as Secretary of Defense. Yet a recent column by former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich reveals who the real McCarthyites are in U.S. politics today, as Reich likens the Tea Party to a conspiracy "to undermine the government of the United States." Reich, who has steadfastly supported President Barack Obama's big-government, tax-and-spend agenda, wrote that the Tea Party had "infiltrated" the government at every level, and had used the budget cuts...

Their official name is the Richmond County Tea Party Patriots -- and they arguably put Congressman Michael Grimm (R-NY) in office twice, first in 2010 when Tea Party supported this U.S. Marine veteran for the U.S. House, and again in 2012. Grimm won the 2010 general election for his district which covers both parts of New York City's Staten Island and Brooklyn with 51 percent of the vote. Ron Devito also created a video of the entire collection of speeches. It can be seen on YouTube.

Virginia's House of Delegates has voted to approve what would become the first major reform in a generation of the state's system for financing its highway network. Friday's vote was 60-40.

'...the system of Tammany Hall and the Chicago machine' Weighing-in on PAC-man Karl Rove's semi-declared war on constitutional conservatives, former House Speaker Gingrich made clear in a Human Events column what the discredited RINO-pumper is attempting to do with his so-called 'Conservative Victory Project': basically crush the TEA Party wing and centralize Republican Party power in favor of 'Rockefeller Republican', Big Government RINOs- an effort Newt described as 'repungnant' and alien to GOP principles: _______________________________________________________________________________ It is appalling how little some Republican consultants have learned from the 2012 defeat. It is even more disturbing how arrogant their plans for the future...

'What America needs is not Robin Hood, but Adam Smith' Ever since Sen Paul clearly distanced himself from his dad's wackadoodle foreign policy, I've been starting to think this guy's closer to my own views than what I've been seeing and hearing from Ryan or Rubio -or anybody else- lately: ______________________________________________________________________ After enduring the latest Five Year Plan from Dear Leader, we were last night offered enlightened responses from Sen Marco Rubio (for the Republicans) and fellow GOP Senator Dr Rand Paul, who brought a comprehensive indictment of the Obama fiscal-death-spiral (along with a bright, Reaganite alternative vision) delivered specifically on behalf of the TEA...

Discredited political consultant, blathering TV talking head, and big-bux fundraiser/PAC-man Karl Rove was once hailed by George W Bush as 'The Architect' in the wake of the 2004 campaign victory he had engineered. In retrospect, we'd probably have been better off in the long-term letting John Kerry try and deal with the earthshaking real estate collapse his Dems' own affirmative-action housing initiatives were soon to bring us. Instead, Rove -as White House Senior Adviser and Deputy Chief-of-Staff- resided over a Bush 2nd-term popularity dive so steep and so politically damaging to the GOP brand that the United States seems to have shifted...

The New York Times´s Manny Fernandez greeted the opening of the biannual Texas legislative session in Austin in Wednesday´s paper: "Texas Budget Surplus Proves as Contentious As a Previous Shortfall." After explaining how Texas has become flush with cash over the last two years, going from a budget deficit to surplus, Fernandez couldn´t help working in a cut against the "far-right" Tea Party. Shortly after noon inside the Capitol’s Senate chamber, Gov. Rick Perry told senators that the comptroller’s revenue estimate released the day before was good news, but cautioned them to retain the state’s fiscally conservative model.

NEVER FORGET The Boner 4... As you all well know by now, John Boehner purged TEA Party-types from treasured congressional committee assignments early last month- imo, a BIG mistake he'll come to regret.  Breitbart.com reported this was because they were too principled for the party's spendthrift DC establishment -steadfastly refusing to back off 'no new taxes' pledges made to constituents- while some even think this brazen and ill-advised declaration of war on constitutional conservatives was part of the deep-in-the-shadows backroom 'fiscal cliff' negotiations with the White House (!) If true, you can see that what Agent Orange now expects is a...

FLORIDA’S GOP ESTABLISHMENT TRYING TO REDISTRICT ALLEN WEST OUT OF A SEAT? - January 31st, 2012Allen West: House GOP leadership ‘sold us down the road’ for ‘pathetic policy’ - January 06, 2012

For more than a few of us, the removal of principled conservatives from influential committee assignments this week was the first shot of a new war we all knew was coming following Mittens' anticlimactic defeat: in the now-unfolding battle for control of the Republican Party, we have TEA Party patriots vs. the ossified -yet at the same time squishy- GOP/RNC old-guard... victory here would do the Reaganite/TP wing more good than any third-party attempt ever will. I myself have given Boehner the benefit-of-the-doubt way too many times, and have now concluded this sinister, unprincipled RINO crybaby has got to go: the...

Somewhere, there’s a whiplash lawyer who runs his law office out of a van down by the river who watches the congressional Republicans attempt to negotiate the fiscal cliff crisis and has to turn his head away. John Boehner and his inept coterie of GOP establishment cronies have made every mistake in the book. It’s professionally embarrassing. Frankly, if these hacks were my associates, they’d be on a street corner with signs reading “Will litigate for food.” Congress is famously full of lawyers, but what people don’t understand is that it is really full of bad lawyers. Good lawyers tend...

TEA PARTY VS. PROGRESSIVE REPUBLICANS — BATTLE FOR THE SOUL OF THE GOP December 3, 2012 by Meredith Jessup Editor’s Note: This is the first in a series of articles examining what went wrong for the Republican Party in the 2012 presidential election and where the GOP goes from here. Please visit our special section GOP: What Next? to follow the series stories and find related content. – Since Nov. 6, there has been no shortage of opinions as to why challenger Mitt Romney and the Republican Party failed to ouster President Barack Obama.  Pre-election divisions in the Republican Party...

How do we conservatives win in 2014? It is a question that we must ask and answer now. We must have a plan now. In our current electoral system, we are in a perpetual campaign. This is especially true for Congress since they only have two-year terms. Is there a plan we can use to win in 2014? Yes there is. It is a simple, grass roots plan. What is it? A friend of mine likes to say, we are in the conversion business. This is so true. I know of almost no one who moves from conservatism to liberalism....

Everyone knows that a cup of tea is good for you, but the exact reasons for this are not clear. To discover the fundamentals of tea’s health benefits, scientists in Germany have investigated the interactions of compounds from tea with cells on a molecular level.Both green and black tea contain around 30,000 polyphenolic compounds, some of which have been shown to have numerous health benefits, including reducing cardiovascular disease, osteoporosis and inflammation. Despite their positive effects, which have been seen in epidemiological findings and clinical trials, their exact biochemical mechanism is still not clear. Polyphenols can act as antioxidants,...

Flyers claiming to be from a non-existent Tea Party in Medina, Ohio were placed in mailboxes on Monday urging Ohio voters to defeat "the n***er" in the White House to "help keep our country strong and white." The flyers, obtained by Breitbart News, were found in mailboxes along Rt. 252 in Medina County, Ohio. It is against federal law to place such flyers into mailboxes. Amy Brighton, Co-founder and Co-coordinator of Medina Tea Party Patriots, told Breitbart News that these "disgusting" flyers were a "desperate attempt to smear the millions of Americans involved in and supportive of the tea party...

The president who famously embraced the “Occupy” movement, closed his re-election campaign this weekend by sneering at the Tea Party. After failing to mention the Tea Party by name on the stump in 2012, President Barack Obama mentioned the movement during at least five stump speeches on Thursday and Friday. Noted Politico: At three events Thursday and two on Friday, Obama said that Romney is “pledging to rubber-stamp the tea party agenda in Congress.” “That’s not change,” he added at a high school gymnasium here. “That’s what we need to change.” Perhaps this explains the president’s comment to admirers that...

Super PAC Tea Party Victory Fund is using the "Obama Phone" lady in a new Ohio swing-state aimed ad. The pitch for the video, which asks donors for help in spreading the video in the state, is written by the Fund's chairman Ken Blackwell, Ohio's former secretary of state, via SLATE: This is it-- this is the October surprise. We just need to get this ad on television today. Will you help us? This commercial is a microcosm of the difference between Republicans and Democrats. Republicans want to create an environment where free people make their own choices and pursue...

T-SPLOST (Transportation Special Purpose Local Option Sales Tax) looks to be going down in flames. Good sign that tax payers are fed up?

Is 16.9 oz. the perfect size? Who knows? We willingly submit to the unforgiving judgment of the market.As a fellow entrepreneur with a public-service orientation, I have been a longtime admirer of Mayor Michael Bloomberg's entrepreneurial spirit and commitment to acting on his principles. Having launched Honest Tea 14 years ago with five thermoses and a belief that consumers were thirsty for a lower-calorie natural and organic beverage, I appreciate all he has accomplished. However, I write today as an entrepreneur frustrated by a proposal that arbitrarily complicates the practical realities of commerce. When the mayor announced his proposal to...

Another act of mass violence, another round of finger-pointing directed at tea party members. When ABC News issued a report Friday suggesting that the horrific shooting at a Colorado movie theater was perpetrated by a suspect with ties to the movement, the situation had a familiar feel to it, tea party leaders say. Just as in January 2011, when the Tucson shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords sparked speculation that the perpetrator was either affiliated with the tea party or influenced by its anti-government rhetoric, members were again wrongly fingered as possible culprits and forced to defend themselves against the assumption...

<p>During a public event at the Reform Congregation - Keneseth Israel in Jenkintown, Pa for Obama (which no Republicans were invited to speak at) - We arrived to find Myron Goldman - a Jewish American for Romney handing out literature. He was told to leave.</p>

“Several commenters mistook my use of the microwave as the way all Americans heat water and clucked their tongues in disapproval. I’m happy to report to any of those who’ve returned to the site that I’m quite atypical in this regard. The standard American way to heat water is to take a pot of water out to our pickup truck, open the hood (what the Brits call a “spanner”), and lock the pot onto the engine block using a set of latches readily available at any Wal-Mart. Then we drive around at high speed, reciting the Gospels and firing our...

Starbucks Coffee Co. will continue expanding beyond its coffee-serving cafes with its first stand-alone tea shop. They also will be able to choose among iced teas, tea lattes and full-leaf tea sachets. In addition to tea, the store will feature packaged chocolates, infused sugars and honey. Other foods and brewing merchandise will also be available. Tazo already represents a $1-billion business for Starbucks, executives said in April, when they briefly referenced the brand's "unique opportunities … in multiple channels of distribution." Starbucks bought Tazo in 1999 for $8.1 million. Some estimates peg the global tea market to be worth $95...

(CNSNews.com) – Senate Republicans want to know if the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) has any legal standing to demand donor information from various Tea Party and conservative groups, which the IRS apparently is pursuing. “We remain concerned that the IRS is requesting the names of donors and contributors to organizations that apply for tax-exempt status,” says the Senate letter sent to IRS Commissioner Douglas H. Schulman on Monday. “In doing so, the IRS appears to be circumventing the statutory privacy protections that Congress has long provided donors.” The letter is signed by Republican Sens. Orrin Hatch of Utah; Mitch McConnell...

h/t Speedunque Some runners-up at Reaganite Republican

Science fiction author Ray Bradbury sits in front of a photo of Mars, presented to him during an 83rd birthday party in his honor on Aug. 23, 2003. Ray Bradbury, master of the sci-fi fantasy and author of Fahrenheit 451, died Tuesday at 91.The man who chronicled dystopian societies had strong political beliefs and spoke as darkly about contemporary politics as he did about burning books. "I think our country is in need of a revolution," the Los Angeles Times quoted him as saying in 2010. "There is too much government today. We've got to remember the government should be...

Talk about a sharply divided electorate. Gov. Scott Walker won Tuesday's recall election by topping his Democratic challenger, Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett, among independents, according to exit poll results in the state. Voters were passionately divided on the Republican-backed law that ended collective bargaining for most public employees and teachers.

The real Tea Party, the Tea Party of Samual Adams was a lot different than the metrosexual Tea Party of today. The Samuel Adam's Tea Party, which helped contribute to the start of the Revolution, was made up of true believers, men willing to fight and die for their convictions

Tea should also be made differently depending on its type.Tea comes from the Camellia sinensis shrub, which is native to China and India. Green, black, white and oolong tea all come from the same plant. The difference is in how much the leaves are processed. According to Chris Brown, who conducts tastings and classes at the British Tea Garden and Rooftop Cafe in Tecumseh, Mich., it’s all about oxidation, which can be thought of as similar to what happens to a banana when it’s exposed to air. Black tea is highly oxidized, while green tea is less processed, and white...

There’s a new rule in American politics: Republican senators and Senate hopefuls who are too close to Washington and show streaks of moderation are toast — or most certainly poised for a grilling of their lifetime...

Sen. Dick Lugar (R-Ind.) is 10 points behind his primary opponent, according to a new nonpartisan poll, making it highly unlikely he'll win Tuesday's contest. Lugar trails Indiana state Treasurer Richard Mourdock (R) 48 percent to 38, according to a poll released Friday from Howey Politics Indiana and DePauw University. That is Mourdock's largest lead in any poll conducted of the race, including those by groups backing him. This is the latest — and biggest — bad sign for the six-term incumbent: The poll is considered the most accurate in the state. Lugar already has seen a major outside group...

On 4/26/2012 9:42 AM, Heather Gass wrote: RECAP: Tea Partiers attended the “Angry white Women of the Tea Party” lecture in the People’s Republic of Berkeley, Ca. Yesterday Here we were, Tea Party members, third row front and center at the Freight and Salvage Theatre in Berkeley, waiting for the lecture to begin. Our speaker was Ruth Rosen: feminist, liberal progressive, author, columnist and all around women's liberation chronicler. This diminutive figure in a dress and matching pink scarf was introduced with all her college letters, literary successes and public writings. We had come to hear her lecture on "The...

Former Obama administration adviser Van Jones said the country should re-elect President Barack Obama to “stop the tea party” because former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney would “govern as a tea party president.” Jones also said that some of Obama’s supporters misunderstood Obama as a “social movement leader” after his victory in the 2008 presidential race rather than as “head of state.” (RELATED: Full coverage of the tea party movement) “We have to win politically in November to stop the tea party. We don’t want a tea party presidency, and I don’t care what you think about Mitt Romney. If we...

While you probably haven’t heard of Noelle Nguyen, her latest project is quickly gaining steam, because it combines her powerful personal testimony with an e-commerce concept to boost American manufacturing at a time when local businesses are struggling to stay afloat amidst global competition… You see, as a child, Noelle and her family fled Saigon after the Viet Cong overran the city. To make matters worse, the boat that served as their escape vessel was raided by pirates. Noelle’s mother had swallowed her wedding ring to ensure that the jewelry wasn’t confiscated, and good thing she did – mom was...

HELENA, Mont. - "Three Cups of Tea" author Greg Mortenson will remain the face of the charity the Minnesota native co-founded, despite his having to repay $1 million after an investigative report released Thursday concluded he mismanaged the organization and misspent its money. Central Asia Institute Interim Executive Director Anne Beyersdorfer said Mortenson will continue to draw a salary from the charity. But it won't be as executive director and he is barred from being a voting member of the board of directors as long as he is still employed by the organization.

This cartoon best answers the question "What's the difference between the Tea Partiers and the Occupiers?" DO-ERS VS LOSERS

Where it the comprehensive list of Tea Party rallies and other events for 2012? Here is the wiki, suggest updating that as well: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tea_Party_protests I do not see any in Manhattan. We need to have one a month until election day. Let's get on the street, good people of the United States!