It has worked and is still working. I don't want to see it stagnate. It is getting the message across to those that will go beyond what the media portrays us as, but now I think we need to get the 'eye rollers' to listen and understand what we are about. I am in MA and I'm a Tea Party 'member' - I've been out there since Feb '09 - I still get the 'rolling eyes' (Republican and Democrat alike)when I bring up the Tea Party - these are people who only see the silly costumes and quirky signs(I've been in newspaper articles holding funny signs)that the media can grab and run on their programs.
A snip from the link above from Beck~
First impressions make well, for anybody who hasn't been with the tea parties and see, you are not going after the Republicans. You're not. You're not getting that. You've done that. Now you're and you've done the independence. They get it. They'll stand with you. But now you have to go after the Democrats, and the Democrats have been hypnotized by the news saying they're not like you, they're dangerous, they're racist, they're they're saying these things all the time. And what are they doing? They're playing the pictures over and over and over again. So what is more effective to be able to get the Democrats to listen to your message? Believe me I've I've been talking to liberals, my friends who are diehard liberals who will say I can't get again let me turn it around in the opposite way.
We have to get everyone on board - there are more out there that are 'We the People' that aren't seeing the message through the costumes and cute signs - we got the ones that understand the message, we need to teach the ones still wearing the medias rose-colored glasses.
I agree with your points, but I don’t agree (if this is what you’re suggesting) that it’s an “either/or.”
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/2591085/posts
I think signs actually HELP rebut stupid stuff such as this. Dean et al. can say all he wants that the Tea Party has a racist element, but when pic after pic shows sign after sign that proves that the Tea Party is about spending, limiting government, getting back to Americanism, it is harder for such stupid accusations to stick.
If protest crowds are NOT displaying their ideas for all to see, they are even more vulnerable to the liars on the Left painting them however they want with impunity.
And as far as being taken seriously as a political movement whose IDEAS are winning elections, Dean proves that, too.