[workerbee]

What does the TEA Party have to do with this incident, other than give the author an excuse to trumpet his disdain for the TEA Party?

(rhetorical question)

[Zeppo]

Evidently Adam Liptak is afraid that if he doesn't practice his NYT 'journalist' skills (of sneering, condescension and contempt for the unwashed rubes) often enough they will atrophy and die from disuse...

Either that, or the NYT pays him extra for dissing the Tea Party