As to your post, you're preaching to the choir. So, no need to get upset. The Founder of FR is a Tea Party member and he assures his conservative brethren that the Tea Party is filled with good social conservative, pro-life Christians. Good enough for me.
Having said that, this conservative will remain vigilant against any and all forms of liberal, libertarian and neocon minorities looking to undermine social conservatism.
>>>>>The common ground among all these things is the spending, spending, spending by our government on these and other things it has no business doing - the Tea Partiers recognize that we can no longer afford any of this stuff because we are flat broke as a nation.
We conservatives have been fighting against big government, the welfare state, excessive spending and social liberalism forever. As far as I'm concerned the Tea Party is an off-shoot of the conservative movement.
Just this morning I've been on several threads that had to do with taxes and spending. Along with ongoing battles against fraudulent efforts of a clown named, Donald Trump and his minions. Also, I've been hitting Boehner and his crew over the head for their measly budget deal with Obama and the Dems. Been giving kudos to Cong Ryan for his courageous 2012 budget proposal.
You see, conservatives can handle more than one issue at a time. We conservatives can juggle fiscal issues and social issues without missing a beat.
re: “The Tea Party movement will damage their brand if they attempt to purge social issues from their agenda. Period. That includes the pro-life issue, the marriage issue and the homo issue among others. I can’t be more plain and to the point then that.”
I agree that if the Tea Party tries to “purge” Americans who are pro-life and pro-traditional values from “participating” in the Tea Party, then you would be correct.
But, that is not what is being done. The “agenda” of the Tea Party is “get back to the Constitution in regard to spending and taxation” - not stopping abortion, not stopping gay marriage, etc. It’s agenda is to stop unconstitutional spending - that would include spending to fund Planned Parenthood, unions, the NEA, EPA, etc.
Attempting to force the Tea Party “agenda” to include all the social conservative issues will, I believe, dull the momentum of the movement. Right now, the Tea Party welcomes all who are against unconstitutional government spending and taxation no matter what your political stripe.
I agree that the Tea Party leader of the California event was a jerk to the pro-life guy - he should have presented the fiscal argument better. But, the fact remains that the single, formost agenda of the Tea Party is to serve as a protest movement against the unconstitutional, out of control, insane government spending and taxation already discussed.
Allowing anyone and any group that happens to attend a Tea Party rally to say “the Tea Party also respresents this or that”, or pass out tracts promoting pro-”anything” other than fiscal responsibility will fragment the movement. The Tea Party should not promote pro-gay, pro-illegal alien either because THAT also would fragment the movement.