Do you believe recent polls or reports saying the Tea Party is dwindling? The media has swayed public opinion on this, but conservatives must be reminded to stay the course.
Occupy Wall Street was promoted effusively by the mainstream media yet on the one year anniversary of OWS last September, New York City could only muster 1,000 demonstrators. Where are they now? A common catalyst leading to the break out of the Tea Party in 2009 and Occupy in 2011 was the policies of Barack Obama.
It’s been proven OWS was about as spontaneous as the attack at Benghazi. The movement was a planned uprising organized by socialists, unions, and left-wing activists. We now know many protestors had jobs, good incomes or college degrees while hypocritically demanding economic justice in the hopes of overthrowing America’s systems.
In contrast, I recently spoke at a Tea Party meeting. Though the movement has branched off into many organized groups, there are hundreds of weekly and monthly meetings continuing to take place across America. The TP has not gone away and continues to be a thorn in the side of the Obama White House and the moderate Republican establishment.
These were two of the biggest public movements affecting America in years, but there was a stark difference in how the media reported on them. For example, Occupy Wall Street drew 24 broadcast network stories in the first nine days of coverage while the Tea Party drew only 19 in the first nine months! This isn’t journalism, folks. The media practically became OWS’s public relations department.
The Tea Party is a conservative grassroots entity. Occupy Wall Street is [was] a well-organized creation supported in part by the leftist Tides Foundation, a major recipient of George Soros’s funding, MoveOn.org, as well as international interests. Massive government spending and the passage of Obamacare were two major factors that galvanized the TP while Vancouver, Canada-based AdBusters, an anti-consumerist publication sounded the initial call for OWS.
The TP endorses cutting both spending and taxes, reducing the national debt, and adherence to the US Constitution. They also aim to call awareness to issues challenging the security or sovereignty of the United States. OWS protested the disparity of wealth in America, capitalism, corporations, and big business. The primary OWS goals are equal distribution of wealth by government through taxation, financial aid for students/more jobs for college graduates, corporate regulation, and bank reform.
ABC, CBS, and NBC flooded their morning and evening newscasts in October 2011 with 33 full stories on OWS. In contrast, the Tea Party was initially ignored.
The story ratio was nineteen favorable to only one critical of OWS. (190 to 10) When confrontations erupted between the police and protestors, networks, being sympathetic to the OWS cause, were much more likely to pin the blame on police. Overall, American media continued to overlook arrests, property damage, public health concerns, assaults, and anti-Semitism.
What did OWS produce? Over 7,719 arrests in 122 different cities as of December 2012. (Over two thousand in New York City alone.) Charges included civil disobedience, disturbing the peace, trespassing, drug use, and vandalism. Police rap sheets showed dozens of incidents of sexual assault, violence, and extortion.
There were at least nine deaths. The media also failed to report on the OWS money trail leading to big unions such as SEIU. The Nancy Pelosi-endorsed, White House-approved (President Obama said, “We are on their side”) protests included American flags hung upside down, desecrated, or burned. Some protesters openly admitted to being Socialists, Communists and Marxists, but the media was virtually silent on these associations.
Groups openly supporting OWS include the Communist Party USA, Louis Farrakhan and Nation of Islam, CAIR, American Nazi Party, Marxist Student Union, and Socialist Party of America.
Conversely, the Tea Party produced the mobilization of tens of millions of American patriots, many of whom have never before been involved in politics. They fly their flags at peaceful rallies, and they’re proud of America’s founders and Constitution. They love this country and are willing to stand up to big government.
The DNC called the Tea Party “rabid right-wing extremists.” ABC said they were a “mob.” CNN accused them of “rabble rousing.” Harry Reid called them “evil mongers.” Nancy Pelosi said they were “un-American.” Anderson Cooper and other liberals simply insult them.
President Obama has unleashed a tidal wave of bills, executive orders, and policies in efforts to make good on his promise to “fundamentally transform the United States of America.” The result has been monstrous debt, relentless regulation, increasing taxes, and social policies that go against our Christian values.
Remember when this administration caused such a massive voter backlash in the 2010 Midterm elections the media had no idea how to spin the landslide? The GOP gained a record 65 seats in the House; Republicans also gained 680 seats in state legislatures and picked up ten state governorships. It was the largest margin of victory since the 1930’s. People of America woke up, spoke up, and voted. However, this is now about changing culture.
Our freedoms are under attack. We missed an opportunity in 2012 by failing to keep the momentum going. A friend recently reminded me, “Elections are not the leading edge of change. Elections are the lagging indicators of what’s already changed.”
Some now suggest our strategy needs to be: re-brand, retool, recruit, and re-engage. OWS may be plotting from underground, but the Tea Party is publicly active. We know what side the media is on. Let’s keep exposing hypocrisy and sharing the truth.
Click here for Part 2, exposing Green Energy Failures/media protecting Obama: