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Glenn Beck yesterday had on both of the Republican candidates in the California Senate primary, the winner of which race will be facing Barbara Boxer. And both Chuck DeVore and Carly Fiorina worked hard to curry Beck's favor, though it isn't hard to figure out which one won, judging by Beck's headline: "Is Chuck DeVore the next Scott Brown?"

Both interviews were essentially explorations by the candidates of Glenn Beck's favorite theme, to wit, progressives are the root of all evil in American life. This was especially the case in the interview with DeVore, who actively stoked Beck's fetish about Woodrow Wilson:

DEVORE: Well, Woodrow Wilson and people like Frank Goodnow, about 130 years ago, saw the Constitution as a roadblock to their plans for perfecting government and for basically ushering in a paradise on earth. And instead of what was set up by Madison to be a separation of powers, with the legislative, the executive and the judicial, because the Founders understood that people like power. And that you'll end up with tyranny in your country if you can't separate the powers.

...

BECK: I think the system is full of — it's riddled with a disease called progressive. If you've got cancer, no doctor says, yes start using filter tips cigarettes. They say no more cigarettes.

DEVORE: Right.

BECK: Progressives and the progressive idea are the cigarettes. So you tell me how to fix it.

Ah, nothing like a little eliminationism in the afternoon, is there?

Predictably, DeVore also revealed himself as one of those Patriot "tenthers" frequently promoted by Beck -- right-wing extremists who believe the Tenth Amendment gives states the ability to nullify federal law:

DEVORE: Well, first of all, we have to follow the Constitution. That's the very first thing that any lawmaker does when they get sworn in.

(CROSSTALK)

BECK: This audience won't, but most people say well, where aren't we following the Constitution?

DEVORE: Well, where do we start?

I think a good obvious place is Tenth Amendment. As a state lawmaker, I find my powers as a state lawmaker being short-circuited at the federal level.

As we've explained, these theories originated in the 1990s with the militia/Patriot movement.

Fiorina, in contrast, was perfectly corporate even as she tried to assure Beck that she really was a populist:

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Mostly she did this by joining Beck in the progressive-bashing:

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Oh, man, is Meghan McCain ever asking for it:

In an appearance on ABC's The View, Meghan McCain also took issue with a number of recent statements from Sarah Palin, criticizing the former Alaska governor for defending Rush Limbaugh's use of the word "retard" and for suggesting that President Obama launch a war against Iran in order to win a second term.

McCain described Former Republican congressman Tom Tancredo's call for a literacy test for voters as "innate racism."

McCain obviously also has issues with Palin, but it was Tancredo's speech -- in which he thanked God that McCain's father lost the election -- that stuck in her craw:

"It's innate racism, and I think it's why young people are turned off by this movement," McCain retorted on The View.

"I'm sorry, but revolutions start with young people, not 65 year old people talking about literacy tests and people who can't say the word 'vote' in English," McCain added.

McCain, a self-described "progressive Republican," criticized Palin's assertion that President Obama could get himself re-elected to a second term if he launched a war against Iran.

"You should never go to war unless its the absolute last circumstance," McCain said.

As for Palin's defense of Rush Limbaugh for using the word "retard" after calling for White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel's resignation over the same word last week, McCain said it was a symbol of "exactly what is wrong with politics today.

"We can't placate and say Democrats can say one thing and Republicans can say another thing," she said.

McCain added that the rhetoric coming from the Tea Party movement and from Republicans like Palin "will continue to turn off young voters, and anybody who says different is smoking something."

Why, if she only watched Fox News, McCain would know that America loves this movement and it's full of revolutionary fervor and all kinds of vim and vigor and pep!

Translation: Intraparty heretics like Meghan McCain are political roadkill. Like her dad.

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Sarah Palin's followers no doubt thought she gave a great speech at the National Tea Party Convention last night. Actually, it was pretty much cookie-cutter stuff, sprinkled with the requisite cheap shots at President Obama. If red meat is your thing, there was plenty. But as always with Palin, there was no substance, and the delivery was pretty close to fingernails clawing their way down a blackboard.

Mostly, she staked out the core political position of the Tea Party movement as the right-wing populism we've already recognized it as. But she repeated that the movement was about "the people," and indeed wrapped it up with an incoherent bit of babble featuring "the people."

There was the requisite nod to the ah, "revolutionary" component of the movement:

Palin: And I am a big supporter of this movement, I believe in this movement. Got lots of friends and family in the Lower 48 who attend these events and across the country, just knowing that this is the movement, and America is ready for another revolution, and you are a part of this.

Of course, the Tea Partiers like to insist that this is a non-violent revolution. But the way they keep packing guns around at public gathering as demonstrations of their constitutional rights, the rest of us aren't feeling all that assured.

Palin also made an interesting remark about Tea Party candidates taking out regular Republican candidates:

Palin: A lot of great common-sense conservative candidates -- they're gonna put it all on the line in 2010, and this year, there are gonna be some tough primaries. And I think that's good. Competition in these primaries is good, competition makes us work harder and be more efficient, and produce more. And I hope you'll get out there and work hard for the candidates who reflect your values, your priorities, because, despite what the pundits want you to think, contested primaries aren't civil war. They're democracy at work, and that's beautiful.

Yeah, we bet John McCain thinks it's just beautiful that he's facing a tough primary challenge from Tea Party favorite J.D. Hayworth this year. Palin later told the audience how proud she was to run with McCain on his ticket, but she seemed to be encouraging candidates like Hayworth. Sounds like some serious cognitive dissonance going on there.

Mostly, Palin spent a lot of time slagging Obama:

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Pat Buchanan unleashed his inner Tea Partier yesterday on Hardball, telling Chris Matthews that he would campaign for Tea Party challenger J.D. Hayworth over John McCain in their Arizona primary race. Hayworth, you may recall, recently voiced support for the Birthers on the same show:

MATTHEWS: Where are you on McCain versus Hayworth?

BUCHANAN: If I‘m out in Arizona, I would vote for J.D. Hayworth, who is a friend of mine and a conservative. And if he lost, I would vote for John McCain.

MATTHEWS: OK, we know where you stand.

Joan Walsh took him to task for it:

WALSH: We absolutely know where you stand. He‘s a birther. He‘s an extremist. Thank you, Pat.

The "Birther" matter is only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to Hayworth. Back in 2006, en route to losing his congressional seat, Hayworth tried to revive Henry Ford's program of "Americanism," which you may recall was actually a code word for anti-Semitic eliminationism; it was also a favorite program promoted avidly by the Ku Klux Klan in the 1920s.

Hayworth lost that race, in no small part because of voters were repelled by his lame denials about the "Americanization" program.

Of course, none of this would bother the author of State of Emergency: The Third World Invasion and Conquest of America, would it?

But because he's still our avuncular Uncle Pitchfork, he of course resorted to the standard retort of conservatives when confronted with the realities of the extremists in their midst:

BUCHANAN: This is why you lose—do you know why you lose these people? Because you show contempt for them. You call them birthers. You call them names. I‘m talking about the people, the Tea Party people. All they want, Joan, is respect. And you liberals never give it to them. You call them all names. No wonder they go over to the Republican party.

Walsh then took Buchanan apart:

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Norah O'Donnell asks Vision America and Tea Party Convention sponsor Rick Scarborough if he's got any problem with Sarah Palin profiting from her speaking engagement at the National Tea Party Convention and the fact that she is using her PAC money to buy copies of her book rather than contribute to candidates.

Of course Scarborough just trusts Palin completely and doesn't see any problem with what she's doing. I don't think I've seen this much spin out of anyone on the talking head shows on cable news in a long time. When these Tea Bag Party protesters are going to wake up to being taken for a ride by the Republicans and Palin who's lining her pocket is beyond me. I doubt it's any time soon if they all just keep watching ClusterFox for their "news".

O’Donnell: But what I’m raising questions with you as someone who feels so strongly about this is whether the Tea Party is actually a movement for change of if it’s one where people are making a personal profit off of some people who want to make change. Let me just show you, Think Progress which of course is a progressive organization has reported that the event organizers of the Tea Party Express manager and Republican public relations firm Russo, Marsh and Rogers has padded its pocket with over one million dollars in money raised by the Tea Party group. Does that concern you that funds by people who want change are being used to pad consultants rather than to elect people that you want to change Washington?

Scarborough: Once again Norah I’m not here to defend or deny; I don’t have enough information to even make a judgement on those kinds of things but what I can say to you is that I am going to invest my time and energy and any finances that people are gracious to give me to do it to find as many Christians, as many concerned Americans as I can, inform them of what the issues are and get them to the polls to vote in the primaries and finally in the election in the fall and I’m grateful for this opportunity to look anybody that will listen in the eye and say hey join us. Join us for the cause of changing America.

O’Donnell: I know but Dr. Scarborough the points that I’m trying to ask is because of this for profit nature of the very event that you’re at, Michele Bachmann who’s been called the leader of the Tea Party movement or one of the leaders is not going to show up. Marsha Blackburn is not showing up. So there are already some issues that may prevent you from having the very people you need to carry out your revolution.

Scarborough: Sure…yeah. It won’t keep me from carrying out mine because both of them are allies and what we do and stand for the values we hold dear, as you I trust know, Democrats and the majority that sit in Congress right now are filing all manner of investigations upon anyone on the conservative side. There are legal issues that have been raised and even if these folks like Sarah Palin find in the course of law that they’re right it costs them hundreds of thousands of dollars and hundreds of hours of distraction to prove their innocence so I fully understand why some of these conservative Congressmen pulled out. They’re not opposed to this. They just don’t want the hassle that ethics committees in Congress will cause them. I don’t have the struggle so here I am.

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Well, we knew the National Tea Party Convention this week was going to be a real festival of outrageous wingnuttery, but Tom Tancredo's speech to kick things off will already be hard to top:

Tancredo: Every year, the liberal Dems and the RINO Republicans turned up the temperature ever so slightly. It seemed after awhile that we'd all be boiled to death in a cauldron of the nanny state.

And then something really odd happened -- mostly because we do not have a civics literacy test before people can vote in this country.

[Applause]

People who cannot even spell the word "vote," or say it in English -- [applause] -- put a committed socialist ideologue in the White House. Name is Barack Hussein Obama.

It's hard to say which was more disturbing: Tancredo's apparent call for reinstituting laws that, as John Byrne at Raw Story points out, were a fundamental component of Jim Crow in the post-Reconstruction South, or the massive round of applause he received for saying it. (The New York Daily News has more on the literacy tests.)

Yes, these people really are nuts. Witness, for instance, the applause Tancredo got for saying he was glad McCain lost -- because, after all, McCain was for "amnesty" too:

If McCain had been elected, the neocons would be writing flattering editorials in the Weekly Standard and the Wall Street Journal. Congressman Gutierrez and President McCain would have been posing in the Rose Garden with big smiles as they received accolades from La Raza for having finally passed an amnesty.

Of course, most of the speech was just Tancredo channeling Glenn Beck. (The boiled frog metaphor was the giveaway, along with the "committed socialist ideologue" bit. As well as lines like this:

So the race for America is on, right now. The President and his left-wing allies in Congress are going to look at every opportunity to destroy the Constitution before we have a chance to save it.

But as always with Tancredo -- as with his audience -- the real motivation comes down to defending white culture:

Some things we can deal with in just a political way -- which is, you know, by the votes we cast. Other things will require a commitment to passing on our culture -- and we really do have one, you know, it is based on Judeo-Christian principles whether people like it or they don't!

[Applause]

That's who we are! That is who we are! And if you don't like it, don't come here! And if you're here and you don't like it, go home! Go someplace else!

As the editors at Imagine 2050 observed:

It is obvious that Beck and Tancredo are trying to push the issue of immigration to the forefront of the tea party movement, something that was explicitly clear during Tancredo’s speech. The acts that followed paled in comparison to Tancredo, who definitely stole the first night spotlight of the three day event.

Indeed. If you thought the Tea Partiers went nuts at those town-hall forums on health care, wait till immigration reform is the issue. It's going to be very ugly.

Tom Tancredo, of course, will be leading the way, pitchfork in hand.

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President Obama ignored warnings not to appear at the National Prayer Breakfast today, since it was organized by fundamentalist religionists whose animus towards not just him but all progressives has been all too obvious for years. But he did anyway -- and, as Sam Stein at HuffPo reports, actually managed to deliver an important message about the critical role of civility in a democratic society.

The main point was that right-wing nutcases, and their frothing about Obama's supposed foreignness and radicalism and hatred of Christianity, make it impossible to even have a rational discussion:

Obama: Civility also requires relearning how to disagree without being disagreeable -- understanding, as President [Kennedy] said, 'Civility is not a sign of weakness.' Now I am the first to confess I am not always right. Michelle will testify to that. But surely, you can question my policies without questioning my faith. Or for that matter, my citizenship.

No doubt, the talkers at Fox will take this as evidence that he hates the "jes' folks" who populate the Tea Parties.

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RushBo, General of the conservative movement gave his orders to the rank-and-file teabaggers today on Fox and Friends with Gretchen Carlson: Do not desert and get with the program.

How will the Tea Party movement like being told what to do? If the teabaggers were really part libertarian, they would create a third party because many of them do come from the Ron Paul party and they aren't fans of the GOP, but as many of us know, most tea partiers are arch conservatives and really only want and see all progressive policies revoked, including Social Security and Medicare, while making sure all the brown people stay where they belong. Hey, maybe I can write a letter and see if Grover, Ralph Reed or even Jack Abramoff (from behind bars) will cosign it, asking the Tea Party movement to stay true to their values and form a third party if they really hate the Republicans.

Carlson: One thing I like to do at the end of interviews is quiz the interviewee on a scale of one to ten. So on a scale of one to ten: Do you think Barack Obama will be re-elected in three years? Limbaugh: One being no, and ten being absolutely?

Carlson: Yes.

Limbaugh: Ah, one.

Carlson: One. Really?

Limbaugh: Yes.

Carlson: On a scale of one to ten, will Hillary Clinton challenge Barack Obama for the Democratic -- ?

Limbaugh: Seven.

Carlson: Seven.

Limbaugh: Laying the groundwork even as we speak.

Carlson: In what way?

Limbaugh: Saying, ‘No, I have no desire to run for president.’ They say that – it’s like a coach getting a vote of confidence from the owner, and gets canned the next day. Saying you don’t want to run is a clear signal that you’re thinking about it and you want to. The Clintons have just as much ambition to get back there as Obama had to get there. And it’s – they will pounce on this weakness.

Carlson: On a scale of one to ten, that the Tea Party will become the Independent Party.

Limbaugh: Three.

Carlson: Why?

Limbaugh: They’re going to come to senses and realize that all third parties do is guarantee the election of the Democrats. The Perot party was the same thing. Let the Democrats do the third-party thing. The success here in the future is gonna be conservatism dominating, retaking if you will, the Republican Party.

I'm not sure why the Generalisimo is so worried that they would start an independent party. Many Teabagger leaders already have been telling the media that they indeed not only want to be part of the GOP, but they want to own it.

MATTHEWS: Matt, how about third party? What about the Tea Party? Sarah Palin is kind of hard to read. She is fascinating. Let‘s face it, we‘re all fascinated with her, because she‘s exciting as a political figure right now. But she‘s talking third party. I mean, she answered the question of Lars Larson. Maybe it just came to mind, but she said, yeah, I might go third party, something like that. Would you guys knock off an incumbent Republican by going third party? You know how the vote splits. Split the right, the Dem wins.

KIBBE: The better way to do it is to take over the Republican party. Frankly, that‘s what our goal is. We need to replace the Republican establishment with fiscal conservatives that are actually willing to cut spending.

If they pull it off, you can forget about public education, EPA, Social Security, Medicaid/Medicare, women's rights and the like. And the sad part is that the teabaggers' own lives will be just as damaged by conservative rule as the rest of America -- and yet they will be happy in doing so.

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Boy, wait till the teabaggers get ahold of this guy.

Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, on Greta Van Susteren's Fox News show yesterday, after his dialogue with President Obama at the House Republican retreat:

Chaffetz: But as I said to the president, I said look, I'm just a freshman here, I didn't create this mess, but I am here to help clean it up. So I don't want to hear about the background here, let's work on moving forward. And so, the rhetoric's good. I just want to make sure that the reality's good. And so, I -- you know, it was a good dialogue, I appreciate him coming. I'm not going to just bite off his hand when he sticks it out. When he has good things to offer, we'll be right there with him. But this transparency in the process is critical, and so -- I thought it was a good step forward today. We'll see if it continues above and beyond just this one event.

...

Van Susteren: Well, it seemed to me that it was a good start to have everybody talking, because it's gotten a little high school here in Washington, where the Republicans are said to be obstructionists, and the Democrats are said to be excluding Republicans. Is there another meeting planned, or is this a sort of like -- you know, if it happens one time, it looks sort of like, you know, it's staged, it's a prop. If you do this routinely, meet with the president, that seems like a huge step forward. Is there another date scheduled?

Chaffetz: There isn't yet. I mean, this is something that really hasn't happened in 12 months -- he came over in February of last year, and we had a nice, small exchange. But, you know, since what's happened with Scott Brown, and some other types of things, hopefully it's moving in the right direction.

I think both sides want that to happen. I went up to him afterward, I shook his hand, I thanked him for being here, and said, 'Look, I'm not just gonna take potshots at you. I'd love to work with you.' And he kind of reciprocated and said he had heard good things, and so I hope, I hope, I'm an optimist!

You can start your countdown for the denunciations from Tea Party types, accusing Chaffetz of being a "RINO."

Because everyone knows that real Republicans want Obama to fail. Saying you'll "work with him" is a betrayal of the Tea Party purity test. Heaven forfend.

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Sarah Palin confirmed on Greta Van Susteren's show last night that she's very much planning to show up and speak at the National Tea Party Convention in Nashville, despite the distinct odor of Scam the whole affair is giving off.

Palin: Oh, you betcha I'm going to be there. I'm going to speak there because there are people traveling from many miles away to hear what that Tea Party movement is all about and what that message is that should be received by our politicians in Washington. I'm honored to get to be there.

This, even as some of her fellow wingnuts are catching the same whiff -- namely, Reps. Michele Bachmann and Marsha Blackburn, who have pulled out of the event:

In separate statements, released by their congressional offices, the lawmakers said that appearing at the convention might conflict with House ethics rules. But they also said they are concerned about how money raised from the event will be spent.

Palin last night had no such concerns -- and said no one should be concerned about that big wad of cash the convention organizers are paying her:

Palin: The speaker's fee will go right back into the cause. I'll be able to donate it to people and those events, those things that I believe in, that will help perpetuate the message, the message being: Government, you have constitutional limits. You better start abiding by them.

Hmmmmm. It sounds like we're going to have to rely on Sarah's say-so when it comes to how she actually spends the money. Smells even more like Scam, doesn't it?

Of course, the whole scenario, as David Corn explored with Keith Olbermann last night, is developing into quite a fiasco -- mainly because Tea Partier and Birther J.D. Hayworth has decided to challenge Palin's former running mate, John McCain, in the Arizona Senate primary.

Palin is staying loyal to McCain. This has outraged the Tea Partiers, as Alan Colmes points out:

She has now chose to align herself with several bad actors. What should this be called, the Rinoization of Sarah Palin. [...]

She is certainly entitled to write a book and make money for her and her family, but other than what has she has done to support Republican and patriotic candidates. … Perhaps, Sarah was too busy talking to her agent about her Fox deal. Where the hell was Sarah?

This is what you get when you build a movement around paranoid right-wingers. There is probably no faction more historically famous for viciously turning on each other in struggles over money and power than right-wing populists.

Couldn't happen to a nicer bunch.

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So this is the GOP's Great White Hope. Oy.

Fox thinks so highly of its new "analyst" that it brought her on twice last night to "analyze" President Obama's speech, once before and then again afterward with Sean Hannity. In FoxNewsLand, "analyze" means "bash Democrats."

Of course, Palin wasn't speaking for the GOP -- she was speaking for herself, as usual. She claimed to be speaking for the long list of empty homilies she constantly recites -- "freedom", "free enterprise", "American people" -- that are obviously little more than rhetorical symbols to hold up and flash so that everyone thinks you're speaking.

But this is all part of the program to build her up as the GOP's 2012 tea-partying candidate. And this was even worse than Bobby Jindal's self-evisceration last February.

Fox News and Roger Ailes think they're building a candidate with this process. Looks to me like they're building the foundation for a monumental wipeout for the GOP. Hey, couldn't happen to a nicer bunch of people.

What struck me was the bigger problem Republicans are going to have in the next couple of elections: Their activist base is demanding that they refuse to compromise with Democrats. But the larger public wants them to cooperate. So which will it be?

The Tea Party folks like Palin are proceeding full steam ahead with their "purity test."

"It's the difference between success and defeat," Bopp said. "It's counterproductive for us to moderate our conservative message. ... We nominated the moderate's poster child, John McCain, for president. It's a prescription for defeat. What we have to do is be faithful to our conservative principles, and when we do we will win."

Palin was obviously on the side of the non-compromising Tea Partiers. In her interview with Hannity, she insisted: "No, we don't want to just chill a little bit and cool a little bit on his health-care plan. We want the thing killed!"

In other words, she was following the GOP prescription on health-care reform to date: "Our way or the highway!"

But all you have to do is look at the most recent NBC/Wall Street Journal poll [PDF file] to see that there's a problem with this:

7b. Do you generally approve or disapprove of the way that Republicans in Congress are handling the issue of health care reform?

Approve ............................... 26
Disapprove ............................ 64
Not sure................................ 10

What polls have consistently shown is that independent voters are angry because they believe both Republicans and Democrats need to set aside the partisanship and work together to get things done effectively in Congress. And they can see that Republicans have been completely unwilling to compromise or work with Democrats in any kind of constructive fashion.

Moreover, what the Tea Partiers and Sarah Palins out there are making plain is that they have no intention of setting aside the partisanship. It's their way or the highway.

No doubt the Tea Party movement is going to be installing a broad slate of Republican candidates in the coming election; indeed, it's looking like every Republican candidate on the planet is going to be at least paying lip service to their demands for purity.

So when the elections come around, all anyone will need to ask them is a simple question:

"Will you be willing to make compromises with Democrats and President Obama in order to effectively solve the nation's problems?"

If they answer yes, they're screwed with the Tea Party crowd. If they answer no, they're screwed with the rest of the voters.

Knowing Republicans, they will try to have it both ways. It will be up to the rest of us not to let them get away with it.

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Notice that peculiar odor arising from the news that Sarah Palin plans to speak at the National Tea Party Convention planned the first week of February in Nashville?

It's got the distinct whiff of a scam. Take, for instance, Palin's insistence last night on The O'Reilly Factor -- in her debut as a "Fox News Analyst" -- that "I will not be financially gaining anything from this".

Well, yeah, except for that $100,000 speaking fee. Palin insisted she was going to "turn it right back around and contribute to campaigns, candidates, and issues that will help our country."

Right.

But exactly what kind of movement is it that locks out the press and operates behind closed doors? As Dave Weigel says:

This really is unusual. As a journalist, I’ve been allowed into sessions, dinners, everything at conferences hosted by the Eagle Forum and by Focus on the Family. Extra credit to Eagle Forum here — when I was covering the How to Take Back America Conference in St. Louis, Phyllis Schlafly’s son Andy, an organizer, invited me away from my media seat and into a seat at his dinner table to chat with more activists. And some of the most controversial speakers at the National Tea Party Convention, like Rick Scarborough, happily chatted with me inside and outside of their sessions at previous events.

One major implication of this, of course, is that for the third time since the presidential election — the first at a speech in China, the second at a speech for a pro-life group in Indiana — Sarah Palin will give a political speech that members of the media are not allowed to attend.

The National Tea Party Convention is being largely spearheaded by Tea Party Nation, which styles itself an independent operation. But if you look at the list of speakers, among them is WorldNetDaily's Joseph Farah, who's keynoting the Friday dinner.

WND, you may recall, has been promoting an assortment of conspiracy theories about Obama, including the "Birther" theory and the claim that concentration camps are being planned for rounding up conservatives. (Weigel has more on this.)

Even the redoubtable Erick Erickson at RedState is sensing the odor:

I think the tea party movement has largely descended into ego and quest for purpose for individuals at the expense of what the tea party movement started out to be.

That’s not to say it is in every case. I have much good to say about groups like Tea Party Patriots, but I think this national tea party convention smells scammy.

Let me be blunt: charging people $500.00 plus the costs of travel and lodging to go to a “National Tea Party Convention” run by a for profit group no one has ever heard of sounds as credible as an email from Nigeria promising me a million bucks if I fork over my bank account number.

That scammy smell is what you get whenever you combine money and far-right wingnuttery.

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Mitt Romney, who is the GOP insiders' favorite to win the GOP nomination in 2012, went on Greta Van Susteren's show the other night to talk about how much better a job he would be doing than President Obama. But Greta also brought up the, um, *delicate* subject of the Tea Parties.

Of course, we're now becoming accustomed to the Romney flip and flop maneuver. He had it on display here.

First, he was for the Tea Parties ...

Romney: I think it shows a great deal of energy and passion on the part of the American people to say stop, we're going the wrong way, enough already, let's get things right in America. And America is headed in the wrong direction -- this growing government, the increase in taxes, the more intrusivesness of government has made a lot of people very angry, and they want to see change in Washington. They want to see the Washington politicians that have been voting for this kind of intrusive government thrown out of office. And I think it's a good thing. I think Washington politicians need to understand, there's a lot of focus and energy around what's happening, and people aren't going to take it a lot longer.

Afore he was agin' 'em ...

Romney: Well, if there were a third party, and a real intent to create a strong third party, that would obviously be very damaging to the party it drew the most votes from, and if it were a Tea Party party, why, that would certainly be from conservative Republicans. I don't think that's going to happen. I think people recognize right now we're not talking about politics, we're talking about the country.

This is a really critical time for the country, both globally and in terms of our safety and security, but also economically. And if we divide the conservative vote, and therefore hand over to the Democrats more years of single-party rule and Barack Obama another four years, we would have a very different country at the end of eight years of Obama rule.

And I don't think in the final analysis that anyone is going to put their personal political aspirations above the needs of the country.

Maybe I need to clean out my ears or something, but it sure sounded to me like he was saying that voting out Obama transcends politics -- it's a national-security issue. If that's what he said, well, wow.

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As much as Michael Steele is trying to suck up to the teabaggers, they aren't being seduced by his witless charm. IL Tea Party co-founder Steve McQueen is no fan of the RNC's Michael Steele and said as much to FNC's Neil Cavuto the other day.

Steele: There really was this big push on tea parties and if I weren't doing this job I'd be out there with the tea parties.
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CAVUTO: Retired Army Sergeant First Class and tea party activist Steve McQueen saying, “Not so fast Mr. Steele.” He joins me right now. Steve, you would say “not quite,” right?

MCQUEEN: Not quite, Neil. Actually the Tea Party is, I liken that to an army of Davids which I am only one. I do confer with Tea Party organizations all over the country so I feel confident that I understand what the movement’s about and as I understand it right now, the GOP is currently on probation with the American people and obviously you can’t be on probation and probably be a member of the Tea Parties at the same time.
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MCQUEEN: I'm saying that the last possibly a year specifically has been a time where I believe that the American, the conservative side of the American constituency has lost trust in all partisan politics and until we get that back on track. Until all candidates, all elected officials in our country are finding themselves in a place where they are representing the outrage the trampling of our constitution and until they are out there representing people in the actual views of American citizens they are going to be on indefinite probation with the American people.

There are great misconceptions about the tea partiers. The reason they are attacking the GOP is because they aren't as far right as they would like them to be. It's not out of anger about politicians being in the pockets of Corporations, but that they haven't bowed down enough to them.

McQueen says teabaggers are upset just by the GOP's behavior during the last year. Seriously? That's why they are mad. They should be praising these GOPers. Not a word about how Bush expanded the government or how he took the deficit to new heights or that Bush led us into two disgusting wars. Nope. As long as conservatives are in charge, Fox News would never have helped create them. It's that they aren't conservative enough. McQueen and his fellow teabaggers want fringe conservative values being represented to the max. And remember, we can't have brown people running around needing health care, we can't have regulations making sure Wall Street and others have rules to follow to protect Americans from their unfettered power and we can't have New Deal programs like Social Security messing with their lives.

In the end, the Tea Party people want to rule the GOP, as they've said before.

David Weigel at the Washington Independent dug up this photo of Dale Robertson, who heads up the would-be national Tea Party website TeaParty.org, with the sign he was carrying at the February 27, 2009 Tea Party in Houston.

According to Weigel, Robertson was eventually kicked out of the event for carrying the sign. But as with most right-wing populist movements, the most extreme elements are very determined to shape the movement in their direction, and will inevitably find ways to float to the top. Especially when the supposed mainstream "just folks" who populate much of the movement turn a willing blind eye to the extremists who increasingly are leading them.

As Weigel notes, Robertson has arranged a series of "Liberty Concerts" to help promote the Tea Party movement. An e-mail sent out to subscribers to news from ResistNet -- one of the major clearinghouses of Tea Party activist information -- described Robertson's plans:

Robertson is molding the Tea Party events to empower Citizens so they will make a difference in the November 2010 elections. The ongoing tactics are to prioritize States, creating a durable model for ballot access, voter eligibility, precinct chair/county chairs, and candidate awareness. The Tea Party is actively seeking candidates that represent Conservative Constitutional Values. It appears the Major Parties can’t get in step with such a complex idea as Conservative Constitutional Values; therefore, the Tea Party will make it easy for the Independent Parties to break the glass ceiling and get on the ballot.

The ‘Liberty Concerts’ event taking place in Stafford, Texas is a developing prototype, which when successful, will allow the Tea Party to create a thriving event not in months but days. We will be quick on the draw, sure fired and ready to rock in a matter of only a few days. This Tea Party formula will work against incredible odds and will be nothing short of a miracle, but Robertson believes with all his heart all the pieces will fall into place.

Does the Tea Party really believe it can make a difference in November? “Some say, “talk is cheap” but 2 years ago when I started the modern day Tea Party no one believed it could work now 7 million strong, the world is listening and America is hoping, we will not fail.” Dale Robertson – TeaParty.org

As Tars Tarkas notes, the folks at ResistNet put out a disclaimer of sorts:

This is in response to the blast mail you received regarding the Liberty Concert being promoted by the National Tea Party group. The purpose of the email was to share an opportunity for you to experience the fellowship and company of other conservatives, as we kick off the election season and strive to take back America, restoring it to the Constitutional Republic it is meant to be. While they are a separate group from us, we share many of the same goals, a free, conservative America, and fiscal responsibility within our government. We are not necessarily promoting their complete ideology.

It's hard to say why ResistNet is even bothering to distance itself; it is, after all, a site riddled throughout with extremists of various stripes, as suggested by its reference to "the Constitutional Republic" in its disclaimer. After all, this is a site that hosts a copy of Louis Beam's essay, "Leaderless Resistance," which was nothing less than the basic blueprint for forming cells of "citizen militias" and "lone wolf" domestic terrorists as the blueprint for action of the white-nationalist far right. Beam, you may recall, was a leader in the Aryan Nations.

This is a movement that is not only riddled throughout with far-right extremists, but is increasingly being led by them. And no doubt they'll keep producing reminders of that for us.