by Caitlin Huey-Burns

Tea Party Revolution
Tea Party Revolution (© Matt Wuerker)

Author Kate Zernike discusses Sarah Palin, Barack Obama, and the politics of the conservative protest movement

Three days before CNBC commentator Rick Santelli famously stood on the floor of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange in February 2009 and called for a modern-day Boston Tea Party protest of President Obama's proposal to help Americans with their mortgages, 29-year-old Keli Carender, feeling misrepresented by her government, held the first Tea Party rally in Seattle. About a hundred people, frustrated with Obama's stimulus plan, showed up.

Grassroots protests like Carender's were what spawned the Tea Party movement and set the agenda for the midterms, says New York Times journalist Kate Zernike. Zernike, author of Boiling Mad: Inside Tea Party America, recently talked about how the Tea Party will affect the new Congress and what members of the movement really think about Sarah Palin. Excerpts:

What is the makeup of the Tea Party?

It's an unlikely movement. Certainly polls say it's a movement made up of older people, but it actually starts with young people and, in particular, young conservatives and libertarians, who are all on Twitter.

What are the common misconceptions of the Tea Party?

That everyone is stark, raving mad or crazy. I think everyone thought of the Tea Partyers as sort of angry, white men, and while they do tend to be largely white, I found such a range of perspectives. There were young mothers; there were people in their 20s and 30s without children; and, of course, there were certainly elderly people who felt that in many ways this was a protest against a country they felt they no longer recognized.

What do you make of the criticism that the movement is a group of crazies or extremists?

I think it is a mistake to dismiss the Tea Party movement as crazy, and I think the biggest mistake that the left made was to assume that this was just all a bunch of noise. Because what the Tea Party proved in the midterm elections was that it was, in fact, all about organizing.

What can liberals learn from your book?

To not dismiss the Tea Party as so much ranting. And I think they should understand the way the Tea Party is organizing because, of course, if you don't agree with them, the best thing you can do is organize in opposition. But also they need to take the Tea Party seriously and argue with them on the basis of ideas.

How will the movement impact the new Congress?

The Tea Party movement has so far been a protest vote. They're very good at defining what they are against. The harder thing now will be to define what they are for. So I think in the short term it's going to be a lot of blocking the Obama administration's agenda, perhaps trying to reverse some of what they see as the work of the [Nancy] Pelosi Congress.

What do they really think of Sarah Palin?

People assumed Palin was the leader of the Tea Party movement, but when you talk to rank and file Tea Partyers, they say, "Well, Sarah Palin can be a Tea Partyer, but she's not the Tea Party leader." And in polls and in interviews, Tea Partyers say they don't necessarily think Palin is qualified to be president. In fact, they look much like other Americans on this score: They don't think she has the experience to be president. It's very early; that can change. But they talk about other people who look more presidential, who have more experience -- particularly experience dealing with the budget. They talk about Gov. Mitch Daniels of Indiana or Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey, or even [former Massachusetts governor] Mitt Romney. So I think they like Palin and her ability to rally people and to get people's attention, but they don't necessarily think that means she should be president.

What can Obama learn from this book?

The Tea Partyers are conservative Republicans; these are not people who were ever going to support Obama to begin with. But I do think that there is a sense, which appeals to people beyond the most hard-core Tea Partyers, of "this government is not listening to me, does not reflect my desires." This was a concern that spoke to a broad swath of Americans. So the Tea Party captured something there, the Tea Party spoke to that concern among people and I think that's important for the president and for the administration to understand.

Is it likely to be an enduring movement?

In my book, a number of people raise this comparison of how they were searching for the MoveOn.org of the right. And they really, consciously, modeled themselves on organizations on the left and, I think, in many ways that's actually the relevant comparison moving forward. I think the Tea Party ends up becoming an interest group within the Republican Party much the way that MoveOn is a pressure point within the Democratic Party. It becomes another voice pushing the Republican Party.

Available at Amazon.com:

Boiling Mad: Inside Tea Party America

Decision Points

Winner-Take-All Politics, How Washington Made the Rich Richer -- And Turned Its Back on the Middle Class

Jimmy Carter: The American Presidents Series: The 39th President, 1977-81

White House Diary

The Feminine Mystique

The Disappearing Center: Engaged Citizens, Polarization, and American Democracy

The Virtues of Mendacity: On Lying in Politics

Bush on the Home Front: Domestic Policy Triumphs and Setbacks

The Political Fix: Changing the Game of American Democracy, from the Grassroots to the White House

Revival: The Struggle for Survival Inside the Obama White House

Renegade: The Making of a President

Year of Meteors: Stephen Douglas, Abraham Lincoln, and the Election that Brought on the Civil War

 

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Inside the Tea Party Revolution | Politics

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