The End of the Tea Party?

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     Over the past few days, I've been reading a sudden influx of articles about the end of the "populist" tea parties. These articles are reacting to the many troubles the Tea Party Convention seems to be having. Perhaps the convention organizers are beginning to find out that it's easy to be angry but it's difficult to organize that anger into a legitimate political force.
     Of course, the same people who are saying that the party is over are the same people who said that the Republican Party was dead after the election of 2008. Instead, in the major political races within the last 5 months, the Republicans have made a clean sweep, including two governorships, a mayoral race in the largest city in America, & the senate seat of the man who was the Liberal Lion of the Senate for over 50 years.
     There may be a little truth to this death theory, though. Within the last few days, President Obama has been sounding like a populist. He's been going hard after the banks & has now even ordered a bipartisan committee to attack the outrageous federal deficit. If the President's latest tone catches on, the Tea Party people may be backed into a corner.

Ebony Power 150

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     A couple of months ago, Ebony Magazine put out its issue of the 150 most powerful African Americans in the country. There were the obvious people on the list. President & Mrs Obama, Jay Z, Beyonce, etc. However, there were two names that I believe were purposely left off of the list, mainly due to their conservative politics.
     Michael Steele is the chairman of the Republican party. Think about this for a minute. A Black man is the head of the Republican party. That means that Black men are the leaders of the two biggest political parties in America. Only one made Ebony's list, though.
     The other man who's missing from this list is Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. He's the only African American on the most powerful court in America. Yet, he doesn't make the Power 150.
     I'm not a big fan of either of these two men; far from it. However, Ebony should respect the fact that both men made it to posts that African Americans had only dreamed about not too many years ago. Both deserve to be on Ebony's list. Shame on Ebony for not even considering them.

The Sotomayor Hearings

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This week, the Senate Juditiary Committee will begin the confirmation hearings to appoint Judge Sotomayor to the U.S. Supreme Court. Here are the two things that you can basically expect:
1. A LOT of long winded speeches disguised as questions. Senators have a time limit & expect them to use ALL of it.
2. Republicans to try to tarnish Judge Sotomayor's reputation. This is the part I find funny. If you speak about how proud you are of your race, you are accused of being racist. If Justice Scalia decided to speak about how proud he is of being Italian, I wonder how many people would complain? Actually, a lot of people.
Racial politics is a blood sport. These hearings will just take it to another level. The republicans even have one of the white fire fighters who won an appeal on a case that Judge Sotomayor was judging testifying against her. That's the first time I've ever heard that being done.
Republicans will use these hearings as part of their Party of No strategy. They will twist every word that Judge Sotomayor has ever written or said to their advantage. Their reason is simple & twofold. First, it's payback to the democrats for all of the justices that George W. Bush nominated & the democrats tried to disgrace. Second, this is the republicans' only option because they don't have the votes to stop the judge's confirmation.
If you enjoy a lot of blowhards bickering with each other & destroying someone's reputation, then this is definitely your week. You hear Sotomayor explain "wise latina woman" so many times, it'll make your ears bleed. It'll keep the cable "news" networks busy & talking about something other than Michael Jackson FINALLY. It'll keep every so-called expert employeed for another week. In the end, though, she'll be nominated unless she didn't pay her social security taxes or something stupid like that. Personally, I think we'd all be better off with a steel cage grudge match between her & the republican senators. My money's on Sotomayor.

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Why So Shocked?

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I must say, I'm very shocked that people are being so critical of Sarah Palin for resigning from the governorship of Alaska. After all, nobody screamed when Minnesota governor Pawlenty decided not to run again. This is a pretty schrewd thing to do right now for many reasons:

1. For starters, she's going to run for president in 2012. Why would she want to continue being governor right now?

2. Once she announced that she wasn't going to run for reelection, that made her a lame duck. Might as well just give it up now.

3. She can now go & do a lot of things like fundraising & speeches for other politicians or even herself.

4. Most importantly, she has a book coming out. This will definitely sell it. Plus, the will she or won't she run questions will sell just a few more copies.

People who count her out & say that she's imploded haven't looked at a calendar. It's July of 2009. The presidential primaries don't start until January of 2012. People who underestimate either Sarah Palin or the republican party do so at their own peril.

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