The political Quote of the Day is actually a pair of quotes dealing with yesterday’s conservative Republican tea parties held throughout the country.
Marc Ambinder sees it this way:
The of tea-party enthusiasm on the American right has provoked a fairly typical reaction from the organized American left. It’s a fake. It involves tea bags and (a) Dick Armey. It’s got the consistency of astroturf, not natural grass. The right, meanwhile, has responded ferociously to the charges that the parties were organized au naturelle by closing ranks, claiming themselves the inheritors of a intellectual tradition beginning with Rosseau through Thomas Pain through Hayek. The right looks more ridiculous than the left at this point, if only because conservatives don’t have much muscle memory when it comes to protesting en masse. But the tea parties really are something. Their origins — organic, programmatic, accidental or otherwise — don’t matter much anymore. If — and we’ll have to see the numbers at the end of the day — 100,000 Americans show up to protest their taxes, the onus to dismiss them as a nascent political force shifts to the Democrats. There’s no evidence that official Republican strategists connected with the Republican National Committee, John Boehner’s office or the NRSC had the insight to conceive of these events, much less to try and bigfoot the organizers.
…. But I also think that we’re too obsessed with the distinction between the top and the bottom of a blade of grass. At some point, critical mass is reached and astroturf campaigns can work — they can catalyze genuine anger and channel it into meaningful political participation.
And Pajamas Media’s Jennifer Rubin sees some political potential — and danger –for the GOP:
But Republicans should not be rejoicing quite yet. Many protesters went out of their way to say they are upset with both parties and hold George W. Bush equally responsible for launching the now never-ending stream of bailouts. And the crowd, if anything, was libertarian in bent rather than conservative. These people are advocating less government, restraints on federal power, and a return to “constitutional government.” Social conservatives who seek expansion of state power on issues from abortion to support for faith-based programs may find themselves at odds with a newly invigorated movement to shrink government and enhance individual liberty.
It is not clear whether this is the making of a new political party or a flash in the pan. What it does show is that the absence of a single Republican leader does not hinder some impressive grassroots organizing. It also shows that young conservatives, who were out in abundance in Lafayette Park even in the pouring rain, do know how to organize through new media including Twitter. And it shows that for conservatives and libertarians, the Obama presidency is a powerful organizing tool. Just as the Left coalesced in opposition to George W. Bush, these activists are, to a large extent, acting out of resentment and anger toward the president and Democratic congressional leaders.
The proof will be in the pudding. If we see an influx of new candidates, activists, and volunteers stemming from the tea party movement, Wednesday will be seen as a significant day in modern political history and new media-based organizing. If the activists go home, never to be seen again, then the day will recede in memory as another failed attempt to shake the political status quo. Stay tuned.
Joe Gandelman is a former fulltime journalist who freelanced in India, Spain, Bangladesh and Cypress writing for publications such as the Christian Science Monitor and Newsweek. He also did radio reports from Madrid for NPR’s All Things Considered. He has worked on two U.S. newspapers and quit the news biz in 1990 to go into entertainment. He also has written for The Week and several online publications, did a column for Cagle Cartoons Syndicate and has appeared on CNN.