He Is What the Tea Party Movement Is Made Of. . .

Forums: Tea Party, Politics, U S Politics, Mining, Blankenship
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Don Blankenship, the CEO of Massey Energy, blasts Reid and Pelosi as "greeniacs," while his company spent millions to defend its right to spew "coal dust on nearby schoolchildren" and the unions are kept out of its mines.

According to Crooksandliars.com:

Don Blankenship inhabits a strange and bizarre world. In his world:

It's fine for elementary school-age children to inhale coal dust while playing at school because Massey Coal "already pays millions of dollars in taxes each year".
Blankenship truly believes that government regulation means "we all better learn to speak Chinese."
He has absolutely no problem paying $3 million to elect state Supreme Court justice Brent Benjamin just ahead of a scheduled hearing of his appeal to overturn a large damage award for driving competitor Harman Mining Corporation into bankruptcy.
Blankenship will spend millions to keep the Massey Energy's workforce non-union, is perfectly happy to discriminate against union workers even if it means being sued and losing, and might hate unions as much as he hates 'greeniacs'.

To read for yourself: http://crooksandliars.com/karoli/massey-energy-don-blankenship-million-dolla

All this went on while his own compensation increased beyond what a person can normally spend in a decade, let alone a year. More here: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=126072828

Blankenship and his ilk are the true enemies, not just of America, but of humanity and the planet. I know the right is foaming at the mouth, waiting to defend this man . . . but he is despicable . . . and a typical right wing extremist whose hallmark phrase is "me! me! me!'

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If the GOP wants to champion free enterprise and deregulation, they had better at minimum explain why practices like this (which aren't even rare) are a justifiable collateral.

Typical **** really
K
O

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@plainoldme,

Sorry but most of the tea party members are not rich owners of coal mines but upper middle class white males being used by such people.

They earn enough money and have enough medical insurance that they are free to look down on others who does not and they fear greatly that the government will play a zero sum game and removed their means and share that with the classes below them.

In the south in the 1930s to 50s they would have been members of the KKK for example fearing blacks gaining a share of the pie at their expense.

The game is very rigs in this society where 1/2 percent of the population have roughly half the wealth and in order to maintain their position they need the middle class to fear the lower classes.

They need the middle class to worry about a welfare queen taking 20,000 or 30,000 out of their pocket every year and not see or worry about the upper class stealing hundreds of billions out of the economic with special deals/bills they write themselves and then have their pay for congressmen pass.

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Don't see the connection to the tea party though...

Tea?
K
O

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@Diest TKO,

It's in the first link . . . he's one of the funders.

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@plainoldme,

He is an example of someone making used the tea party movement.

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This:

Here’s something else about Don Blankenship and Massey Energy Company: Blankenship spent over $1 million dollars along with other US Chamber buddies like Verizon to sponsor last year’s Labor Day Tea Party, also known as the “Friends of America Rally.” Here’s Massey’s pitch. Note how he makes it sound like he isn’t one of the corporate enemies of America.

can be sourced here:

http://blogs.alternet.org/speakeasy/2010/04/07/ceo-of-mine-where-25-workers-were-killed-is-a-teabagger/

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@Diest TKO,

Diest TKO wrote:

Don't see the connection to the tea party though...

Tea?
K
O

nor do I, I see the tea baggers as just another poipulist movement made of a variety of people dissatisfied with life as they perceive it, most of them totally justified in the perceptions, combined with a few total wackos in search of a mission.

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@BillRM,

He is representative of the attitude behind the movement.

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@plainoldme,

Any proof, professor? Should we appeal to YOUR authority on this subject?

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@dyslexia,

I do not see them as a populist movement but a recruited movement. I still populism through the lens of the '60s, when guys who wanted to wear bell bottoms, slashed their jeans and inserted triangular cuts from their worn madras shirts in them. Populism comes from below . . . the picketers in this case are not leaders but the led.

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@plainoldme,

I guess you wouldn't see Ross Perot as "populist" either but I would.

1 Reply

@dyslexia,

dyslexia wrote:

I guess you wouldn't see Ross Perot as "populist" either but I would.

From today's Washington Post:

Quote:

For those in the movement, "the deficit is a symbol of the mess in Washington." They are "deeply anti-political" and hold "deep antipathy to Congress." They are "anti-government and anti-establishment."

Sound familiar? Those words could easily be applied to the "tea party" movement that has elbowed its way to the front lines of American politics in the past year. In fact, they were written 17 years ago in a Democratic Leadership Council study of Ross Perot supporters

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@plainoldme,

plainoldme wrote:

a typical right wing extremist whose hallmark phrase is "me! me! me!'

Yeah; that is the natural thing to think and say! I 'll STIPULATE TO THAT.

Other than that is perverted.

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@dyslexia,

A friend who is a history professor and I had a long talk about politics, the Tea Totalitarians, the economy, how people do not realize that capitalism is an economic system and democracy is a political philosophy and more.

We both feel that the Tea Baggers are neither a movement nor populist in origin.

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@OmSigDAVID,

I am proud of you for admitting that you are a Me!ME! MEEEE!!! person. I think of that every time I read one of your posts.

Particularly the one in which you excused plastic bags because they feel good in your hand.

You are drawn to lethal items.

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@plainoldme,

plainoldme wrote:

I am proud of you for admitting that you are a Me!ME! MEEEE!!! person.
I think of that every time I read one of your posts.

Particularly the one in which you excused plastic bags because they feel good in your hand.

You are drawn to lethal items.

When I was 7, before I acquired my first functional gun,
I made knives. I had other ones anyway, but I made some too.

David

1 Reply

@OmSigDAVID,

Quote:

When I was 7, before I acquired my first functional gun,
I made knives. I had other ones anyway, but I made some too.

My lord that sure sound like a child far far too dangerous to be around and who should had been shipped of to Russia!

At least the child in the news did not throw a knife at his adopted mother.

1 Reply

@plainoldme,

plainoldme wrote:

I am proud of you for admitting that you are a Me! ME! ` MEEEE!!! person.
I think of that every time I read one of your posts.

Its not just admitting it, Plain: its more like PROUDLY PROCLAIMING IT, with enthusiasm.
I loved the 1980s, presided over by Ronald Reagan!
I encourage EVERYONE to adopt that point of vu.

Its NATURAL !

David

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I still think the point here is not that this guy is what the Tea Party is made up of. He might be a part of the financial backing, but I think that is a different point all together.

The relevance of the Tea Party in this is that the public should be dispelled of any notion that this is a grassroots operation organized by concerned citizens.

This rich asshole doesn't even have to agree with them, really. All he has to do is recognize their ability to be a hassle for the Democrats, and then fund the circus they create. People like this are on nobody but their own side.

T
K
O

1 Reply

He Is What the Tea Party Movement Is Made Of. . .

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