Alternatives needed to tea party puppets

The tea party understands what every gangbanger does — be rude to, over yell and over talk, those you want to intimidate.

They know if you ignore the rules of order, decorum and civility, you disrupt and overcome thoughtful conversation and debate. These tactics feed the drama and sound bite-driven media and has given a larger public presence to an otherwise minor part of the voting public.

CNN, which usually manages to rise above such drivel, recently announced it would co-sponsor a tea party debate. The answer to why they have chosen to wallow in that puddle is theirs to explain. For the other 95 percent of the electorate, who take choosing candidates seriously and who are not interested in people pledged to dismantle what our ancestors have built, will probably pass on that circus.

What has the tea party offered? Michelle Bachmann, who, with weekly pronouncements, steadily falls farther from reality and whose husband runs a pray-away-the-gay clinic, on the take for over $137,000 from Medicaid.

Rick Perry, who once supported climate change science and having Texas secede from the Union but is now against both. In addition, Perry claims to be a Christian but has a history of being notoriously fast applying Texas’ death penalties, making him, as governor, U.S. Grand Champ in the numbers of executions.

In addition, the tea party coolly supports Mitt Romney, who seems embarrassed for taking care of his Massachusetts constituents’ health with a program much like Obama’s program and which Mitt now wished to disavow in exchange for tea party favor.

Lest we forget brain trust Sarah Palin waits in the wings. The one thing they all have in common is being tea party puppets with no good plans of their own.

Wanted — one old-fashioned, principled Republican.

Gail Talbot

Huntley