•Minnesota to Hold Tax Cut Rally Saturday May 2

"Minnesota and the nation need you and your neighbors to show up in force Saturday, May 2 in St. Paul so that the tax and spenders can get the message loud and clear: not one more dime."

~Sincerely, Jason Lewis, Organizer of Minnesota Tax Cut Rally

The tax rally will have food, refreshments, music, activities for children and prizes for the best signs. Also, vendor boothes, and other points of interest.

Please register ahead in order for them to gauge the turnout and to be kept in the loop of rally-related updates.

Bring the family, enjoy the day with a group of concerned citizens, and know you are standing up to preserve this great Republic.

Much more information at the Minnesota Tax Cut Rally Website.

Steve Richards who gave us the report of the Rochester Minnesota Tea Party will be attending this one and here is what he has to say:

I feel another streaming video coming on. Excited? You bet! I get off-air myself at 10am, and then, I'm heading north to St... Paul.

I'm thrilled that Pawlenty is speaking! He is truly one of the rising-stars!

Minnesota Tax Cut Rally Schedule, including Minn. Governor Tim Pawlenty to speak.

Minnesota Tax Cut Rally Contests, they have all sorts of fun things planned.
(I foresee another photo-stream on the horizon)

Have a great weekend!
-Steve, Train Wreck Radio Blog

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Congressional Credit Card Image by Jenci Spradlin at Tea Party

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• Ricky Cain on Lansing, Michigan Tea Party

Ricky Cain doesn't seem to fit the news media's description of who attended the tea parties on April 15th. This is Cain's story of the day:

His Belief's

I am a libertarian and I voted for Barr. I'm more libertarian in a stance that is more pro state than vs. pro-government. As the general saying forgoes kind of what the protest was about; if everyone is bailing out these companies and they are printing money it contributes to inflation. I am standing against the bail-outs from my retro points. I’m not a politician, I can’t really judge...I can’t say what would be a better use of tax money, but my stance is to keep our money and let us decide where to use our tax money for the state and as individuals.

I come from a lovely state that is tax friendly. I would say in a federal sense we pay less. But, in Michigan everything is more and more tax. For instance, car insurance went up sixty percent. Jennifer Graholm, the governor of Michigan is very social program oriented. The higher taxes went to pay for her food stamps programs and the social programs that she goes for. She has increased the social programs budget and in doing so she had to increase the taxes.

Another thing, property taxes went up thirty-one percent, but yet, the value of my home went down. It was appraised at $150k two years ago and it is pry worth $90k now. Of course for me, I can understand where the property value went down, but the property taxes going up are not proportionate; incongruent.

The Lansing Tea Parties

I can tell you from me being there, the state tea party seemed like a lot of conservatives there...like a lot of Republicans there. It didn’t seem so biased as there were a lot of people who may have been Republican's and they were the ones organizing it.

The local one, by the county was organized by the county and that tea party seemed so scripted. I knew a few friends who were doing it, and you know, how you go to protest there is aliveness? The state one had more energy to it, there wasn’t that aliveness to the county, it was more scripted in a sense.

There were at least 100 people at the county tea party and I heard 3,000 to 6,000 were at Lansing, Mich. Not sure on the numbers, PJTV will be able to verify later how many. Which, getting those kinds of numbers here is amazing because this is very democratic and liberal territory.

I was surprised at the number of people who showed up. It was said that many people haven’t come out for this kind of protest since the 70s. I can’t think of anything that would have brought that many people out in the 70s around here.

About Litter?

I didn’t stay long enough for the capitol tea party to see if there was any litter left behind. There wasn't any while I was there. For the county one there wasn’t much left behind of litter, there may have been a few things left behind.

I can’t say for the state one I wasn’t there long enough I would say the atmosphere was very hospitable and friendly for some rallies they always have their mantras with is the energy i was talking about

I didn’t see any crazies, it wasn’t like anything like so anti-government they weren’t advocating anarchy

The state capitol and the county weren’t the only tea parties, either. There was one in Troy, Mich. and Taylor, Mich. They are maybe about an hour’s drive from state capital. Plus, there were seven or more little tea parties around the state capitol.

Favorite Signs

Some of them had the Obama acronyms, I took a few pics of them.

I like the "Don’t Tread on Me" the most out of them all.

Ricky’s Background

I am 23. I consider myself a computer geek or techie. I am an entrepreneur in the sense that I do my own computer business, I run a solo gig fixing computers in my little town. I can also do remote support now. I am a very a one person-minded, mellow tech guy.

Ricky Cain can be contacted at http://caintechservices.com

And, for those of you who would like to see what really happened instead of the biased ??news?? version:

Videos

For the Lansing Tea Party here are some videos I took.
When you are on the first part click the More info. I have links to part 2, 3 and 4. I must say, It wasn't excellent camera work. But, it shows how many people were there and I am sure one day, it would have historical value.

Thank you Ricky.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0yrPMf69bCs

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• The Fabulous Michelle Malkin

Michelle Malkin is one of the catalysts in giving root to the Tea Parties. She is the epitome' of the F word.

Funny, Factual, and Fundamental--meaning she serves as an original and generating source of assisting us to remember our basic principles when things get muddy, murky, and downright dirty and still have a sharp sense of humor backed up with the facts and the proof.

This page is dedicated to her brilliance and is filled with her blogs, articles and articles of others she found of interest. It also has some of her snippets from Twitter and other random funnies. She is entertaining, educational and evokes emotion in many.

You can click on all the blue links to go to the actual columns and read more about it. Again, these are snippets for your convenience.

Million Taxpayer March

This is a teachable moment for GOP public relations peddlers in Washington. While they search for the Holy Grail of Re-branding in tony salons and country club conferences, the agenda for 2010 is smacking them in the face. It's the three T's, stupid: Too Many Taxes, Trillions in Debt, and Transparency.

As one of the most popular Tea Party signs read: "You can't fix stupid, but you can vote it out."


You Might Be a "Radicalized Right-Wing Extremist" If…

Department of Homeland Security Sec. Janet Napolitano has turned her attention away from acts of Islamic jihad on American soil (which she now refers to as "man-caused disasters"). Instead to...

"Right-wing extremist chatter on the Internet continues to focus on the economy, the perceived loss of U.S. jobs in the manufacturing and construction sectors, and home foreclosures," the assessment warns.

The SPLC, you see, has designated the venerable American Legion a "hate group" for its stance on immigration enforcement.


Snippets from Malkin

Around 3000 at second Greenville, South Carolina tea party, practically booed Republican Gresham Barrett off stage.

NBC-DC website runs leftist spoof video of tea party as real thing for two days and counting. This article is by Amy Ridenour and copy of the video NBC-DC was running as a 'true' news video is on Eric the Red on his Vocal Minority blog.


Sixteen-Year-Old Rocks Philly

Friday fun: Conservative rebels in blue jeans

From George Will, the weirdest comment of the week:
“Denim is the carefully calculated costume of people eager to communicate indifference to appearances.”

Photo credit: Scott Ableman

Malkin's Advice? People in yellow pants shouldn’t throw stones.

Here’s hoping Will is cured of his intellectual wedgie soon.

Oh, and my prescription for what ails him in the above photo: A pair of Genuine Wrangler’s Loose Fit Jeans.

Malkin Found the Tidbit Below. The Video of Susan Roesgen is at CNN Reporting News of Tea Party.

Partied-Out CNN Reporter Takes a Break

Two days after Susan Roesgen's much talked-about Chicago Tea Party live shots, we are learning more about what happened off-camera.

Sources close to the situation tell TVNewser as Roesgen was reporting her 2pmET live shot for CNN, she heard shouts from the crowd including "Damn CNN" and "Shut up, bitch."

As we now know, Roesgen wrapped up the live shot, saying "I think you get the general tenor of this," that it was "not really family viewing" from an "Anti-CNN" crowd.

Our source says Roesgen received an avalanche of email messages, some supportive, and some "vitriolic with crude insults."

CNN denies reports that Roesgen's email was shut down. A spokesperson tells TVNewser many people were emailing what they believed to be Roesgen's CNN account, but it was actually a non-existent inbox. Her email account was and continues to be active.

So far Roesgen is not talking publicly about the situation. CNN tells us she's now on a previously-planned vacation.

Click continued to see a longer version of Wednesday's 2pmET live shot...

• Related: Gawker reports Roesgen twice applied for a job at "the right-wing conservative network Fox."

James Wolcott: Beclowned

By Michelle Malkin • April 16, 2009 12:09 PM

Watch this. Liberal toady James Wolcott argues that since he didn’t see big Tea Party crowds on his favorite left-wing tv stations and didn’t read front-page stories about the protests in his favorite left-wing newspapers, they weren’t newsworthy and no one really turned out except at the ones Fox News covered. C-SPAN host Susan Swain then displays front page after front pa

ge of local news coverage showing thousands of Tea Party participants:

“Does that change your view?” [Video of Wolcott is on Malkin's website]

Wolcott: Er, no.

What is the difference between Anderson Cooper and

Matt Taibbi?

By Michelle Malkin • April 16, 2009 04:36 PM

Does internationally respected, award-winning CNN journalist Anderson Cooper feel any shame in the fact that he dragged David Gergen down with him to get in his cheap shot at hundreds of thousands of Tax Day Tea Party protesters?

250,000 Americans assemble peacefully to protest high taxes, massive spending, and endless bailouts, and all the liberal media can do for a week is recycle each other’s lame teabagging jokes on prime time TV?

[Read More..Vulgar Matt Taibbi Words and Cooper's Video]

Stop blaming Bush for DHS hit job

By Michelle Malkin • April 17, 2009 12:02 PM

Ed Morrissey nails the buck-passers on the DHS rightwing extremism assessment:

First, while the Bush administration might have wanted an assessment of right-wing extremist threats, it didn’t necessarily want one that painted returning veterans and conservative thought on abortion, illegal immigration, and federalism as extremist threats, nor did it want a threat assessment that couldn’t find a threat and had no data on actual, specific groups. Secondly, and most obviously, this report was dated April 7, 2009, almost 3 months after Bush left office.

Just when does the new administration take responsibility for reports they release? 2013? For people who thought Bush was such a dunce, they seem to give him remarkable powers to control government months after he’s retired to Crawford....[Read More DHS Hit Job]

Obama Census Plan: No Illegal Alien Left Behind

The fate of $300 billion in federal funding -- and, most importantly, the apportionment of congressional seats -- rest in their hands. As for "privacy rights," it's not your privacy rights they care about. It's the privacy rights of millions of illegal aliens, whose advocates have enshrined for them a sacred right never to be questioned about their immigration status...[More on This-another thing he disreagards-89% of population do not want illegal aliens in our country]

And, Her Number One Favorite Sign of the day

By Michelle Malkin • April 13, 2009 05:10 PM

Leslie at Temple of Mut blogged the San Diego Tea Party this weekend and took a pic of my favorite sign of the day:

If you are a grass-roots activist who believes in fiscal accountability and transparency, you see a protester who is sending a clear message to the Chicken Littles in both parties in Congress: No more bailout/spending legislation without deliberation!

If you are a race-obsessed leftist like Geraldo Rivera, all you can see is a “person of color” who must have been brainwashed into holding the sign!

MalTwitisms

Can't get the Tax & Spend Rap outta my head.

My friend T. Hayes, who made the Chuck "Let them eat pork" Schumer pic, has a new site. Gr8 #teaparty signs: http://bit.ly/v21qe #tco

Of course. They're not about him. RT: @allahpundit Obama is "unaware" of tea parties http://is.gd/sBgq (via @Slublog)

Favorite tea party sign: 'Went to bed a conservative, woke up a threat to national security.' (via @Slublog)

More Tea Party signs: "Obama Help Me...They want me to work and Stuff!" (via @onpointcoach)

Gov taxinator mentioned here in Sacto. Huge boos.

Janet Napolitano goes on an Extremist Makeover media tour http://bit.ly/Zqm2J #tcot

RT @JTlol: The Beavis & Butt-head of News: http://tr.im/j2Y5 The great @battonl does it again!| Shame on @andersoncooper

Another Gorestorm here in Colorado. Ugh.

Greeley CO sheriff receives bomb threat 4 jailing illegal aliens. Paging Napolitano. Oh, never mind. http://bit.ly/18FkUZ #tcot

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• Stephen Kruiser 'America Needs Me' on Van Nuys, California Tea Party

A Tea Party Day and Night for Stephen

My impression was a little different than most, PJTV had me doing the live tweeting things. I was involved with naysayers all day; it was interesting. Mostly people from the left, I kept trying to phrase it as non partisan ad I could, which is very unusual because I am very partisan.

The tone started to shift because I had to keep hammering on this all day, "Look I’ve been involved in this since February and there is no funding or no talking points." They kept saying, "Look,"…I said, "You are calling me a liar now?"

There were a lot of people who thought it was a GOP thing. I talked about the picture Tammy Bruce posted online where people were mad at both sides. Then a Republican politician tried to speak and people refused him to be a speaker.

That was the struggle for me all day, while watching the numbers, as they got bigger, it was easier to dismiss. The tea parties in the East were mostly during work or at lunch—the numbers weren’t good, it was hammering rain, etc. After people got off work, the numbers started getting better. As the numbers started shifting, the naysayers got better, lighter. I'm not saying there is a correlation, it's just the way it happened.

The day did have an election type feel at first, slow and boring--not much coming out of the polling booths. As things closed in the East and started opening across the country, it started looking better.

There were a couple of people who were generally surprised that they ended up in agreement. I said, "Look this is about taxation and spending, even if you believe the government should have a role, you can’t really be happy with how the government is spending the money."

As the day wore on, this being an evil right wing thing started wearing out, it was easy to keep disproving it with all of the unsubstantiated things. In LA we didn’t have that because instead of having one big centralized tea party we had it all over. LA is a pain to get around in. Orange County, Inland Empire, in the Valley, San Diego...the one in Orange County appeared to be pretty significant, pretty large. The Van Nuys was the only one I attended last night and there were 900 to 1200 people. And, we had a late last minute change of venue.

We were getting royally hosed with permits. One of our organizers, who knows how to work the channels pretty well, got the run around all day long Monday. Then, late that afternoon, he ended up with the same guy who sent him on the goose chase in the early morning. The cops said, look if it's peaceful we don’t start looking for things like that.

[Editor's note: This is the third party I have heard of that had difficulties getting their permits. The Treasury Department (you know, the one that is storing ALL of OUR $$$$) pulled the permit for Washingtonian's tea party.]

We had some people who were pretty enthusiastic. We had cars that kept honking and honking and honking; it sounded like a wedding--like when they drive away. Only it went on constantly. You can’t say they attended, but you get the feeling they were supporting us. I tried to get someone to pull the audio, it was a nice impression. That honking was just relentless, the whole time we were there.

A Few Favorite Signs:

• The Constitution, the Other Document They Didn’t Read.
• Don’t Tax Me Bro—I thought of this line before the last Tea Party, and posted it on twitter, they got it out to other cities, today I got photographs from Tennessee, etc. It was really gratifying personally.
• There was a kid holding a sign; Eight-Years-Old and $36,000 in Debt.
• Don’t Tax All My Money, I’m Only 10, I haven’t Earned it All, Yet.
• New Dog in the Whitehouse, Same Pigs in Congress.
• One had a picture of George Washington, it simply said, DUDE...cracked me up.

Sadly, I didn’t see any inspired ones at Van Nuys.

I was speaking about Prop 1A at the rally. In cities like San Francisco, Los Angeles, New York, the people on the right are so used to being marginalized. I live, basically, in Santa Monica--I am in Henry Waxman’s district down here and I don’t even know if I’ve met another Republican here. I've met a few of them online, but have never seen them in person.

The Press

We had someone from NBC show up—they didn’t have anyone interviewing, just getting footage to show. There was someone from LA Times—don’t know if we identified anyone from LA Daily News, which is odd, since it's the Valley paper. They may have gone to some of the other tea parties.

I thought CNN headline news had a story in there, they rotate stories everyhalf-hour, which seemed to be okay, but you know there was that thing in Chicago where the CNN woman came unhinged. Michelle Malkin showed a thing where that same reporter was at a protest against Bush, they were saying and doing all sorts of crazy things and she wasn’t at all upset about that.

Fox news was at the huge rally in Sacramento. They say Fox News was getting the Tea Parties together, but the other news media could have gone out. I get frustrated when they do over advocate, like the CNN woman—but, it’s kind of like people who have weird relationship with their parents. You hope it changes, but it never does. I am never going to hope that they get on board, if we happen to get some big time left wing people on board they may move, but if we keep it up, and keep doing it they can’t dismiss it. It won’t go away.

About Stephen Kruiser

I run a blog called 'America needs Me.'

I have been a standup comic as my job most of my life. In college, a guy I knew from high-school and we became friends in college, he inspired me to start at a comedy club with him. He quit after awhile and I kept doing it. I've also written an EBook on how to get into standup and have been blogging for a long time, for a political website. And, I have written for other comics.

Stephen's Tweetisms from Twitter (Voyeurism into one-side of a conversation)

• To @pinkelephantpun: See? @heytammybruce is following u and not me. And I sleep w/ her books under my pillow. Told ya u were a rock star.
• Just had my hair chopped off. Permanent state of bedhead at the moment. Ought 2 look ridiculous on camera tomorrow.
• All of my friends & family in AZ are glad the state has been cured of Napolitano. She's a national plague now.
• You did a good job w/that. He has that Lanny Davis/Carville disease so he can only repeat 1 or 2 misleading talking points.
• I'm not wearing any pants right now.
• Be honest, how many real conservatives do you interact with on a regular basis?
• ABC News reported that the president is "unaware" of tea party protests. Has any1 seen that reported elsewhere?
• This isn't an either or thing. U like excessive gov't spending and taxes?
• Real news? As if that exists. I'll ask u too: Ru a big fan of out of control spending and excessive taxation?
• I'm gonna make ALL kinds of friends today.
• Let me 'splain: taxes & spending r American issues, not "left or right" issues.
• Thank u for that important Obama dog news. Perhaps we can hear about Michelle's arms & fashion sense now!
• Pants back on now.
• How the hell can any rational person be FOR taxes & wasteful spending?!?!?!?
• In all my yrs of being politically active I've never seen "common sense spending."
• Have u ever paid ANY attn to how that $ is actually spent? Appropriation & wise spending don't go hand-in-hand.
• The opportunities in this country are a by-product of the Constitution as a whole, not taxes.
• I must say, my deodorant is fabulous today.
• I know, facts are difficult for the parallel universe people.
• U haven't noticed an across-the-board lack of fiscal responsibility on the Hill for the last several years? Seriously?
• RepubliCONS? Original. For a 4th grader.
• Boxer-briefs, for those of you who were curious.
• The name-calling lets me know that I'm on the right track.

And...the day rolled on from there, many more conversations were had with people who hate the Tea Parties...And, that my friends is another day in the life of Stephen Kruiser.

All Images Courtesy Stephen Kruiser, 1. Kruiser explaining right wing hand gestures. 2. Sign at Tea Party by Michael Leahy. 3. Kruiser with Tea Party attendee and signs, Don't tax me Bro.

Interview by Dawn Bonner, Editor in Chief

Living Life….Boomer Style
Most Obnoxious Blog
Music and Entertainment News Blog
Tea Party Blog

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