What Is Your Take On The Tea Party? Open Minded Modern Conservatives? Or Racist Homophobes?
A year ago Brandon Brice was one of the primary speakers at the tax day “tea party” rally in New York. The 27-year-old African American, who calls himself a hip-hop Republican, felt at home with the fairly diverse crowd of protesters.
Today, Brice says he is worried about the movement.
“It’s strayed away from the message of wasteful spending and Washington not listening to its constituents, and it’s become more of this rally of hate.”
Jean Howard-Hill, a moderate Republican who leads the National Republican African American Caucus, wrote that she is “not sure what’s in the cup of tea.”
Tension stems from reports of racial and homophobic slurs directed against black and gay members of Congress who voted to overhaul health care, from photos circulating on the Internet of signs raised at tea party protests with slogans such as “Obama Promotes White Slavery,” and the exhortation of a speaker at the group’s convention that voters should be subject to literacy tests.
“Any movement which cannot openly denounce racism, calling it out as wrong troubles me,” she wrote. “To attack President Obama on his policy is one thing, but to do so on his race or some hysterical pretext of socialism is yet another.”
